Dumping Milk from the Treadmill of Production
Over 43 million gallons of milk has been dumped into manure pits and fields the first eight months of 2016. There is too much of it. Yet milk…
Tag: Technology
Do Mobile Phones Set Citizens Free?
In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, mobile phones are being used in many different ways for many different reasons—from oppression to liberation. PAPY MULONGO/AFP/Getty Images Today …
Web Roundup: Photography and Visual Tech by Lily Shapiro
This month’s Web Roundup is focused loosely around the theme of the visual. How do we use photography and other mediums to tell stories, and what stories do…
Lecture: Visuelle Anthropologie in Zeiten zunehmender Digitalisierung
Vorlesung “Visuelle Anthropologie in Zeiten zunehmender Digitalisierung“, Wintersemester 2016/17, am Institut für Kultur- und Sozialanthropologie der Universität Wien Philipp Budka Ziele D…
Concept map: Ethnographie des Cyberspace (nach Ackermann, 2000)
Diese Concept Map visualisiert die wesentlichsten Punkte einer “Ethnographie des Cyberspace” nach Ackermann (2000). “Für die Ethnologie sind die sozialen Phänomene des Cyberspace ins…
Forget Not the Mighty Zipper
The Denver Museum of Nature & Science (DMNS) curates a beautiful fur parka from Barrow, Alaska. The body and hood are made of muskrat fur; the hood is…
Resource: Transitioning from high school to post-secondary education
Many students struggle with culture shock as they make the transition between high school and post-secondary education. New freedoms for many students living away from home for the…
Burning incense | 烧香
One month ago I happened to drop by Basement6 right on time for the opening of a solo exhibition by Shangainese artist 许聪 Xu Cong called Technological Spectacle…
Animal Trafficking Is Big Business on Instagram
Social media platforms can be used to perpetuate the trafficking of animals and animal products such as bear bile, which is commonly harvested from Asiatic black bears. Lee…
Lost or Found? A Stick Chart From the Marshall Islands
In a recent blog post, I focused on the Global Positioning System (GPS) and mused on how we ever got along without high-tech navigational aids. GPS units became…
The Birth of Indonesia’s Cyber Village
In Yogyakarta, one of Indonesia’s culturally rich cities, lies Kampoeng Cyber, or “Cyber Village”—a community that caught the attention of Mark Zuckerberg (right), the co-founder of Facebook, for…
The Flipside of Counterfeit Goods
Although they are often illegal, counterfeit electronics such as these fake iPhones continue to be manufactured in China and distributed widely due to high demand for inexpensive products.…
Podcasting (ethnography) in the classroom
Anthropologist Lindsay A. Bell has written a two-part post for Teaching Culture on “her attempt to organize a senior seminar course around producing a podcast based on student research”…
Why aren’t millennials buying diamonds?
link to original tweet @TheEconomist Earlier this week, The Economist magazine asked the Twittersphere a question: Why aren’t millennials buying diamonds? Unsurprisingly, this question generat…
How Did We Ever Live Without GPS?
You’ve got to be very careful if you don’t know where you are going, because you might not get there. —(attributed to) Yogi Berra I’m writing this post…
Web Roundup: Ethical Technology, Moral Medicine by Emily Goldsher-Diamond
Researchers at MIT have launched Moral Machine, a web project to help gauge human perspectives on “moral decisions made by machine intelligence.” The project comes in the wake…
The future of designing autonomous systems will involve ethnographers
Note from the Editor, Tricia Wang: Next up in our Co-designing with machines edition is Madeleine Clare Elish, (@mcette), is an anthropologist and researcher at Data & Society, presents a…
Anthropologist, CTO
Is it really that strange to think that an anthropologist would be the best choice for a Chief Technology Officer? According to Susannah Fox, the CTO for HHS…
An Engineering Anthropologist: Why tech companies need to hire software developers with ethnographic skills
Note from the Editor, Tricia Wang: I’m very please to announce that the next contributor in the Co-designing with machines edition is Astrid Countee (@ianthro), an anthropologist, software de…
The human-side of artificial intelligence and machine learning
Note from the Editor, Tricia Wang: Next up in our Co-designing with machines edition is Steven Gustafson (@stevengustafson), founder of the Knowledge Discovery Lab at the General Electric Gl…
The hidden story of how metrics are being used in courtrooms and newsrooms to make more decisions
Note from the Editor, Tricia Wang: The next author for the Co-designing with machines edition is Angèle Christin (@angelechristin), sociologist and Postdoctoral Fellow at the Data & Soci…
Why do brands lose their chill? How bots, algorithms, and humans can work together on social media
Editor’s Note: The fourth contributor to the Co-designing with machines edition is Molly Templeton (@mollymeme), digital and social media expert, Director of Social Media at Everybody …
Mindful Algorithms: the new role of the designer in generative design
Editor’s Note: Next up in our Co-designing with machines edition is Che-Wei Wang, (Alicia Dudek (@sayway), is a designer and architect who runs CW&T, a design study with his partner…
Lou and Cee Cee prepare for fieldwork in the future: a world where robots conduct ethnography
Editor’s Note: Kicking off our Co-designing with machines edition is Alicia Dudek (@aliciadudek), Innovation Insight Lead & Design Ethnographer at Deloitte Digital Australia. Using …