Technology and Power: Agency, Discourse and Community Formation

Technology and Power:
Agency, Discourse and Community Formation
IT studies in Social Sciences and Humanities
University of Tyumen
Dec 1 2020
Aleksandar Bradic

MY JOURNEY SO FAR
IoT/AnalyticsVertical Search
+ Enterprise
Vertical Search
+ SaaS
ENGINEERING ENGINEERING
DATA SCIENCE
GROWTH
EARLY STAGEGROWTH/MATURITY STARTUP/GROWTH
PRODUCT DESIGN
GROWTH
PRODUCT DESIGN
GROWTH
ENGINEERING
PRODUCTPRODUCT
UX
STARTUPS
ACADEMICS
University of Belgrade
MSc, Computer Engineering
University of London
MSc, Quantitative Finance
Academy of Art University
MFA, Web Design & New Media

DISCOURSE TECHNOLOGY
CREATION
“Internet of Things”
CARNEGIE MELLON UNIVERSITY
DISCUSSION THREAD, 1982
WEISER, MARK (1991)
"THE COMPUTER FOR THE 21ST CENTURY"
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN. 265 HYPE CYCLE METHODOLOGY
GARTNER, INC (1995)

“Inordertochange anexistingparadigmyoudonot
struggletotryandchange theproblematicmodel.
Youcreateanewmodelandmaketheoldoneobsolete.”
―BuckminsterR.Fuller
PARADIGM SHIFT CREDO

1990 2000 2010 2020
2001 Dot Com crash “R.I.P. Good Times”
— Sequoia Capital, 2008
Aug. 19, 2004
Google IPO
May 18, 2012
Facebook IPO
Aug 9, 1995
Netscape IPO
April 1993
Wired Magazine Issue #1
1991
“Cyberpunk,”
John Markoff
Alpha Go vs. Fan Hui
(2015)
May 9, 2019
Uber IPO
May 15, 1997
Amazon IPO
CYBERSPACE DOT COM
WEB 2.0 CLOUD COMPUTING
BIG DATA ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
FREE SOFTWARE OPEN SOURCE
MAKER MOVEMENTHARDWARE HACKING
AN (AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL) TIMELINE OF EMERGING TECHNOLOGICAL DISCOURSES

AgencyDiscourseCom
m
unity
Inform
ation
wants
to
be
free
The
beauty
ofthe
baud
Free
as
in
freedom
Network
is
the
com
puter
Don’tbe
evil
Solving
the
world’s
problem
s
Repair/DIY
culture
M
aking
the
world
a
betterplace
Bringing
people
together
Sharing
econom
y
Singularity
Alienation
oflabor
Socialalienation
Ownership
Control
M
eans
ofproduction
Success
envy
Socialvalidation
Fearofm
issing
out
Relationships
ofpower
Self-actualisation
Bulletin
board
Discussion
group
Open
Source
project
Hacking
con
Unconference
M
akerspace
Hackathon
M
akerfaire
Show-and-tell
HackChat

THE PROMETHEAN MYTH
JOE KIM, HACKADAY EDITORIAL ILLUSTRATION, AUG 2016JOE KIM, HACKADAY EDITORIAL ILLUSTRATION, JAN 2017
RANDOM ASYMMETRIC RETURNS

THE REALITY OF WORK
OFFICE SPACE, MIKE JUDGE, 1999
ETHICS / SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

ASYNCHRONOUS SYNCHRONOUS
ANONYMOUS
REAL IDENTITY
Hacker Culture
HackChat
Demo Scene
Maker Culture
IRC
Open Source
BBS / Zine Culture
Tech Meetups
Startups
Discussion Forums

Cyberspace has always been
a metaphor for a solitary
community longing for a
human connection. Manifest-
ed through bulletin boards
and electronic zines, this
teenage-centric written
culture engages in a
collective exploration of
the limits of computing
and unwritten maps of the
sprawling Internet
infrastructure.
Cyberspace
isaliterary,
not
technological
construct.
HACKER CULTURE AS A
PEER-REVIEW COMMUNITY
OF LETTERS TURNED ACTION.
ASYNCHRONOUS
ANONYMOUS

STILLS FROM “BAUD ZERO SIGNIFIER” - A PHRACK MAGAZINE TRIBUTE PROJECT // CYBERPUNK FILM FESTIVAL 2020

The emergence of Desktop
Publishing has ushered a
new era in trade magazine
advertising, replacing the
high-quality International
Style-inspired agency work
with gimmicky do-it-your-
self designs cooked up by
and for the salespeople.
In this new environment,
the computer text termi-
nal's minimalistic aesthet-
ics becomes an attractive
avenue for escape.
An aesthetic
escape
RETURN TO THE
MYSTICAL BLISS OF THE
COMPUTER TERMINAL
ASYNCHRONOUS
ANONYMOUS
IBM ADVERTISING POSTER, PAUL RAND, 1981 PC MAGAZINE, SELECT ADVERTISEMENTS, OCT 1994

Wired and Mondo 2000 maga-
zines emerge in the early
90ies as voices of the
"mainstream"
cyberculture. Both publica-
tions draw heavily on the
Bay Area countercultural
heritage but champion fun-
damentally different world-
views - techno-utopianism
vs. dystopian.
Waiting
for....
techno
utopia
or
dystopia?
THE BAY AREA DILEMMA
ASYNCHRONOUS
ANONYMOUS

TIME MAGAZINE COVER, FEB 8 1993 TIME MAGAZINE COVER, JULY 25, 1994 HACKERS MOVIE POSTER, SEPT 1995 TIME MAGAZINE COVER, FEB 19, 1996

In navigating the "ontolog-
ical gap" between humans
and computers, proprietary
software emerges as an ob-
structing layer, devoid of
essence, hiding behind in-
tellectual property law's
false authority. The revo-
lutionary path forward is
rebuilding the computing
universe with freedom as
its core axiom.
FreeSoftware
as an
antithesis
MIT AI LAB PRANKSTERS
TURN REVOLUTIONARIES
ASYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
GNU MANIFESTO, RICHARD STALLMAN, MARCH 1985 STALLMAN & THE MIT AI LAB CULTURE
GNU PROJECT LOGOS
TM

Building on the GNU tradi-
tion of animal-based brand
characters for software
projects, Linux introduces
the Tux character, which
becomes a community-build-
ing point of visual refer-
ence and the primary agent
of Linux's increasing
commercial appeal.
Revolution
witha
human
face
ANIMAL REPRESENTATION
SEMIOTICS AS A
VISUAL DISCOURSE AGENT
ASYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
LINUX TUX BRAND CHARACTER, LARRY EWING, 1996

Concerns about the commer-
cial viability of the
"free" software model lead
to the formation of the
Palo Alto-based Open Source
Initiative - a (ﬁrst of
many) project of rebranding
a grassroots technology
movement and converting it
into a viable "market." The
new narrative allowed for
the participation of estab-
lished companies such as
IBM and the proliferation
of Open Source evangelism
as a business agent
disrupting the technologi-
cal status quo.
TheAge
of OpenSource
Software
Advocacy
FREEDOM OR AN IPO?
PICK ONE.
SYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
OPEN SOURCE INITIATIVE, FEBRUARY 1998, LOGO BY COLIN VIEBROCK
OCCURENCE OF SWEAR WORDS IN LINUX KERNEL SOURCE
https://www.vidarholen.net/contents/wordcount/
OCT 15 1996
MAR 11 2000
REDHAT LINUX IPO, AUG 11 1999FORBES MAGAZINE, AUGUST 10 1998 IBM x LINUX POSTER, 2002NEW YORK TIMES, MARCH 20 2000

The proliferation of Open
Source projects with
increasingly commer-
cial-friendly licensing
models and the emergence of
code sharing platforms such
as Github leads to the com-
modiﬁcation of the creation
process and the "Death of
the Author," replicating
the same alienation issues
that lead to the birth of
the movement.
Open
Sourceasa
(yetanother)
business
model
CUSTOMER ACQUISITION
IN THE AGE OF
ATTENTION ECONOMY
ASYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
APACHE SOFTWARE FOUNDATION PROJECT LOGOS
GITHUB.COM HOMEPAGE
NOV 8, 2018 - 100M REPOS / 500K CONTRIBUTORS GITHUB OCTOCAT LOGO

For a brief period in time,
in the late 2000s, it felt
that the Internet had of-
fered a way for engineers
to regain full access to
means of production. This
new medium has allowed for
free dissemination of
ideas, putting creators of
technology back in the
driver's seat. Great engi-
neers became sought-after
"rockstars," founders of
new business, writing soft-
ware that is, in the words
of Mark Adreesen, "eating
the world."
Controlling
the meansof
production
ONE PERSON + ONE LAPTOP
= REVOLUTION
SYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
WEB 2.0 VOCABULARY
JQUERY JAVASCRIPT LIBRARY HOMEPAGE, 2006
COFFEE SHOP ENTREPRENEURSHIP

A ghost town only a couple
of years earlier, still
recovering from the Dotcom
crash, in 2007, San Fran-
cisco emerged as the Web
2.0 universe's epicenter,
a melting pot bringing
together creative, bohemi-
an-minded technology
professionals, and
libertarian entrepreneurs.
San
Francisco
Bohemian
Dream
Redux
WHERE COUNTER-CULTURE
BECOMES MAINSTREAM
DISRUPTION
SYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
RITUAL COFFEE ROASTERS, 1026 VALENCIA ST. / SAN FRANCISCO, CA
FACEBOOK OFFICE, PALO ALTO, 2010 G2 CROWD SF IN TECH REPORT NEW YORK TIMES, NOV 1 2013

The "physical turn" of
technology production,
characterized by the mass
migration of tech workers
into major startup hubs
such as the Bay Area, has
led to new power hierar-
chies. In these environ-
ments, the older genera-
tions of successful entre-
preneurs control access to
Venture Capital and profes-
sional networks, while the
younger generation is sub-
ject to didactic consump-
tion of the older genera-
tion's "wisdom," in search
of "playbooks" that will
help create successful com-
panies of their own.
Selling
pickaxes
duringa
gold rush
TECHNOLOGY GOES
SOCIAL & DIDACTIC
SYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY

Since the beginning of the
Web 2.0 era, tech entrepre-
neurs have discovered tre-
mendous business value in
inventing and promoting ab-
stract concepts and euphe-
misms such as "Cloud Com-
puting," "Big Data," or
"Sharing Economy." This
discourse-invention process
becomes a standard part of
every startup's "playbook"
starting in 2010.
Widening
the
Ontological
Gap
SYNTHETIC DISCOURSE
GENERATION AND
THE OTHERNESS
OF TECHNOLOGY
SYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
Interaction Transaction
Human Computer Cloud
50ms
Cloud Round Trip Latency
(USA)
250ms
Cloud Round Trip Latency
(Australia)
8.66sec
Average Web page
full page load
15ms
Average Touch Stimulus
Reaction Time
17ms
Average Audio Stimulus
Reaction Time
25ms
Average Visual Stimulus
Reaction Time
H U M A N C L O U D
CLOUD COMPUTINGCLOUD COMPUTING
SOFTWARE-AS-A-SERVICE
PLATFORM-AS-A-SERVICE
ALGORITHMIC RECOMMENDATION
INTERNET OF THINGS
D A T A
Interactive
The Unknowable
Human Computer
SELLING THE IDEA OF
EXTERNAL PRIVATE DATA
STORAGE & COMPUTATION
NUMBER OF TERM MENTIONS
IN TECHCRUNCH ARTICLES
2005 - 2018

In the eye of the 2007
ﬁnancial crisis, disillu-
sioned by the demise of
Free Software ideals, tech
enthusiasts and tech-elites
both turn to the world of
physical creation as a way
of escape from the dread of
day-to-day software
development.
TheReturn
of the
Physical
ATOMS OVER BITS,
AN ESCAPE FROM
THE DIGITAL
ASYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
MATERIABLE PROJECT, MIT TANGIBLE MEDIA GROUP, 2016 ARDUINO UNO MICROCONTROLLER BOARD, 2010
RADIANCE DOME BY LIGHT AT PLAY, BURNING MAN 2012
ADAFRUIT NEOPIXEL ADDRESSABLE LEDS, OCTOBER 2013

After the age of the domi-
nance of Software in tech-
nology enthusiast circles
(since the early PC era),
hardware returns to the
stage. Previously thought
of as, beyond the reach of
an individual engineer,
silicon devices become the
object of reverse engineer-
ing, creative reuse, and
ground-up, "do it yourself"
recreation.
Seeking
forbidden
sillicon
knowledge
THE ART OF
REVERSE ENGINEERING
ASYNCHRONOUS
ANONYMOUS
OPEN SOURCE HARDWARE ASSOCIATION, FOUNDED IN 2012
NOVENA OPEN HARDWARE LAPTOP, BUNNIE HUANG, 2014
HACKADAY LOGO
PHILLIP TORRONE, 2004
REPRAP OPEN HARDWARE 3D PRINTER, 2005
BUS PIRATE,
IAN LESNET, 2008
RISC-V OPEN HARDWARE PROCESSOR, 2010 -

Combining the Warholian
promise of 15 minutes of
fame with a profound desire
for entertainment and pa-
rental connection, Make
Magazine, a San Francisco
publisher, has single-hand-
edly created a mass phenom-
ena called Maker Faire - a
series of events around the
globe attended by almost
half a million people
annualy.
Bridgingthe
generational
gap
OR HOW TO EXPLOIT
GUILTY ENGINEERING PARENTS
SYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
MAKER FAIRE LIVE EVENTS
MAKE MAGAZINE COVERS

Around 2015, governments
around the world have awak-
ened to the potential of
the "maker" narrative as a
means of serving political
agendas. In the West, it
was seen as a counter-nar-
rative to the trend of man-
ufacturing outsourcing,
while in China as a path to
addressing the issue of
perceived lack of local in-
novation. In both cases,
particularly in China, this
led to hyperproduction of
maker spaces, and, towards
the end of the decade,
their ultimate demise.
Serving
the
Nation
State
NOTHING BEATS A GOOD
PHOTO OP
SYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
US GOVERNMENT NATIONAL WEEK OF MAKING INITIATIVE, 2015
PREMIER LI KEQIANG VISITS CHAIHUO MAKERSPACE IN SHENZHEN

Hackaday.com started in
2004 as a tech blog, part
of Endgadget.com and in its
ﬁrst decade of existence
has amassed a quite signiﬁ-
cant readership. In 2013
the blog went up for sale
and was under threat of
being dissolved or
repurposed as a source of
lightweight “lifehack”
clickbait entertainment.
Buildinga
metanarrative-free
techcommunity
HOW TO GROW A
MISSION-FREE LARGE-SCALE
TECH CREATOR COMMUNITY?
ASYNCHRONOUS
ANONYMOUS
HACKADAY.COM // JULY 3 2013 HACKADAY.COM // JULY 25 2013

Drawing inspiration from
diverse counter-cultural
sources, from Douglas Adams
and Hunter Thomson to
William Gibson and Neal
Stephenson, Hackaday.com
aims to disseminate
advanced technical
knowledge in a playful and
irreverent fashion. Visited
by over a million people
every month, it is the
largest editorially
independent tech
publication online.
Hackaday.com:
AGradSchool
for Hardware
Hackers
GONZO JOURNALISM,
TECHNOLOGY SUBVERSION,
CREATIVE INSPIRATION.
ASYNCHRONOUS
ANONYMOUS
HACKADAY.COM SAMPLE ARTICLE EDITORIAL ILLUSTRATION BY JOE KIM

Started in 2014,
Hackaday.io is the "social
network" side of the
Hackaday community,
enabling creators to post
ideas or complete projects,
get feedback, build teams,
and collaborate. Since its
inception, more than
100,000 projects have been
created and/or uploaded to
the platform.
Hackaday.io:
Social
Networkfor
Electronic
Misfits
DISCOVER. GET INSPIRED.
BUILD. REPEAT
ASYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY

HackChat is a series of
online textual chat
conversations on the
Hackaday.io platform, held
weekly with a predesignated
topic and a conversation
moderator. A unique poster
design accompanies each of
the 158 events held so far,
setting an abstract visual
frame, a memento that pro-
vides a temporal point of
reference for otherwise
transient online
conversation.
HackChat:
TheArt
ofthe
Transient
VISUAL FRAMING OF
TEXTUAL KNOWLEDGE
SYNCHRONOUS
ANONYMOUS

Hackaday Prize started as
an engineering competition
to incentivize and grow the
Hackaday community. Held
since 2014, Prize brings
together independent
creators from all over the
world and results in more
than one thousand new
projects created each year.
It's quite fascinating that
the participant community
has collectively rejected
the "winner takes all"
award structure and instead
embraced the model of
offering smaller "seed"
funding for as many
projects as possible.
Hackaday
Prize&
Superconference
CREATING INCENTIVES
FOR SOCIAL GOOD.
FOSTERING COLLABORATION,
NOT COMPETITON
SYNCHRONOUS
REAL IDENTITY
2018 HACKADAY PRIZE POSTER HACKADAY SUPERCONFERENCE

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