New Media M.A. Research Blog | Media Studies, University of Amsterdam

HelpOut: Real Help for Real People

The Crisis at Hand Political upheaval in the Middle East, Africa and South Asia have forced about 464,000 migrants to cross into Europe in 2015, a phenomenon referred to as the “Refugee Crisis” (Park). Numerous tragic events, like the...

By Katharina Lueke on 10/16/15 Comments Off

Cute Culture in Private Couples App: Communicating with Kawaii Stickers

Mobile apps designed for couples to communicate in a private setting has started to gain popularity in the past few years. In the West, there are apps such as Couple, Duet, and Avocado. In the East, Between, an intimate...

By Vincent So on 09/17/15 Comments Off

The end of Secret, the end of anonymous social media apps?

How to stay anonymous on the web? It sounds like a trick question when the web constantly tracks your online behaviour and requires you to upload a user account on nearly every website you visit. However, the solution seems...

By Laura Nusser on 09/16/15 Comments Off

Facebook Jumps on the Bandwagon!

Facebook Notes has been long forgotten over the years as the company’s main focus was to distinguish the platform from other what seemed similar ones in the past days. Today the company (Facebook) seems to have grasped the importance of...

By Ash Monzer on 09/16/15 Comments Off

Be There or Be Square: Instagram Introduces New Sizes

Be There or Be Square: Instagram Introduces New Sizes Many frequent users of Instagram (including myself) at some point experienced the following scenario: a moment captured with the camera on your smartphone is significant enough to share on Instagram....

By Eva Hekman on 09/15/15 Comments Off

Anti-social apps: counterattacking the power of networks

We judge ourselves with the means other people have and have given us for judging ourselves. Into whatever I say about myself someone else’s judgement always enters. (Jean-Paul Sartre) In 2013, Scott Garner, an artist based in New York,...

By Giovanni Carta on 09/14/15 1

“Day 1: Tim takes a dump” – taking <i>live</i> to the next level

“Day 1: Tim takes a dump” – taking live to the next level

In The Truman Show, Truman has no idea he is being watched 24/7, until the sun comes crushing down – literally, because the sun turned out to be a studio lamp. In Edtv, Ed knows and agrees to being...

By S. Dorrestein on 09/14/15 Comments Off

YouTube | It’s gone 360º

YouTube – Home to viral sensations, talking cats, Charlie’s finger and not to mention irritating music videos – with some holding over two billion views! From its launch in May 2005, YouTube has developed, changed and re-formatted over...

By Max Cantellow on 09/14/15 Comments Off

What’s it like to BeMe?

Curated Self-Publishing Scrolling down the Facbebook or Instagram newsfeed you see all these nice pictures and videos of beautiful and happy people going out for dinner at fancy restaurants with their lover or travelling around the world with their...

By Felicitas Deiler on 09/14/15 Comments Off

Refugees Welcome: Network Hospitality with A Cause

Before the trending topic of current situation on the refugees crisis within Europe was gaining its media spotlight, a German-based group has invented a website named Refugees Welcome as response to the problem. The website aims to match the...

By Afra suci Ramadhon on 09/14/15 Comments Off

rMA Thesis Conference 2015: (pre)Cyberspace Perspectives on Information Technologies

The following is a modified transcript of my research presentation for the 2015 Research Master in Media Studies Thesis Conference. My thesis is an exploration of magical writing practices in contemporary digital culture. This was too much to talk...

By Rose Rowson on 05/05/15 Comments Off

Working the Social Network

“Social media is not Facebook. Nor is it YouTube. Neither is it blogging or tweeting. Facebook, YouTube, blogs, and twitter are merely platforms and channels; players on a much broader stage collectively referred to as social media” ....

By Janina Sommerlad on 10/17/14 1

The posthuman cyborg: Technological telepathy

Researches have recently published an article where they have done an experiment with some kind of technological telepathy. A man in India wearing a BCI (Brain-Computer Interface), has successfully transmitted different kind of words through thoughts to a man’s...

By Chaïm Wijnberg on 09/18/14 Comments Off

Could Snapchat’s new feature challenge Facebook’s dominance in terms of trust and privacy?

What’s the next Facebook or is there one? Ask many, including John D. Sutter (2012), who suggests that this question is not only wishful thinking, but an increasingly likely reality. Jamie Turner argues that although Facebook is still “king...

By Agnieszka Walewinder on 09/18/14 Comments Off

Should we keep our emojis in check? Emojli doesn’t think so

On August 29th, London-based app developers Matt Gray and Tom Scott released an application that could possibly redefine the way we communicate through our digital devices forever: Emojli, a social network, where users can only communicate by using emoticons, or...

By Miles Zornig on 09/18/14 Comments Off

Twitter’s “buy” button creates one-click shopping

Twitter, a microblogging platform with 271 million monthly active users began beta testing a “buy” button, allowing users to purchase exclusive merchandise from within the Twitter app. According to Twitter’s blog post, released September 8, 2014: “Today we are...

By Sage Stargrove on 09/18/14 Comments Off

Clasp, a new app helping to bring down Autism barriers

Generally described as a disability that affects how a person makes sense of the world and communicate to others, we will explore how a new electronic device is trying to help and improve the life of those suffering from...

By Caio Domingues on 09/15/14 Comments Off

Ice Bucket Challenge: Entering a new era of viral fundraising

Approximately two months ago, another viral phenomenon started taking over the Internet: The Ice Bucket Challenge. While everybody should applaud the charitable motive behind it, I was tired of seeing foolish narcissists pouring ice water over their head and posting a video...

By Miles Zornig on 09/11/14 Comments Off

Has internet worsened our grammar?

Since the advent of the internet and the world wide web, it has never been easier to exchange and share information with people from all around the world. A good part of the technological inventions developed in the last...

By Josip Batinic on 09/08/14 Comments Off

What can we learn from a Facebook clone?

What is the future of Facebook? With the fast-evolving nature of new media, it is interesting to think of the possible scenarios for the further development. One way to do so is to look at a former Facebook clone...

By Polina Boykova on 09/08/14 Comments Off

The Digital Book: curating emails via the EPUB format

During the first block of the Spring semester, a group of MA New Media students took part in the elective The Digital Book. This course aims to contextualise the rise of digital publishing in theoretical terms, focussing on themes...

By Rose Rowson on 03/21/14 1

8tracks and web-radios: the contemporary music consumption is personal and social

Since the growth of the Internet and its collection of interactive platforms and social networks, the cultural industry has turned a critical corner. This statement is especially true for the music industry in term of music creation and consumption,...

By V Weydert on 10/31/13 Comments Off

Digital Hangovers: Capturing an Emergent New Media Phenomenon through DigitalObservatory

Introduction Modern technology has led to a rapidly increasing amount of media objects that can be shared online. Every minute, for instance, more than hundred videos are uploaded on Youtube. Yet, the downside of this development is that what...

By Tessa de Keijser on 10/21/13 1

From Geo to Neo: Can NeoCities Provide a Creative Utopia for Contemporary Web Culture?

Established in 1994, one of the most popular websites worldwide by 1997, and bought by Yahoo! For $3.57bn in 1999, the US branch of GeoCities closed in 2009. Hailed as a structural precursor to the socially centred web as...

By Cristel Kolopaking on 10/09/13 1