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Michael Stevenson

I am a lecturer and PhD candidate in Media Studies at the University of Amsterdam. I've been a contributor to Masters of Media since 2006, though I now only post occasionally. A short list of papers and projects can be found here

http://www.whateverbutton.com/blog

True Crime Blogging

This site is an interesting mix of blogging and amateur online investigative journalism – trying to get more information on reported crimes by searching Google, MySpace, etc. Lots of advertising, though – true crime is a popular and lucrative...

Second Life backlash no. 3

this is (very) funny: Get a first life the guy behind it explains his actions here

More Local Web

Amsterdam is using a Google map mashup to display complaints they’re dealing with. Imagine, those two neighbors who hate each other, constantly using this mashup to get even.. Speaking of, what does the local web mean for that old...

Wikipedia and AI

Lately I’ve been looking at the possibility of using Wikipedia’s interlinking to study collective memory – seeing what associations are made and so on. Here’s an article about using similar techniques to make computers smarter. For example, with anti-spam...

Second Life backlash no. 2

Nicholas Carr: A second life avatar consumes as much energy as the average Brazilian.

Surveillance theory and ‘that video’

In Consumer Technology after Surveillance Theory, Richard Rogers and Sabine Niederer talk about how consumer technology unsettles old institutional power, possibly bringing a whole new set of problems along. There was the consumer-soldier, for example, who produced the Abu...

The local Web, continued

Placeblogger brings together blogs based on their location. Personally, I really am looking forward to aggregators like this one taking off. Maybe they will change how we perceive the blogosphere (i.e. beyond terms of A-list bloggers and the Long...

BBC article on remote access

You don’t need your computer to, y’know, use your computer. Surely there are some nice hacks for this that allow people to get around firewalls and censorware.. Link By the way, if you look at the article, take note...

The Simpsons understand

“If only we’d known that iPods would unite and overthrow the very humans they entertained…” From The Plastic Bag

Homeless in Second Life

A while back I promised to become the first bum on second life, but it seems someone has beat me to it. The NGO Mensajeros de la Paz has created a homeless, teenage avatar to raise awareness (and money?)...
MyCreativity, First Session Part Two

MyCreativity, First Session Part Two

Matteo Pasquinelli took the podium for the second presentation, followed by Rosalind Gill and Danielle van Diemen.
MyCreativity, First Session Part One

MyCreativity, First Session Part One

At around 10:15 the usual suspects started showing up, including my fellow master students (some of us are aware that a 10 a.m. start means 10:30 in conference-speak). Geert Lovink (see photo) opened the proceedings as laptops took over...

Ask-the-Masters: Going Locative?

Locative media is about as vague a term as web 2.0. Essentially, locative seems to be about connecting ‘third nature’ information to real world places and/or objects. But there are a number of ways this can happen. Below I...

delicious tags for our NM theories assignment

So I take it everyone has started researching their paper for new media theories? I’ve decided to tag all the useful papers and articles i find with nmtheories, while tagging related artwork or projects with locativeprojects. Anyone up to...

Databodies in paradiso, databodies in cut-up

Just a reminder that the databodies event is in paradiso tonight. Also there are some short articles about databodies in the new issue of cut-up (including those written by fellow masters Esther, Jasper and myself), for those that just...

Warning Signs for Tomorrow

an inventory of future warning signs is funny: should the masters make stickers and distribute accordingly? Of course, the warning signs we have now are not so bad, either. via Schneier

Exporting the Amazon model for behavioral profiling

In the book Profiling Machines, new media theorist Greg Elmer looks at how consumers are tracked and how their data is fed back to them, affecting change in the spaces they navigate. His examples include recommendation systems like those...

More archiving of the archived Internet

Not unlike Yahoo’s Timecapsule, BBC points to a British initiative to use a mass blog to record ‘everyday life’ on October 17th. We used to only come together to commemorate the past or yell at the present, now we...

more Life-support for the Record Industry

While nothing is decided yet, it looks like (note: article is in Dutch) consumers will be forced to pay extra taxes on their mp3 players and TiVo-like recorders, a kind of pre-penalty for the copies they will ‘inevitably’ make....

Ask-the-Masters: Can we use Wikipedia to map emergent issues?

Watching the Mark Foley scandal make its way from a newspaper blog to political blogs to the front pages of major newspapers, I was intrigued with how various actors got involved (and by actors I mean places, things, terms...

Bruce Sterling on blogs – podcast

Bruce Sterling, cyberpunk science fiction writer, asks what new media does for writers. He talks about the creative process of writing, the restrictions and politics, the uselessness of Microsoft Word and.. blogs! Apparently, comic book writers and stand-up comedians...

Cut-Up Method at Work

A friend was inspired after a conversation about the cut-up method and the article William S. Burroghs wrote. The result is below the fold, enjoy.