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

We The People: A Direct Line To The White House?

The White House recently announced the development of a new platform: We The People. Obama is quoted in the introduction explaining why: “I pledged to make government more open and accountable to its citizens. That’s what the new We...

By Floris Spronk on 09/14/11 2

‘Headdesking’ and Beyond: The British Uprisings

‘Governments of the Industrial World, you weary giants of flesh and steel, I come from Cyberspace, the new home of Mind. On behalf of the future, I ask you of the past to leave us alone. You are not...

By Jamie Franklin on 09/12/11 2

Not About Media!

The Impossibility of Media Theory Where previous generations of Serious Men saw in the concept of Medium but marginal or esoteric wordplay, we in our times seem to attribute to it almost magical qualities, such as the 19th century...

By Daniel de Zeeuw on 09/11/11 Comments Off

On the Political Value of TED

The Technology Entertainment and Design conference, better known as TED, has spread its worthy ideas annually since 1990. The last couple of years the TED-virus has spread the world as TED became globally known by letting their talks be...

By Bob Nefkens on 03/24/11 1

TOP: Climategate IPCC and the legitimacy of public concerns

In this session we focus on the contemporary connections between science, technology, and politics. The connections between these three domains are often neglected or unjust presented as complete seperated area’s. Bruno Latour speaks of matters that matter, by which...

By Elias van Hees on 03/20/11 1

Book Review – Open 20: The Populist Imagination

The Populist Imagination comes in a timely moment. The 20th issue of Open, the cahier on art and the public domain published by NAi, is a collection of essays dealing with “the role of myth, narratives and identity in...

By Nicola Bozzi on 03/07/11 2

Economies of the Commons 2: Death Knell for Open Politics

Open source, open government, open culture - as Nate Tkacz, PhD at the University of Melbourne points out in his talk at the Economies of the Commons Conference, the ubiquity of 'openness' as a master category of politics in...

By Caroline Goralczyk on 11/14/10 1

Truthy: Policing Misinformation, One Meme-ing Tweet At a Time

“Swiftboaters beware!” The battle to control Congress is on and this election year the truth is about to get Truthier. Twitter – the social media network, twenty-four-hour news site, conversation and blogging platform, wedding and death announcement site, gossip...

By Ekaterina Yudin on 10/18/10 2

Twitter: the Perfect Blend of Internet Content?

Twitter is a combination of different elements and content that other Internet sites and platforms already had. To me, this is what makes Twitter so great: in a way my usage of the Internet is being channeled and collected...

By Erik van Bemmelen on 10/11/10 6

Tweet Me Some Revolution

Create the change, become a Twitizen, fight injustice and eff the system. Revolution here and revolution there. Everywhere we hear about how social media and micro-blogging has brought about a tremendous change in the organization of social movements and...

By Caroline Goralczyk on 10/10/10 Comments Off

Bookreview: Communication Power

Where lies the power in network society? That’s the question Manuel Castells tries to answer in his book ‘Communication Power’. An interesting and relevant question considering our changing society. According to Castells, power relationships operate in networks. In his...

By Mathijs Voordenberg on 10/02/10 Comments Off

Campaigning and advocacy via social network sites, are social movements on the right path?

I do believe the Web 2.0 is shaping our societies, and much more the way users relate to each other. Social movements are adopting very fast social media technologies in their communication strategy. They use social network sites mostly...

By Cristina Reyna on 09/26/10 Comments Off

Live blogging @ Picnic10

Today i'm present at Picnic'10 and i'm really excited to be here. I will be live blogging today via the 'Masters of Media' blog and also on...

By Elias van Hees on 09/22/10 Comments Off

Internet, Policy and Politics Conference in Oxford

Last week I attended a conference on Internet, Policy and Politics at the OII in Oxford. I was invited to present my paper based on my MA research conducted in Brazil, which I finished a couple of weeks ago.

By ellen sluis on 09/22/10 Comments Off

Blog theory by Jodi Dean reviewed

Jodi Dean is professor of political science at Hobart an William Smith Colleges. She focus on the contemporary space or possibility of politics. Dean is a blogger herself and in her book she makes some points clear by...

By Floor Broer van Dijk on 09/19/10 1

Book Review: “Who Controls the Internet? Illusions of a Borderless World”

Imagine a place where there are no differences among people, everyone is living in a common space where the same language is spoken, borderless communication and free trade is frictionless and the freedom of speech is fully guaranteed. Yes,...

By Caroline Goralczyk on 09/19/10 2

Book review: “Proud to be Flesh” – Mute Magazine Anthology of cultural politics after the net

Proud to be Flesh is an Anthology of Mute Magazine, and consists of a big amount of articles from the magazine’s archives dating from 1994 till 2009. Tho it is an anthology, it’s not written to be a “best...

By Sander Jansma on 09/19/10 Comments Off

Book review: “Deep Search. The Politics of Search beyond Google”

It is hard to imagine life without search engines. Information is everywhere and we seem to need it all the time. So the importance of being able to access all information at any particular time of our choosing cannot...

By Rosanne Sliuzas on 09/19/10 Comments Off

Bye Bye, Islam! How the Virtual Space Enhances Anti-Muslim Campaigning

Shoot a mosque and you will earn 2000 points, shoot a Muslim calling for prayer and you are another 1000 points ahead! What sounds like a mere disaster in terms of religious intolerance can now be seen online with...

By Caroline Goralczyk on 09/10/10 2

The reign of Justin Bieber

We’ve all seen him, heard him sing or heard the likes and dislikes of other people talking about him: Justin Bieber. Personally I am not really a fan: if you told me half a year ago that I would...

By Sander Jansma on 09/08/10 4

The Politics of Social Media. Facebook: Control and Resistance

Hereby I post my MA thesis ‘The Politics of Social Media. Facebook: Control and Resistance’ for anyone who is interested in the political dimension of social media. A link to the full PDF can be found below. Abstract This...

By Marc Stumpel on 09/04/10 2

Facebook vs Ning – what is “social”?

A social network is, according to Wikipedia, a social structure made of individuals or organizations, which are connected by one or more specific types of interdependency (friendship, kinship, financial exchange, sexual relationships, and relationships of beliefs, knowledge or prestige)....

By Jan Bajec on 09/29/09 Comments Off

Wiki’s Political Point of View?

A conflict usually has two or more oppositional factions. They all have their own reason for this conflict, they all have a different point of view on this conflict, and most important; they do not agree with each other...

By Harro Heijboer on 09/22/09 Comments Off

Book Report: Virtualpolitik by Elizabeth Losh

Elizabeth Losh is the Writing Director of the Humanities Core Course at U.C. Irvine where she teaches courses on digital rhetoric and public communication. Her research specialty is digital rhetoric and the discourses of information culture, especially the...

By Jan Bajec on 09/14/09 Comments Off