Archives: Episode

We’re always told algorithms are going to change our world. And they do, but it always seems to be for the worse. Do we have any alternative to simply breaking the machines that have run afoul of our values and needs? We’re thrilled to welcome Ben Tarnoff back on the show to talk his calls… Continue reading 81 Third Wave Internet with Ben Tarnoff

Do Spotify’s algorithms make a listener’s music taste, or does taste make the algorithm? Nick Seaver embedded himself as an ethnographer at a music recommendation software firm to learn about the the very real way very specific people influence the algorithms that power our automated world. Nick Seaver directs the program in Science, Technology, and… Continue reading 80 *Slaps Roof of Algorithm* You Can Fit so Much Taste in This Thing with Nick Seaver

For our first ever episode talking about Amazon (somehow?), Logic Magazine co-founder Moira Weigel tells us what she learned about Amazon by spending years interviewing its third-party sellers. From hand sanitizer hoarding to Chinese vendors getting “dragon boated,” Moira gives us a fascinating look at a massive, unregulated economy. Moira Weigel is assistant professor in… Continue reading 79 Taking Stock of the Everything Store with Moira Weigel

We’re thrilled to launch a new tool today: a big interactive map of Reddit, showing how biggest subreddits on the site are connected with each other. Mike is joined by iDPI’s very own Jasmine Mangat and Virginia Partridge for a riveting tell-all about RedditMap.Social. You can visit the tool at RedditMap.Social, talk to other redditors… Continue reading 78 We Mapped Reddit with Jasmine Mangat and Virginia Partridge

How do we get better moderated social media platforms without putting governments in control of who gets to say what? For our part 2 of our episode with Daphne Keller, we get Daphne to tell us what the current wave of EU Internet regulation will mean for the future of social media. Transcript Ethan Zuckerman:… Continue reading 77 Lawful But Awful and the Future of Social Media with Daphne Keller (part 2)

If you want to understand anything about global Internet regulation, you’d be lucky to get Daphne Keller’s perspective on it. We’re thrilled to have the director of Stanford’s Cyber Policy Center on for a two-parter about regulating social media platforms. First off, a speed run through the Supreme Court cases that were designed to reshape… Continue reading 76 Platforms v. Supreme Court with Daphne Keller (part 1)

We talk a lot about reimagining the internet here at iDPI, and that’s because it’s something we spend most of our time at the lab doing. We’re thrilled to share our new, banner white paper with you, and we hope you’re excited by our call to widen your own imagination if what’s possible in social… Continue reading 75 iDPI’s New Manifesto: The Three-Legged Stool

Trusting justice means making it feel meaningful—people have to trust that justice systems are themselves just. To conclude our miniseries on Trust, we talk to Nathan Matias about how exactly people lost trust in Elon Musks’ Twitter, and revisit our recent interview with Tracey Meares and Tom Tyler about how procedural justice can convince can… Continue reading 74 Do You Trust that Justice is Just? with Nathan Matias, Tracey Meares, and Tom Tyler (Trust episode 4)

Almost two decades ago, World of Warcraft gamers started gathering in guilds to share resources and organize raids. Did they create one of the most trustful types of communities on the entire Internet? This week on our trust mini-series, we talk about how artist and gaming communities cooperate with artist Kei Kreutler and sociologist of… Continue reading 73 How to Start a Guild with Kei Kreutler and T.L. Taylor (Trust episode 3)

Cryptocurrency is supposedly the basis of trustless economy, but in the past few years there were a lot of everyday people who entrusted it with everything. How did this happen? In this episode of our miniseries on trust, we talk to Finn Brunton about the deep history of crypto and Molly White about how the… Continue reading 72 Why Would People Trust Crypto? with Finn Brunton and Molly White (Trust episode 2)