From ned at nedrossiter.org Fri May 13 00:52:06 2016 From: ned at nedrossiter.org (Ned Rossiter) Date: Fri, 13 May 2016 08:52:06 +1000 Subject: ::fibreculture:: Cryptocurrencies Workshop Message-ID: <57350916.5040709@nedrossiter.org> Cryptocurrencies Workshop 17 May 2016 Institute for Culture and Society Western Sydney University, Parramatta South Room: EA.1.33 Time: 1?4 pm Organized by Liam Magee, Jack Parkin and Ned Rossiter, ICS Digital Life research program http://www.westernsydney.edu.au/ics/events/cryptocurrencies_workshop Misunderstood outside the boutique industries of micro-finance and tech startups, cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology are moving fast into the mainstream. Banks, insurance companies and the financial press are scrambling to understand their implications. Once a conceptual twinkle in the eye of Cypherpunks ? an online movement of anarchic libertarian-leaning cryptographers ? cryptocurrencies have become a social, technical and economic reality. Bitcoin, the first widely implemented cryptocurrency, arose from the ashes of the 2008 global financial crisis as a codified alternative to trusting fiat currencies that are heavily influenced by private banks and the nation state. Bitcoin?s decentralized protocol ? the blockchain ? promised to free people from an oppressive global monetary system and put financial power back into the hands of the masses. But for those not technically inclined, a host of startup companies have produced fee-based systems that simplify use of the blockchain. A fledgling industry sector has spawned, receiving over one billion U.S. dollars in capital investment to date. As the spectacular collapse of Mt Gox, a Bitcoin exchange, demonstrated in 2014, financial distrust is far from being eliminated in the new systems of digital capital distribution. Yet the world of the blockchain moves on. Its software architecture and algorithms are being configured by startup companies and platforms such as Ethereum to reorganize information in banking, law and accountancy via smart contracts, techno-equity and decentralized registers. This workshop introduces cryptocurrencies, bringing academic researchers together with industry representatives to discuss the phenomenon of alternative monetary systems such as Bitcoin and the capacity of blockchain architectures to scale and reorganize institutional cultures and social practices. Registration (free) Spaces are limited, so please register at: http://tinyurl.com/jfkjvo3 Coffee/tea will be provided. Schedule (with Q&A after each presentation) 1:00 Introduction ? Ned Rossiter and Liam Magee 1:10 Bit Trade Labs, What is the Blockchain? 1:35 Jack Parkin, Grounding Digital Currencies: The Geography of Bitcoin 2:00 Chris Mountford, Blockchain as an Application Platform 2.25 Teresa Swist & Liam Magee, Crypto-research: Blockchains, Academia and Decentralisation 2:50 Bit Trade Labs, SovereignID: Towards the Blockchained Self 3:15 Ned Rossiter, Blockchains and the Territoriality of Organization 3:30 General discussion, with reference to presentations and readings 4:00 Closing remarks Speaker bios Liam Magee is Senior Research Fellow in the Institute for Culture and Society, and with Ned Rossiter co-convenes the Digital Life Research Program. He is author of Interwoven Cities (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016). Jonathon Miller is co-founder of Bit Trade Australia and is a director of Bit Trade Labs. He holds an honours degree in political economics and runs an indie record label, but exercises the force of his creativity as a blockchain consultant with specialist understanding of product development and blockchain technology. Chris Mountford is a senior software developer with a heavy involvement in the Bitcoin space. He is widely regarded as Australia?s leading technical speaker on Bitcoin and related technologies. Jack Parkin is a PhD candidate at Western Sydney University. His PhD looks at the spatial relationships of Bitcoin drawing from ethnographic fieldwork in the ?Bitcoin hubs? of Silicon Valley, London and New York. Ned Rossiter is Professor of Communication with a joint appointment in the Institute for Culture and Society and the School of Humanities and Communication Arts at Western Sydney University. He is author of Software, Infrastructure, Labor: A Media Theory of Logistical Nightmares (Routledge, 2016). Teresa Swist is Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Young and Well Research Cooperative Centre at the Institute for Culture and Society. She researches participatory design and processes of innovation, and is preparing a manuscript, Improvising the University: How We Learn Through Making, for Springer. Readings ?The Magic of Mining?, The Economist, 10 January, 2015, http://www.economist.com/news/business/21638124-minting-digital-currency-has-become-big-ruthlessly-competitive-business-magic Eyres, James. ?Why the Blockchain will Propel a Services Revolution?, Australian Financial Review, 14 December, 2014, http://www.afr.com/technology/why-the-blockchain-will-propel-a-services-revolution-20151212-glm6xf Kostakis, Vasilis and Giotitsas, Chris. ?The (A)Political Economy of Bitcoin?, Triple C (Communication, Capitalism and Critique): Journal for a Global Sustainable Information Society 2.2 (2014), http://www.triple-c.at/index.php/tripleC/article/view/606 Lanchester, John. ?When Bitcoin Grows Up?, London Review of Books 38.8 (2016): 3?12, http://www.lrb.co.uk/v38/n08/john-lanchester/when-bitcoin-grows-up ? Ned Rossiter Professor of Communication Institute for Culture and Society / School of Humanities and Communication Arts Western Sydney University Parramatta Campus Locked Bag 1797 Penrith NSW 2751 Australia From ned at nedrossiter.org Fri May 13 02:39:53 2016 From: ned at nedrossiter.org (Ned Rossiter) Date: Fri, 13 May 2016 10:39:53 +1000 Subject: ::fibreculture:: Fwd: Cultural analytics + urban studies workshop with Lev Manovich and Damiano Cerrone in St. Petersburg, Russia In-Reply-To: <67ffe3671ec85d3bb8a9319ca2d7bf5ceab.20160512185944@mail93.suw17.mcsv.net> References: <67ffe3671ec85d3bb8a9319ca2d7bf5ceab.20160512185944@mail93.suw17.mcsv.net> Message-ID: <57352259.4000109@nedrossiter.org> -------- Forwarded Message -------- Subject: Cultural analytics + urban studies workshop with Lev Manovich and Damiano Cerrone in St. Petersburg, Russia Date: Thu, 12 May 2016 18:59:56 +0000 From: Lev Manovich Reply-To: Lev Manovich To: ned at nedrossiter.org Cultural analytics + urban studies workshop with Lev Manovich and Damiano Cerrone in St. Petersburg, Russia "Digital Traces 1: Meta-Morphologies of St. Petersburg," an urban studies workshop with Lev Manovich and Damiano Cerrone View this email in your browser Participate in our summer lab: Digital Traces 1: Meta-Morphologies of St. Petersburg *Practical hands-on lab co-directed by Lev Manovich and Damiano Cerrone during 2016 Summer School at European University in St. Petersburg, Russia.* *Application details: https://eu.spb.ru/digitaltraces2016 * This laboratory explores the landscape of the invisible city, using digital traces to unveil, measure and study the meta-morphology of the city. Participants will use large dataset of location-based social media from Instagram and open source GIS software. They will also physically observe selected city locations and compare their findings with the patterns revealed by analysis of Instagram images. The participants will work in groups producing maps, diagrams, and visualizations to gain understanding between social practices, urban space, and their representations in social media. *The main dataset is 400,000 Instagram images shared in St. Petersburg between July 2014 and June 2015. * Participants will be introduced to a number of research methods including** - spatial analysis using GIS, - visualization of image collections, - computational language analysis, - use of computer vision to detect objects and scenes in photos.* * *Where:* The Science and Technology Studies (STS) Center at European University at St. Petersburg, Russia *When:* August 17 - 30, 2016. *Format:* The hands-on lab is a part of the 2016 Summer school devoted to exploring new methods for social and cultural research. School activities include lectures by participating faculty from Paris, New York, Amsterdam and St. Petersburg. The second summer school will take place in Paris in 2017, and the third will be in New York in 2018. *2016 Summer School Directors: * Diana Kurkovsky West (European University at St. Petersburg) Vincent L?pinay (Sciences Po) *Lab Directors:* Lev Manovich (The Graduate Center, City University of New York; softwarestudies.com ) Damiano Cerrone (SPIN Unit, www.spinunit.eu/ ) *Faculty Team:* Jean Philippe Cointet (LISIS, Paris) Olga Sezneva (EUSP and University of Amsterdam) Ilya Utekhin (EUSP) Donato Ricci (Sciences Po and Parsons School of Design, Paris) /Copyright ? 2016 Lev Manovich, All rights reserved./ We send only a few emails per year about big new projects in our lab softwarestudies.com *Our mailing address is:* Lev Manovich PhD Program in Computer Science, The Graduate Center, City University of New York (CUNY) 365 Fifth Avenue New York, NY 10016 Add us to your address book unsubscribe from this list update subscription preferences Email Marketing Powered by MailChimp From maxdovey at gmail.com Fri May 20 11:45:15 2016 From: maxdovey at gmail.com (Max Dovey) Date: Fri, 20 May 2016 11:45:15 +0200 Subject: ::fibreculture:: Internship opportunity with Institute of Network Cultures in Amsterdam, NL Message-ID: The Institute of Network Cultures is looking for an intern with writing, research and production skills, for the organisation of MoneyLab#3: Failing Better that will take place on 1 /2 Dec 2016 in Amsterdam. MoneyLab is a network of researchers, artists, hackers and entrepreneurs and other creators that take up the call for critical and creative experiments into alternative forms of exchange, ownership and the distribution of value. It provides a platform for multi-disciplinary dialogues between a variety of people and initiatives, both commercial and non-commercial, to work on creative alternatives in the digital economy. We are looking for an enthusiastic, energetic, inquisitive (former) student with knowledge of and a demonstrated interest in MoneyLab related topics. Internship period: 29th August until 16 December 2016 (0.6 ? 0.8 fte). For further information visit http://networkcultures.org/moneylab/ or contact Inte Gloerich: Inte [at] networkcultures [dot] org Max Dovey | Project Associate Institute of Network Cultures Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences | HvA room 04A07 Rhijnspoorplein 1 NL-1091 GC Amsterdam www.networkcultures.org @INCAmsterdam Please sign up for our newsletter to stay up to date on publications, events and research of the Institute of Network Cultures -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: