Which systems really deserve to be built? Which problems most need to be tackled? Who is best placed to build them? And who decides? We need genuine accountability mechanisms, external to companies and accessible to populations Over the past decade, algorithmic accountability has become an important concern for social scientists, computer scientists, journalists, and lawyers. Exposés have […]
Against Economics
David Graeber reviews Money and Government: The Past and Future of Economics by Robert Skidelsky Mainstream economists nowadays might not be particularly good at predicting financial crashes, facilitating general prosperity, or coming up with models for preventing climate change, but when it comes to establishing themselves in positions of intellectual authority, unaffected by such failings, their […]
The rise of microchipping: are we ready for technology to get under the skin?
As implants grow more common, experts fear surveillance and exploitation of workers. Advocates say the concerns are irrational “It was like my body was online,” he said. “It was my very own Johnny Mnemonic moment.” On 1 August 2017, workers at Three Square Market, a Wisconsin-based company specializing in vending machines, lined up in the office cafeteria to be […]
Putting the ‘I’ in science
Chris Lintott’s chronicle of the booming citizen-science project Zooniverse is inspirational, finds Michael West. The Crowd and the Cosmos: Adventures in the Zooniverse Chris Lintott Oxford University Press (2019) Citizen science is booming. Today, anyone with a computer or a smartphone can participate in research in astronomy, oceanography, medicine, zoology and beyond. With such studies no longer […]
The British Digital Cooperative: A New Model Public Sector Institution
Commercial platforms cannot prioritise the ideals of a liberal public sphere, much less the principle of popular sovereignty, over the profit motive. Introduction The information technology sector broadly defined is now at the leading edge of the capitalist system. Material production and distribution, enterprise and professional management, finance, insurance and real estate are all increasingly […]