Consent of the Networked; Open Government Data for Open Accountability; Connected Democracy

Harvard-MIT-Yale Cyberscholar Working Group

Wednesday, February 1st, 6:00pm ET, Berkman Center for Internet & Society, 23 Everett St, Cambridge, MA.

The "Harvard-MIT-Yale Cyberscholar Working Group" is a forum for fellows and affiliates of the MIT, Yale Law School Information Society Project, and the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University to discuss their ongoing research. This month's presentations will include: Jennifer Shkabatur on "Transparency with(out) Accountability: The Effects of the Internet on the Administrative State" and more. RSVP Required. more information on our website>

Consent of the Networked: The Worldwide Struggle for Internet Freedom

Thursday, February 2, 6:00pm ET, MIT Media Lab. This event is co-sponsored by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society and the Center for Civic Media at MIT.

A global struggle for control of the Internet is now underway. At stake are no less than civil liberties, privacy and even the character of democracy in the 21st century. Many commentators have debated whether the Internet is ultimately a force for freedom of expression and political liberation, or for alienation, and repression. It is time to stop arguing over whether the Internet empowers individuals and societies, and address the more fundamental and urgent question of how technology should be structured and governed to support the rights and liberties of all the world’s Internet users. In her timely book, Rebecca MacKinnon warns that a convergence of unchecked government actions and unaccountable company practices is threatening the future of democracy and human rights around the world. Consent of the Networked is a call to action: Our freedom in the Internet age depends on whether we defend our rights on digital platforms and networks in the same way that people fight for their rights and accountable governance in physical communities and nations. It is time to stop thinking of ourselves as passive “users” of technology and instead act like citizens of the Internet – as netizens – and take ownership and responsibility for our digital future. Rebecca MacKinnon is a Bernard L. Schwartz Senior Fellow at the New America Foundation, where she conducts research, writing and advocacy on global Internet policy, free expression, and the impact of digital technologies on human rights. She is cofounder of Global Voices, an international citizen media network. She also serves on the Boards of Directors of the Committee to Protect Journalists and the Global Network Initiative. RSVP Required. more information on our website>

Open Government Data for Open Accountability

Tuesday, February 7, 12:30pm ET, Berkman Center for Internet & Society, 23 Everett St, Cambridge, MA. This event will be webcast live.

Over the past decade 'transparency' has become one of those key words in the debates on modern governance. A pervasive cliché captured by the rhetoric of politics, which has raised 'transparency' as a perfect paracetamol to potentially remedy problems as diverse as accountability, growth, public service delivery and participation. For years, the cornerstone of transparency policies has been the 'Freedom of Information Act', a regulation that since the mid 1960's has spread from 3 to nearly 80 countries around the globe, but which maybe increasingly gaining obsolesce in the context of the digital age. Open Government Data policy, is the latest chapter of the transparency story. It is moving the paradigm from 'access to public documentation' (FOIA) towards 'access to public data', avoiding obsolesce, and keeping up to date our right to access public information that increasingly flows through a digital ecosystem. Though the implementation of Open Data policies is likely to impact a diverse variety of sectors, 'accountability' is certainly one of the main domains of impact. The bursting rise and spread of online accountability tools and watch-dogs such as the Sunlight Foundation (US.), MySociety (UK), Ushahidi (Kenya), and Ciudadano Inteligente (Chile), are good examples of how the web is creating a more powerful sort of open and crowd sourced accountability. More eyes now rest upon government, the question is 'how' (if) does this matter. The talk will quickly overview the spread of transparency policy through freedom of information regulation, and point out to the rise of 'Open Government Data' as the latest chapter of the transparency story, highlighting how it potentially may impact 'open accountability' and the rise of a new breed of online watchdogs. Felipe Heusser is a Berkman Center fellow and is the Founder and Director of Fundación Ciudadano Inteligente, a Latin American NGO based in Chile that uses information technology to promote transparency and active citizen participation. RSVP Required. more information on our website>

Connecting Democracy: Online Consultation and the Flow of Political Communication

Tuesday, February 7, 6:00pm ET, Austin Hall, Harvard Law School. This event is co-sponsored by the Harvard Law School Library and Berkman Center for Internet & Society.

A Panel Discussion about Connecting Democracy: Online Consultation and the Flow of Political Communication with Peter Shane, Jacob E. Davis and Jacob E. Davis II Chair in Law at the Ohio State University and Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School Library (co-editor of the book); David Lazer, Associate Professor, College of Computer and Information Science, Northeastern University; Ethan Zuckerman, Director of the Center for Civic Media at MIT; Matthew Baum, Marvin Kalb Professor of Global Communications, Professor of Public Policy, Shorenstein Center, Harvard Kennedy School of Government; John Palfrey, Berkman Faculty Co-Director, Henry N. Ess III Professor of Law, Vice Dean, Library and Information Resources, Harvard Law School RSVP Required. more information on our website>

Mate Choice in an Online Dating Site

Tuesday, February 14, 12:30pm ET, Berkman Center for Internet & Society, 23 Everett St, Cambridge, MA. This event will be webcast live.

The 21st century has witnessed a transformation of the American dating scene: Online dating—previously a marginalized social practice—has skyrocketed in popularity to become one of the primary ways that singles meet and mate today. While clearly an empirical topic worthy of study in its own right, data from online dating sites also offer an unprecedented opportunity to address questions of longstanding interest to social scientists. In this talk, I introduce a new social network dataset based on behavioral data from a popular online dating site; discuss the utility of these data for understanding the shape of contemporary stratification systems; and provide a first look at the dynamics of inequality, exclusion, and gender asymmetry that characterize the early stages of mate choice. Kevin Lewis is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Sociology and a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society. RSVP Required. more information on our website>

Beth Kolko on Hackademia: Leveraging the Conflict Between Expertise and Innovation to Create Disruptive Technologies

How and why do nonexperts contribute to innovation? The conflict between expertise and innovation sits uneasily in academia, where the enterprise hinges on doling out official credentials. But a lack of expertise can in fact drive people to create the kind of disruptive technologies that really are game-changers. In this presentation Beth Kolko — Professor in the Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering at the University of Washington — connects the hacking and making/DIY communities at the point of disruptive technologies, demonstrating how the lack of institutional affiliation and formal credentials within each community opens up the space for creative problem-solving approaches. video/audio on our website>

Andres Monroy-Hernandez on Designing for Remixing: Computer-supported Social Creativity

The Scratch Online Community allows young people to share and remix their own video games and animations, as well as those of their peers. In four years, the community has grown to close to a million registered members and more than two million user-contributed projects. Andrés Monroy-Hernández — the developer of Scratch, a post-doctoral researcher at Microsoft Research, and Berkman Fellow — presents a framework for the design and study of an online community of amateur creators, focusing on remixing as a lens to understand the social, cultural, and technical structures of a social computing system that supports creative expression. video/audio on our website>