Fing’in

Unconferences seem a lot like conferences. Guys at a table talking with big ol slides behind them. But this one is in Provence, and out the back door there is an amazing blue sky and a forest full of singing birds. The conference is held in a villa. I am stunned, and more stunned by the fact that I know people here — it’s as if I have been absorbed into another kind of identity.

There has been a lot of discususion here about the slipperyness between public and private, the creation of tribes, (what my economist friends call closed networks) and persistent networks of friends and “communities” — which seem to be a new form that companies have identified as a market. There was a very interesting presentation on the spontaneous organization and innovation that produced Bittorrent, and a lot of sociological analysis by theoretical French academics about the shifts in public and private space.

But what I am getting, and what I am working on in my research project, is the instability of this format, of this space between the organized, regulated, and top-down, and the individual in the world. It feels like the individual is disappearing as a social actor, in favour of some kind of perpetual gang of folks with weak ties to one another. What is the significance of this intermediary space between mass culture and the individual? If the marketers (and the economists) are already sure that this exists, how do we understand the social consequences? Does capitalism get reorganized? How do we make policy? And, most importantly, is there any indication about how to manage this shift (if it is really one) for the benefit of others beside the telecom and computer companies.

UP! To Provence

I am off next weekend to a hilariously titled conference: the UPFING! Actually, it’s subtitled the EntreNet, and is a one of these “UN-conferences” where everyone is thoretically a participant. But the thematic looks interesting — what happens in between the dynamics of “bottom up” and “top-down” and how do associative technologies play an ambivalent role in mediating these dynamics. Also, it’s in Provence, which will get me out of the city.

In the rest of my life, I see a daily opposition between the rigidly bureaucratic structures imposed by the last vestiges of a French aristocracy, and the inclusive, chaotic “mani”res de faire” of people forced to live with a public service that is not interested in providing service but in providing stable jobs. With an unemployment rate of 12% there is enormous pressure to get in to the bureaucracy, and enormous stress for the rest of the people on the margins. So the tension between “top-down” and “bottom-up” is really lived, everywhere from the swimming pool the the post office. More on this later.

Paris

Yes, Paris for the summer. Everyone said it would be wonderful, and it is. But not exactly in the way I expected. I am working on a research contract for the summer at the Ecole Nationale Superieure de Telecom where I work with some economists who are trying to convince me that the new left uses statistics. I run into culture shocks everywhere, but especially intellectually. In France, serious thematics of race and gender in the social sciences are viewed with confusion. After all, the Republic is based on equality, so why look at difference?

Like working as a qualitative researcher in a quantiative department, and as a “sociologist” (closest approximation of my work) among economists, this disjuncture between my surroundings and my own practice is very productive. It makes me rethink where I am coming from, what the implications are of my politics and my practice.

Oh, and I am working on a historically-informed study of telecommunications as public and private — looking at the telephone, the radio, and WiFi. How do people negotiate public and private practices? What is the role of policy making? Of local culture? Of regulation? I have a little side project about ad-hoc WiFi devices, too. Fun stuff — and probably the last time I get to work on side projects before writing my thesis.

Happy International Women’s Day

Was I born a feminist, or am I always growing into being one? Sure, I was born a woman, but as we all know, that’s neither a necessary nor sufficient condition for being a feminist. Many women won’t or can’t call themselves feminists. My brothers and some good male friends are what I would call feminists, in that they are aware of their inherent privilege, work to live with it and to mobilize it against injustices (individual, systemic) that affect women.

I am a feminist myself in that I try to do this too, even though I sometimes find myself unwittingly participating in situations where sexism and patriarchy are reinforced. In these moments I remember that being feminist is not about proclamation, but about action — beginning in our everyday lives and practices but grounded in social justice. So, today, on International Women’s Day, I would like to provide some reminders of why we, women and men, still need feminism. For our bodies, our selves, our work and our lives.

Work – The theory side

Community Wireless Networks and Open-Source Software Development as forms of Civic Engagement?

Thank you to
Steph and Mike for their assistance in producing this. My apologies for not updating this post sooner

Technology development as civic engagement?
Faced with Putnam’s (2000) chilling evocation of a society where mediated relationships have us bowling alone, philosophers of technology and community informatics researchers have explored the potential for online communities and virtual engagement to fill the gap (see Feenberg and Barney, 2004). Yet the ability of ICTs to promote participation in one’s community may come from building, not using them. Community wireless networks use wireless internet technology to create alternative communications infrastructure. In Montreal, the community wireless network Ile Sans Fil (ISF) demonstrates how building this infrastructure also acts as a way to engage groups of people who might otherwise not participate in the civic life of their community. It also provides an opportunity to rethink the parameters of democratic participation.

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Work – the community side

Although it doesn’t always look like it, I have a long professional relationship with Ile Sans Fil. Here are the results of an intervention I conducted with the people who use their hotspots. Thank you to everyone who participated in the research project.

I. Executive Summary

Interviews with Ile Sans Fil users and analyses of their everyday practices reveals that most users are still ISF’s systems are relatively easy to use, but still require interpretation for most users. Users see different advantages to ISF services, but primarily the fact that they are free and available in locations that are convenient. Many reported that they changed their everyday behavior to use wireless, and saw public wireless as a very important service. Surprisingly, many used ISF signals in places other than where they were provided, as long as the location was convenient to them. Even though they didn’t necessarily believe in the power of ISF to create virtual communities in hyper-local spaces, they all felt that they were connected with the ISF project. They wanted to know more about the group and its mandate

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changing the world

I talked to two great friends yesterday. One is building water pipelines in Haiti; the other is starting to work for a human rights law prof on a project to help migrant workers in Quebec. At the same time, I am trying to develop the theoretical relevance of my thesis topic , which seems so far from this kind of direct, hands-on action as to be almost meaningless.

This is the burden: we know the world is a fantastically unequal place. If we have any sense of justice, we feel responsible for alleviating, in some way at least, that inequality (or guilty at participating in it). But for me, and I think for many people, this responsibility/guilt is frustrating. How to alleviate the inequality? I am not a lawyer, nor an engineer, nor even particularly skilled in much of anything. What to do? I have been wallowing in guilt so far, but this doesn’t seem very productive.

So, as part of the beginnings of a new year, I resolve to find a way to make my own community a less unequal place. If any of you know of good volunteer opportunities for the verbose but unskilled, please let me know. And to my friends who are on the world’s front lines, take heart. I am proud of you.

(RE(re))penser la technique

Two quotations:

“Since the Industrial Revolution, society and culture have been subservient to technology. One of the compelling tasks today is to reverse the process and make technology serve culture and society.”
– Ben Bagdikian (1992)

“To the extent that technology is swept into the democratic movement of history, we can hope to inhabit a very different future from the one projected by essentialist critique. In that future technology is not a fate one must choose for or against, but a challenge to political and social creativity.”
– Andrew Feenberg (1999)

I keep hearing this talk of technology holding values, or of technology waiting for the proper values (democracy, progressive thought, community spirit) to be inscribed upon it or co-created with it. This is wonderful, but I wonder, even if these values are inscribed, will they mean anything to the people who consume, practice, use the technology?

Yesterday after my computer crashed for the 4700th time I noticed that its UNIX OS was still copyrighted to UC Berkeley. Of course, I know my history, but this fact (which brings with it certain values, doesn’t it?) was locked into the black box of my machine. I suspect my curious suprise would have been of a similar, but no less limited type if I had discovered my computer was running Linux. What comes through to the user? What kind of democracy operates shrouded in steel? What do the glorious proclamations mean once the box is closed?

In other news I am trying to write a first draft of my thesis project. Scarier than skydiving.

. . . and on the mountain

Away from the books, Saturdays are a heady mix of sun, snow, mud, leaves and sky, with excellent and charming company to boot. From theory — “wait, hasn’t Latour gone back on actor-network theory – oh, watch out for that tree” – to practice — “Technology is useless! Do you have the trail map?” – it’s a pleasure to play. Thank you to Antoine, Steph, Anne, Agn”s and Eric for proof that there’s more to life than the city.

defining myself in the library stacks . . .

I came home from the library today with the following:

Hackers (Steven Levy)
Doing IT: Women working in information technology (Krista Scott-Dixon)
Silicon Valley, Women, and the California Dream (Glenna Matthews)
Love, Power and Knowledge: Towards a feminist transformation of the sciences (Hilary Rose)

I am trying to make sense of how I came to be a woman working in the man’s world of hacking, free software, and community technology, and also of the implications of where I have positioned myself in that world – outside, as an engaged and yet critical observer. This is in some ways a gendered position (I am not by any means “one of the guys”) but it is a negotiated one, as the critical position also brings with it certain power, or as Donna Haraway argues, the trial and privilege of the “partial perspective.”

Then I got this article from a friend. According to it, my chances of getting married go down as my IQ goes up, regardless of whether I’m comfortably holed up in the pink ghetto of the marketing department or butting heads in tech or R&D. Apparently, men are just plain intimidated by smart successful women, and feminism’s promises are perceived as not only wrong, but counter to evolution. I hope that the troubling social changes the article points to are taken as an indication of the necessity for feminism and not its irrelevance.