post-privacy age

Debates about privacy in media environments, particularly the online world, burn as strongly as they ever have. 

Some even contend that we are already in a post-privacy age, with the development of professional and personal interactions and relations through social media and the melding of the two spheres, manifest, for example, in forms of immaterial labour. 

Concerns are expressed about surveillance, the treatment of protest by the State, and abandonment of respect for privacy by commercial organisations.  Yet, high profile dissenting organisations and analysts, such as Wikileaks, IndyMedia and The Invisible Committee, for example – provide evidence of a more complex, contested environment. 

Wikileaks’s maxim “privacy for individuals and transparency for institutions” is suggestive of a new paradigm of what must be private, and what will be public.

Digital movements

The role of social media in the development of contemporary social movements, such as the 'Arab spring' or the Indignados, has been decisive. Social media are useful instruments to coordinate national and international actions, and they have become essential to keep up with the latest news about different movements.
Nevertheless, we should take a step back from the focus on social media and think about it as yet another available tool in the development of social movements. While Castells (2009) states that recent technological changes have allowed new actors to enter the global network society, other authors argue that we need to pay attention to the physical and emotional aspects of social movements. Collins (2001), for instance, points out that the level of critical mass involved in social movements depends on emotional dynamics, and that it is in the physical assembly of people where a sense of collective awareness develops.

After all, the digital divide is still a reality and, as activists involved in the 15M actions in 2011 point out, the initial web-based operation turned into a vast street-based campaign which included the use of posters, debates and word of mouth (Gerbaudo, 2012: 89). The need to become visible in the streets came from the fact that millions of citizens are still cut off from the online campaigns carried out on social media.

Emerging cultural practices

Some ideas for researchers related to emerging cultural practices:
 • New emerging cultural and communication practices with a capacity for promoting social change.
 • New cultural macro narratives: cooperation versus competitiveness, horizontality in contrast to hierarchy, communality or public deliberation.
• Subjectivity and collectivity in the context of the new cultural practices of dissidence.
 • The current impact of Gramscian and neo-Marxist thought applied to discursive practices or the cultural industries in the current context of crisis.
• Humour as a discourse of resistance: new formats and practices.
• Novel artistic and academic practices for building a new hegemony.
 • Political economy and appropriation of social networks: YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.
• Cyber-activism and the concept of the Rhizome applied to new forms of political, social and communication action.
• Transparency as a dissident space: from data journalism to WikiLeaks
• Consumption patterns of the discourses of resistance, propaganda and counter-propaganda.
• Visualization practices of discontent and self-contention in TV, the press and advertising.

Digital historical games

Given the massive commercial successes of the medium in recent years, digital historical games (i.e. games that utilise historical settings) have rapidly become one of the most widespread and successful forms of popular history. This, alongside their chosen historical content, makes them potentially highly influential histories that are generally experienced in informal settings. Similarly, the possibilities of a new form of history also raises interesting new questions for formal educational settings that must be answered. Despite, the widespread nature of games as cultural products, historical game studies (though benefitting from disciplinary diversity and featuring much good research) is still a somewhat scattered and incoherent field that can therefore be difficult for students to access. The Historical Representation in Games course pulls these strands together into a unified curriculum that provides a foundational basis for approaching historical games (both digital and non-digital) and exploring their possibilities and limitations as a form of history.

The internet of things!

The Internet of Things (IoT) is an umbrella term used to describe a next step in the evolution of the Internet. While the first phase of the web can be thought of as a combination of an internet of hyper-text documents and an internet of applications (think blogs, online email, social sites, etc.), one of the next steps is an Internet of augmented ‘smart’ objects – or ‘things’ – being accessible to human beings and each other over network connections. This is the internet of Things!

E-tivity

E-tivity is a term coined by Professor Gilly Salmon (2002) to describe a framework for facilitating active learning in an online environemt. An E-tivity involves learners interacting with oneanother and with the course tutor (who Salmon refers to as the e-moderator) in an online communication environment (e.g bulletin board/chat room) in order to complete a particular task.

E-tivities generally involve the tutor providing a small piece of information, stimulus or challenge, which Salmon refers to as the 'spark'. Learners then take part in an online discussion or activity which requires them to respond in some way to the 'spark'. This generally involves each learner proving an individual response and then commenting on, or contributing to, that presented by other group/course members. A summary, feedback or critique is then provided, often by the e-moderator but in some cases it may be provided by the learners themselves.

Open Data

In efforts to increase openness, transparency and participation, governments around the world have drafted Open Government policies and established Open Data as an integral part of modern administration.

 Open data and public sector information has been held out as a powerful resource to support good governance, improve public services, engage citizens, and stimulate economic growth.

The promises have been high, but the results have been modest so far and more and there are more and more critical sounds. Policies have not resulted in gaining the desired benefits and implementations have been criticized for its technology orientation and neglecting the user perspective. 

These policies and implementations are now under scrutiny, with important questions to be asked about: whether the results justify the efforts; about how different outcomes from open data can be secured; and who is benefiting from open data in different countries and contexts?In efforts to increase openness, transparency and participation,governments around the world have drafted Open Government policies and established Open Data as an integral part of modern administration.

Open data and public sector information has been held out as a powerful resource to support good governance, improve public services, engage citizens, and stimulate economic growth. The promises have been high, but the results have been modest so far and more and there are more and more critical sounds.

Policies have not resulted in gaining the desired benefits and implementations have been criticized for its technology orientation and neglecting the user perspective. These policies and implementations are now under scrutiny, with important questions to be asked about: whether the results justify the efforts; about how different outcomes from open data can be secured; and who is benefiting from open data in different countries and contexts?