Gabriella Coleman: Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy: The Many Faces of Anonymous (2014)

“A book on the worldwide movement of hackers, pranksters, and activists that operates under the non-name Anonymous.

Half a dozen years ago, anthropologist Gabriella Coleman set out to study the rise of this global phenomenon just as some of its members were turning to political protest and disruption (before Anonymous emerged as a player in the battles over WikiLeaks, the Arab Spring, and Occupy Wall Street). She ended up becoming closely connected to Anonymous and the story of her inside-outside status as Anon confidante, interpreter, and erstwhile mouthpiece forms one of the themes of this engrossing book.

The narrative brims with details unearthed from within a notoriously mysterious subculture, whose best-known tricksters – such as Topiary, tflow, Anachaos, and Sabu – emerge as complex, diverse, politically and culturally sophisticated people. Propelled by years of chats and encounters with a multitude of hackers, including imprisoned activist Jeremy Hammond and the double agent who helped put him away, Hector Monsegur, Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy is filled with insights about digital activism and little understood facets of culture in the Internet age, including the history of “trolling,” the ethics and metaphysics of hacking, and the origins and manifold meanings of “the lulz.””

Publisher Verso Books, London and New York, November 2014
Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license
ISBN 1781685835, 9781781685839
452 pages
via Marcell

Reviews: Astra Taylor (Bookforum, 2014), Jamie Bartlett (Guardian, 2014), Hannah Kuchler (Financial Times, 2014), David Gilbert (IB Business Times, 2014), Haley Mlotek (National Post, 2014), Publishers Weekly (2014), Kirkus Reviews (2014), Nathalie Maréchal (Int’l J of Communication, 2015), Maxigas (Krisis, 2015).

Commentary: João Biehl & Naomi Zucker, Haidy Geismar, Adam Fish & Luca Follis, Tom Boellstorff, Gabriella Coleman (J Ethnographic Theory book symposium, 2015).

Debate with Gabriella Coleman, Cory Doctorow and James Bridle, London, 4 Nov

Publisher
WorldCat

PDF
EPUB

Journal of Peer Production, 5: Shared Machine Shops (2014)

“Despite the marketing clangour of the “maker movement”, shared machine shops are currently “fringe phenomena” since they play a minor role in the production of wealth, knowledge, political consensus and the social organisation of life. Interestingly, however, they also prominently share the core transformations experienced in contemporary capitalism. The convergence of work, labour and other aspects of life — the rapid development of algorithmically driven technical systems and their intensifying role in social organisation — the practical and legitimation crisis of institutions, echoed by renewed attempts at self-organisation.

Each article in this special issue addresses a received truth which circulates unreflected amongst both academics analysing these phenomena and practitioners engaged in the respective scenes. Questioning such myths based on empirical research founded on a rigorous theoretical framework is what a journal such as the Journal of Peer Production can contribute to both academic and activist discourses. Shared machine shops have been around for at least a decade or so, which makes for a good time to evaluate how they live up to their self-professed social missions.”

Edited by Maxigas and Peter Troxler
Published in October 2014
Open Access
ISSN 2213-5316

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Ada 5: Queer Feminist Media Praxis (2014)

“Alexandra Juhasz’s work on feminist media praxis together with Aristea Fotopoulou’s work on contemporary digital media, feminism and queer studies structured the theme of this issue. We were interested in exploring what the concept of praxis could offer in our thinking about the intersections of gender, digital media, and technology. Praxis in both Marxist and in Arendtian political thought brings together theory, philosophy and political action into the realm of the everyday. Inspired from this premise, and continuing the conversations that started during the workshop, we focus here on the conditions for a queer feminist digital media praxis.” (from the Introduction)

Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology, Issue 5
Edited by Aristea Fotopoulou, Kate O’Riordan, and Alexandra Juhasz
Publisher University of Oregon Libraries
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License
ISSN 2325-0496

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HTML (at Fembotcollective.org)