New academic business model alert! My OUP book, Angels of Efficiency: A Media History of Consulting (partly on training films), was used as training data for an anthropic AI model that the company stole from a Pirate Bay–style database of books. I will receive a share of the $1.5 billion settlement.

Join us Today and Tomorrow for the two media studies Panels „Behind the Scenes. The materiality of Images“at the Swiss History Days in Lucern. www.geschichtstage.ch

As I said:

Just curious, what’s the tariff on a $400 million jet from Qatar?

In December I co-organized the Harvard Frankfurt www.aftersurveillance.info conference. In our introduction, Moira Weigel and I claimed that Palanir is not a surveillance company, but something else. This claim has just been proven. www.wired.com/story/palant...

Not sure if there is anything left to improve.

SCOOP: DOGE is hosting a “hackathon” in DC next week with the goal of building one “mega API” for accessing all IRS data. Palantir has been brought up as a potential partner. www.wired.com/story/doge-h...

Sleepwalking on steroids

deutsche akademiker:innen im völlig stellenbefreiten wissenschaftsbetrieb beim lesen der vielen hoffnungsvollen op eds, dass der brain drain aus den usa nach deutschland beginnen könnte

Palantir might go Germany, nationwide. Political Initiative that the Software should become Standard Solution for German Police.

RIP. What a legend. One of the few who was as brilliant as he was nice and generous, a genuine rarity in academia.

They're called public records for a reason. Starting today, WIRED will *stop paywalling* articles that are primarily based on public records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, becoming the first publication to partner with @freedom.press to offer this for our new coverage.

🚨to all the digital rights policy people: Industrial applications of #AI (+the cloud) is where it’s at! Were so hung up on social media and direct business to consumer AI, that we overlook the massive transformation that’s happening across entire industries

Germany, USA, everywhere …

Not that I'm particularly Habermasian, but both @forbes.com and @faznet.bsky.social articles can be misinterpreted to mean that Alex C. Karp did his doctorate under Habermas. Nope. Was turned down by Habermas and (!) Luhmann; ended up with some psychoanalysts from the Sigmund Freud Institute.

Beyond surveillance…

Cybernetics aftermath…

Ich war in den 1990ern als Weikersheimer Bürger Teilnehmer einer Jahrestagung des Studienzentrums. Grund für die Öffnung für die Weikersheimer Öffentlichkeit war die Stimmung gegen das Studienzentrum. Das Personal der Panels und deren Atmosphäre war gespenstisch, wie eben heute das der AfD.

OpenAI furious DeepSeek might have stolen all the data OpenAI stole from us 🔗 www.404media.co/openai-furio...

before tiktok, before bluesky, before twitter, before meta, before it all, there were sewers. after all, there will be sewers.

first ever bootleg DVD purchase in my life, 2002 on a black market in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

It's only cancel culture if it originates in the Cancelle region in France. Everything else is just sparkling consequences.

Next Week: The Harvard - Frankfurt Conference I co-organized with Moira Weigel "After Surveillance. Digital Intermediaries of Confidence, Security, and Trust" Keynotes: Nicole Starosielski, UC Berkley, Nick Couldry, LSE details, abstracts, program: www.aftersurveillance.info

Golden Access but slightly different

Join us for the SCMS Nontheatrical Film and Media SIG Meeting this Saturday 3 PM, US CT; for Continental Europe this is the Late Night Slot @ 10PM

Die Crux u.a. von #eXit: Verändern (informelle) Handlungen digitale Ordnungen? Unser Workshop: @ameliehldt.bsky.social, Bundeskanzleramt, @joschkaselinger.bsky.social @servatius.bsky.social von @freiheitsrechte.org, Simon Schrör, @weizenbauminstitut.bsky.social, Jan-Felix Schrage, Jannis Lennartz

Heute in der FAZ: Unsere Kritik der Exzellenzstrategie, als Blick hinter die Fassade der Potemkinschen Dörfer, die für die Gutachtenden und Geldgeber errichtet werden. Wir wissen, wovon wir reden, denn wir arbeiten dort. Text ist online noch nicht verfügbar, deshalb erst mal ein screenshot.

Anybody interested in participating as an author for an online encyclopedia on film history project by FIAF, Louis B Mayer Foundation and George Eastman Museum click here: www.filmatlas.com/most-wanted

We just opened the Call for Papers for the Nontheatrical Student Essay Award 2025 in collaboration with The Moving Image (U. of Minnesota Press). Deadline: Feb 28, 2025 If you are thinking about submitting and have any questions, feel free to DM me. www.upress.umn.edu/journals/the...

Anybody experiencing (and solved) the „invalid handle“ Bluesky bug?

Internet studies people unite! Internet studies starter pack is here - incomplete, skewed etc etc but some fantastic folks, to help us all rebuild our social networks. Happy to add you if I left you out! Please circulate, and here it is: go.bsky.app/KHmxfWf

SCMS+ online book event, Thursday, Jan. 18th, 16:00-17:30 (Central European Time) I will talk about our book "Films that Work Harder. The Circulation of Industrial Film". register here for the event: cmstudies.org/page/SCMSplu... download book for free here: aup.nl/en/book/9789...

Films that work harder. Everything you ever wanted to know about the global circulation of industrial film. Out now 800+ pages, you can get it open access here library.oapen.org/handle/20.50... But why not consider spending an affordable 222 Euros for the coffee table book or bookshelf version?