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Opening the black box: The social construction of search engines Astrid Mager HUMlab, Ume University/ Sweden Lecture @ Wits School of Arts, University of the Witwatersrand/ Johannesburg, March 2011 Slide 2 HUMlab founded in 1997/ 2000 (studio space) meeting place for the humanities, culture and information technology/ Ume University, Sweden digital humanities work at the intersection of computing/ new media & humanities (social sciences) / Patrik Svensson International collaboration/ 2 year postdoc fellowships Slide 3 Googlization of Everything? (Vaidhyanathan) Joel Saget/Agence France-Presse Getty Images Microsoft Slide 4 Critique of search engines/ focus on implications - Googlepoly (Pasquinelli) / gatekeeper of knowledge -Algorithm: ordering of knowledge based on popularity/ scientometrics (Mayer) -Business Model service for profile/ surveillance (Elmer/ Rogers) http://landofthefreeish.com/ http://lonesailor.wordpress.com/ Slide 5 Opening the Black Box i)How are search engines socially constructed? - Who are the dominant actors shaping the technology? - What interests do they follow & what implications result from that? - What is expected from the future? ii) What information politics do search engines trigger? - How do search engines present, hierarchize, display their results? - Who succeeds in the battle for attention? - What broader consequences does this ordering mechanism trigger? Slide 6 Analysis I Slide 7 Analysis II Slide 8 Social construction of technology (SCOT) Basic idea: Innovation is not a linear process, but involves complex negotiations of actors/ interests Ordinary bicyle back then & now how did this happen? Stabilization in actor-network of engineers, different types of cyclists & industry within the societal context of the emancipation of women => Innovation develops in the context of economic & social relationships/ within society Skoda Museum, Chech Republic, photo by: Agnieszka Kwiecie Nova Slide 9 Core Actor-Network Slide 10 Universities Start-Ups Server FarmsWebsites SEO Money Interests Skills Technology Slide 11 Economic relations Universities Start-Ups Server FarmsWebsites SEO Money Interests Skills Technology Slide 12 Economic relations Universities Start-Ups Server FarmsWebsites SEO Money Interests Skills Technology Business Model Brand Value Advertising Spamming User Profiles Feed-Back Slide 13 Tensions & Negotiations information retrieval: "more data means better results" engineer: that improves the quality of the information (...) and makes your site actually more valuable critical scholar: ahm, yeah, I use Google constantly and I do love it, (...) it is a great search engine for giving me what I want Slide 14 Tensions & Negotiations politics: "it clearly concerns the business and they don't deny that" SEO: I mean there is dirty things you can do to make your website more prominent critical scholar: thats to worry, thats information we would not wanna have a state to have of us Slide 15 Information society/ economy Competitors Search Engines Facebook, Twitter & co. Mobile Technology Contracts User Data Slide 16 Information society/ economy Media Activists Hacker Open source community China Street View Competitors Search Engines Facebook, Twitter & co. Mobile Technology Contracts Education Civil society Alternatives User Data Slide 17 Information society/ economy Legislation Politics Nation states EU UNO FTC Media Activists Hacker Open source community China Street View Competitors Search Engines Facebook, Twitter & co. Mobile Technology Consumer/ Data Protection Contracts Education Civil society Alternatives User Data Slide 18 Information society/ economy Legislation Politics Nation states EU UNO FTC Media Activists Hacker Open source community China Street View Competitors Search Engines Facebook, Twitter & co. Mobile Technology Consumer/ Data Protection Contracts Education Civil society Alternatives New Actor? Controlling Institution Foundation data protection Mediator Custodian User Data Slide 19 First conclusions SCOT perspective shows that search technology is developed/ shaped/ stabilized in a complex actor-network Search engine may be seen as a location where societal values are negotiated Core network is dominated by an economic logic political, legal, cultural actors stabilize the actor-network through inaction Incorporates the ideology of the information economy/ capitalist society Search engine bias/ exploitation of collective intelligence (Pasquinelli)/ commercialization of knowledge Slide 20 Future developments? Not enough to blame the Googlepoly (Pasquinelli) understand the mechanisms behind power creation and stabilization understand that we are all part of the picture Future is not set open to debate and potential social intervention Questions to ask: Do we really want to leave the task of organizing the worlds information to a private firm with a clearly commercial agenda? Who else could/ should take part in the shaping of search technology/ the culture of search/ our access to knowledge/ construction of social reality? How could we as a society strengthen these actors & their interests? Slide 21 Further info/ contact Thanks for your attention! astrid.mager@humlab.umu.se http://www.notesfromastridmager.tk/