Author: Margarita Osipian

The Great American Meme Off – Democrats vs. Trumpists on TikTok

Josephine Oettle

Josephine Oettle exploring how the 2020 US elections shaped the new meme war on TikTok.

Josephine Oettle is a freelance writer and communication specialist, who completed her master’s degree in New Media and Digital Culture at the University of Amsterdam in 2020. As a researcher in new media and digital culture, she specializes on TikTok, popular & youth culture and (political) subcultures online.

Perfect Sync: Mapping TikToks through video collage

Sjef van Beers

Sjef van Beers creating video collages to map the world of TikTok.

Sjef van Beers is an artist whose work focuses on technology and the internet. He looks for loopholes in the digital media we use on a daily basis to dissect and rearrange them. 

The Self Design Committee: How a face filter might or might not democratize self-design

Noam Youngrak Son

In our image contribution, designer Noam Youngrak Son moves away from the selfie as an individual experience and explores the creation of a multiplicious identity.

Noam Youngrak Son inscribes myths for the underrepresented in various mediums, from books to performances to 3D printed sex toys. They are excited about the unexpectedness that a well-designed fiction can open up, and the critical political discussions that it may cultivate. They use their capability as a designer to visualize and materialize the setup for the technological & ecological bodies in their fiction to play roles in.

Space, people, and the digital extensions of protest

Ola Hassanain

An essay by Ola Hassanain. Ola zooms into the urbanscape of Khartoum under the recent revolution in Sudan and speculates on the role of social media platforms in the collective reimagining of space.

About Ola: Ola Hassanain’s videos, texts, performances and installation-based photographic work produces intriguing layered artwork that is informed by the cultural, political, and societal position of people in Khartoum, including her own experiences and her family’s diaspora. When her family scattered across the globe due to economic collapse in Sudan, her fascination with the ways the built environment reflects, responds to, and shapes the lives of those who inhabit it increased. Her most recent work explores the idea of “space as discourse,” an expanded notion of space that encompasses political and environmental questions. Hassanain’s honors include the University of Westminster’s Quintin Hogg Trust scholarship, a BAK–basis voor actuele kunst fellowship, and a Prince Claus Fund for Culture and Development grant. Hassanaian lives and works in Khartoum and Utrecht, and is currently a PhD candidate at the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna.

TikTok: Copycat Culture as the New Cool

Linda Duits

An essay by Linda Duits. Linda dives into the world of TikTok. She emerged with insights on the shifting definition of cool, copycat culture, and the transfer of global power.

About Linda: Linda Duits is a social scientist specialized in popular culture. She writes columns for Folia and Brainwash, and regularly appears in the media as an expert on youth culture. She is an affiliated researcher with the Institute for Cultural Inquiry of Utrecht University.

A User’s Guide to Not Getting Used

Anna Reutinger

An essay by Anna Reutinger. Anna offers tips and tricks to bypass the digital detox, subvert functionality, mess with your data, and shift power back to the user.

About Anna: Anna Reutinger is a sculptor originally from California, living and working in Berlin. Reutinger’s work subverts the position of the digital-native-global-citizen by soothing digitally induced anxieties and providing coping mechanisms to apocalyptic inevitabilities through a return to craft and empathy. She received her M.F.A. in Dirty Art from the Sandberg Instituut in Amsterdam, and her B.A. in Design Media Arts and Digital Humanities from UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles). Her work has been exhibited at the Saint Etienne Biennale, FR; Jan van Eyck Academie, W139, Ram Foundation, De Fabriek, NL; Macao, Milan, IT; The Hammer Museum, The Getty Center, The New Wight Gallery, Chin’s Push and Control Room, Los Angeles, US. 

The Simulated Real: Roleplaying Terrorism in Gaming

Salvador Miranda

An essay by Salvador Miranda. Salvador explores the experience of roleplaying terrorism in gaming. Where does this desire come from and what does it say about how we construct our own identities?

Double tapping on the white walls of the museum

Manique Hendricks

An essay by Manique Hendricks. Manique shares her views on the ways in which museums and their visitors make use of Instagram and the impact this growing social media platform has on the art world.

About Manique: Manique Hendricks (1992) is an art historian. She works at LIMA, the institute for media art in Amsterdam and is affiliated with Kunstfort bij Vijfhuizen and art platform 37PK. Manique is part of the team of curators at We Are Public and organizes exhibitions and events with Sugar Pop Institute. As a freelancer she conducts research, writes, curates and coordinates projects. Her work focuses on contemporary (media) art, visual- and digital culture and theme’s as identity, representation, camp and club culture

Is Article 13 really the end of the open internet?

Joe McNamee

An essay by Joe McNamee. Joe elaborates on the potential impact of the copyright law Article 13 on artists and content providers.

About Joe: Joe McNamee, former Executive Director of European Digital Rights (EDRi), claimed a space in Brussels and the heart of the European Union for digital fundamental rights to be heard. EDRi has fought excessive copyright regulations in the EU—most recently against Articles 13 and 11. EDRi has also worked for Europe’s net neutrality rules, against privatised law enforcement, and was instrumental in the bruising lobbying battle over the GDPR, the “General Data Protection Regulation” that increased digital privacy for people in Europe and beyond. McNamee joined EDRi in 2009, at a time when there were no digital rights advocacy groups based in Brussels, despite the importance of EU decision-making for global digital freedom. During the nine years since, EDRi has grown to become an established part of digital rights policy-making. Prior to joining EDRi, McNamee worked for eleven years on Internet policy, including for the European Internet Services Providers Association. He started his Internet career working on the CompuServe UK helpdesk in 1995.