Events

Johannes M. Bauer, Broadband and educational achievements: disentangling a multifaceted relationship, 2021 GCTC Agriculture and Rural SuperCluster Workshop, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, July 21, 2021.   The program website is at https://ag.purdue.edu/digital-ag-resources/event/2021-gctc-agriculture-and-rural-supercluster-workshop/.   This is a hybrid event in which Purdue University is hosting the SuperCluster workshop for in-person participation onsite at Convergence Center, Purdue University and on Zoom.

Join us in person or via Zoom (sign up here).  A Rural Computing Research Consortium/Quello Center joint event. Drawn from the pages of Dr. Ali's new book, Farm Fresh Broadband: The Politics of Rural Connectivity (MIT Press, September 2021), this talk will focus on the politics, policies, and political economies that have prevented broadband from being systematically and democratically deployed in rural areas of the United States. Dr. Ali will describe and contrast the failure of federal rural broadband policy with the resilience and tenacity of local communities and counties who have connected themselves despite a regulatory system that ignores […]

Tiago S. Prado will present Effects of Big Tech Acquisitions on Start-up Funding and Innovation at the online 49th Research Conference on Communication, Information, and Internet Policy (TPRC49) on Friday, September 24, 10:30 AM. The paper is part of the Quello Center research project on Modeling and Measuring the Economic Impacts of Digital Platform Innovation. Quello Center Working Paper No. 04-21, available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3787127.

DIGITAL FUTURES WORKSHOP: Pablo J. Boczkowski at the Quello Center. Join us in person or via Zoom(sign up here).  Information overload is something that humans have dealt with for millennia. During different historical eras, massive increases in what was available to know has motivated the creation of systems for sorting, indexing, and compiling information as well as concerns that the abundance of information might cause cultural anxiety or even drive people to madness. The digital age has renewed concerns about information overload and the detrimental effects it has on our ability to sort through the stream of online data, decide […]

Please RSVP here or email quello@msu.edu Submit any questions to quello@msu.edu The Quello Center Information Seeking Project examines how information seeking from online and offline sources is associated with knowledge of dynamically evolving events. We use the COVID-19 pandemic as a case in point for a class of phenomena for which incomplete (scientific) information about the phenomenon interacts with misinformation and disinformation. How is reliance on different information sources associated with beliefs about the pandemic, knowledge about it, and behavioral intentions to engage in precautionary measures? We applied multiple theoretical and empirical models to data from nationally representative surveys in the United States (N=2,280) […]

Via Zoom  RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu A Rural Computing Research Consortium/Quello Center joint event. Precision agriculture (PA) has aided farmers, researchers, and agricultural technology providers (ATPs) with feeding a growing population with finite resources. By using remote sensing and other data collecting techniques, farmers can more precisely apply their inputs to maximize their yield. ATPs collect input and output data from farmers and use artificial intelligence and machine learning to build prescription maps which farmers can program farm equipment to follow. The use of PA has allowed farmers to use less resources, which saves money and reduces environmental impact. However, technology […]

  Prof. Dr. Natascha Just, Alena Birrer, MA, Danya He, MSc, Media & Internet Governance Division, Department of Communication and Media Research, University of Zurich Via Zoom | RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu Internationally dominant Internet platforms have established themselves as crucial intermediaries for opinion-forming content and have disrupted national media and communications markets. This raises new questions about the control of opinion power and media concentration in times of platformization. This talk presents findings from a cross-national study on the control of market and opinion power in five countries (Germany, Switzerland, Austria, UK, USA). It scrutinizes the current state of media-concentration control […]

  Sandra Braman, Abbott Professor of Liberal Arts, Department of Communication, Texas A&M University Via Zoom | RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu The Covid-19 pandemic provided an opportunity to examine how a medical emergency -- so different in kind from the national security emergencies we are accustomed to thinking about in this policy issue area -- affected information policy as broadly defined. The talk will provide an overview of information policy as legal epidemiology, examines the legal imaginaries of the pandemic as they appeared in the first five months, and positions those imaginaries relative to the longer trajectories of the evolution of information […]

Via Zoom | RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu People living with HIV in rural areas need to get to healthcare facilities and places where they can find nutritious food that are often located in other towns or cities. Thus, access to affordable and reliable forms of transportation to healthcare and food resources is critical for this population. Yet, the transportation needs of this vulnerable population are often underserved as public and private transportation services are limited in rural areas. Ridesharing platforms have made it easier for people living in urban areas to get to work, grocery stores and healthcare providers. However, such technologies […]

Dr. Johannes Bauer will be speaking with Maria Alessandra Rossi, Maria Massaro, and Pier Luigi Parcu at a webinar organized by the International Telecommunications Society 5G development, implementation and disruptiveness continues to gather attention and debate among policymakers and researchers. 5G will provide the basis for digitization in many areas of our lives and will influence a broad spectrum of sectors. Full realisation of the Internet of Things (IoT), often called the next Industrial Revolution, relies on 5G development. At present, one estimate is that there will be up to 26 billion connected devices by 2026 (Ericsson, 2021). The global […]

https://youtu.be/a9GqncndRrw Amy S. Bruckman, Regents' Professor and Senior Associate Chair, School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology Via Zoom | RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu Social computing researchers increasingly need to question the nature of “truth” in our day-to-day work. In this talk, Dr. Bruckman will review ideas from philosophy, especially social epistemology, to give us practical, working definitions of “truth” and “knowledge.” Building on that, she examines the value of virtue epistemology (a combination of social epistemology and virtue ethics) to our research and teaching practice. Finally, exploring reasons why Wikipedia has been successful and broader lessons we can draw from […]

https://youtu.be/-6tslwD0LAo Rachel Kowert, Ph.D Research Director of Take This Keynote at Meaningful Play Conference | RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu In this talk, Dr. Kowert will explore the ways in which toxic behavior and toxic gamer cultures permeate beyond the virtual walls of our digital playgroups. This will include a discussion of the normalization of hate in gaming spaces and the games industry as well as overview who and how these actions are impacting. While toxic gamer culture is often downplayed or believed to live exclusively within online spaces, it has a radius of impact on mental health, workplace culture, and even extremism […]

https://youtu.be/Kqiv8s7AXZ0 David Clark, Senior Research Scientist at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Via Zoom | RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu Much attention today is focused on security challenges faced by computers attached to the Internet: system penetration, malware, ransomware, and so on. The security of the Internet itself seems to get less attention, but most of the key systems that make up the packet carriage layer of the Internet suffer from serious vulnerabilities that are exploited today be malicious actors. The Internet service is the foundation on top of which all applications are build, and these vulnerabilities can have an […]

Johannes M. Bauer, will share research on the governance of the digital economy at the Weizenbaum Institute online symposium New Perspectives on the Digital Economy: Sharing, Platforms & Regulation, Friday, December 2, 2022, 10:15 AM-6:46 PM CET. Specifically, his presentation An Information-Economic Perspective on Platform Governance, scheduled for 1 PM CET, will suggest a new conceptual framework for the design of digital platform policy that avoids some of the shortcomings of prevailing approaches. The full program is available at https://plamadiso.weizenbaum-institut.de/symposium-digital-economy/ and registration is free.

Johannes M. Bauer spoke at the national, invitation only, Broadband Leaders Summit in Miami, FL, on December 9, 2022. The presentation, titled "Broadband Opportunities Compass: Metrics to Monitor, Evaluate, and Guide State Broadband Policy", was based on work done by a national task force, initiated and co-coordinated by the Quello Center, on a theoretical and methodological framework for the monitoring of the effectiveness of the massive federal and state broadband infrastructure and digital equity investments.

Johannes M. Bauer will give an online seminar on Thursday, January 5, 11 AM-12 noon, on "The Return of the State into the Digital Economy". The seminar is organized jointly by the Center for Tele-Information at Columbia University and the International Media Management Academic Association. Participation is free, but registration is required at https://citiimmaabauer2023.eventbrite.com.

Joint event with the Weizenbaum Institute, Berlin Via WebEx | The panel is part of the Symposium on Innovation and Competition in the Digital Economy jointly organized by Prof. Johannes M. Bauer, Quello Center at Michigan State University, and Dr. Volker Stocker, Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society. The event will provide a stimulating venue for researchers from multiple fields, including economics/management and law, to discuss their work and perspectives on the roles of big tech for innovation and competition in the digital economy. Specifically, we would like to discuss the impact of big tech companies on competition and their […]

Join us in person, Communication Arts & Sciences Room 191 (South entrance) or via Zoom (sign up here). Event is Sponsored by the Rural Computing Research Consortium, Quello Center, American Indian and Indigenous Studies Program, and the Department of Computer Science and Engineering Rural places have experienced pernicious digital inequities for decades. Recent Pew Survey data finds that 28% of rural households in the US do not have broadband Internet access. For years, solutions to this digital divide have involved trillions of dollars invested into infrastructure that never quite bridges the gap. Instead of playing a perpetual game of technology […]

Via Zoom | So many of the debates about public policy and the digital economy revolve around issues that are social-cybernetic in nature. That is, they deal with control and communication, but not “in the animal and the machine,” as Norbert Wiener’s foundational definition of cybernetics would have it, but control and communication in social systems. AI applications are accused of reinforcing societal biases by replicating patterns that reflect past discriminatory decisions. We want to know how much of our social life can be automated or turned over to robots, and whether this increases or decreases our sense of control […]

Via Zoom | RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu When ignoring service terms and agreement implications, people contribute to an internet meme known as "the biggest lie on the internet" (said to be "I agree to the terms and conditions"). This talk will review research unpacking the meme. This includes survey research addressing policy ignoring behaviors, analyses of the length/complexity of service terms, and clickwrap user interface designs. Findings suggest deceptive designs like the clickwrap, and long/complicated policies contribute to ignoring behaviours. Findings also suggest privacy protective behaviors are viewed as tangential to service use goals. This is problematic as online consent processes […]

Via Zoom | Follow the link at the bottom to add to your calendar The first part of this presentation examines the emergent and sometimes paradoxical logic of the internet news ecosystem, in particular: (1) collectively, news diets have become far more concentrated in a small number of outlets; (2)  however, individuals have relatively diverse news diets-- almost certainly far more diverse than was plausible pre-Internet (as measured by number of unique content producers); (3) the social-algorithmic curation system of the Internet tends to point people to content with their preferences, sometimes in unlikely places. The greater diversity of consumption of news measured […]

Marcus Foth is a Professor of Urban Informatics in the School of Design and a Chief Investigator in the QUT Digital Media Research Centre (DMRC), Faculty of Creative Industries, Education, and Social Justice, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia. He is a founding member of the More-than-Human Futures research group. Marcus’ research brings together people, place, and technology. His current research foci include: urban media and geoprivacy; data care in smart cities; digital inclusion and participation; blockchain and food supply chains; and sustainability and more-than-human futures.

Via Zoom  RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu Evolving technologies are changing how young people learn and the kinds of work their parents do. These changes create uncertainty about how adults can ensure stability and mobility in the workforce today, and how to prepare for what they anticipate work will look like for their children in the future. How parents and children answer these questions is heavily influenced by their “technological timelines”: how they see their families and communities having been affected by technological changes past, present, and future. This presentation presents an in-depth view on how working-class Black and White families in […]

In Person in CAS Room 191 and Via Zoom  RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu A Rural Computing Research Consortium/Quello Center joint event. Responsible innovation can be helpful in the realm of developing climate-smart farming tools, where data-driven technologies, AI modeling, and localized farm data can enable climate adaptation and mitigation. However, to achieve benefits of these innovations for the public interest and for scaling up, it is imperative to cultivate trust among a range of actors and organizations across the food system value chain. This trust-building process necessitates the development of transparent pathways for converting raw data into actionable insights, a task that […]

Via Zoom  RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu Early in 2020, the use of telehealth for primary care exploded because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Funded by PCORI, their team launched an extensive set of quantitative and qualitative evaluations of this natural experiment and its impact on healthcare. Ancker will report on their findings about patient and provider experiences in three states on the basis of interviews and surveys, as well as a Medicare claims-based analysis of the effects of telehealth on preventable healthcare utilization. Jessica S. Ancker, MPH, PhD, is a professor of biomedical informatics and health policy at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. […]

Via Zoom - RSVP Here  The Quello Center 2024-2025 speaking series is co-hosted by the Information Policy Workshop and presents works-in-progress on topics covered by the Information Policy Book Series of The MIT Press. The series is co-organized by Sandra Braman and Keith Hampton. Proposals for presentations (and for books!) are welcome; please contact Sandra at bramansa@msu.edu if you are interested. All talks will be recorded and will be available to those who have registered. For a copy of the recording, please reach out to Ashley Wilson at wils1620@msu.edu In the wake of the end of the USSR, the Russian Internet initially developed […]

Via Zoom – RSVP Here  The Quello Center 2024-2025 speaking series is co-hosted by the Information Policy Workshop and presents works-in-progress on topics covered by the Information Policy Book Series of The MIT Press. The series is co-organized by Sandra Braman and Keith Hampton. Proposals for presentations (and for books!) are welcome; please contact Sandra at bramansa@msu.edu if you are interested. All talks will be recorded and will be available to those who have registered. For a copy of the recording, please reach out to Ashley Wilson at wils1620@msu.edu On a planet of waste, where whole populations and regions are written off as externalities, the notion […]

Via Zoom  RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu A Rural Computing Research Consortium/Quello Center joint event. Between June and September of 2024, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) accepted public comments on whether a statutory law should be established to allow an experimental use exception for products protected by utility patents. This problem has emerged because of conflicting court decisions over whether scientific research on patented products constitutes patent infringement. Agricultural crops were immune to these concerns until the 1980s, when utility patents began to be applied to living organisms. Prior to this, crops were protected by the Plant Variety Protection Act […]

Via Zoom  RSVP Here | or email quello@msu.edu An Internet Governance Project (IGP)/Quello Center joint event. On April 4, 2025, the Internet Governance Project (IGP) in collaboration with the Quello Center will gather scholars of differing views to debate what digital sovereignty means, how it is being used as a label, and whether the various interpretations of the term are compatible with the foundational values of the open internet. Recently, new books and analyses have been published, including the book edited by Min Jiang and Luca Belli, Digital sovereignty in the BRICS countries (Cambridge, 2025), the volume by Johannes Thumfart, The liberal internet […]

Via Zoom  To RSVP please email quello@msu.edu More information to come.   Robert Gorwa did graduate work in media and communication/internet studies (MSc) and politics and international relations (DPhil) in Oxford before joining the WZB as one of its Digitization Postdocs. He conducts interdisciplinary empirical and conceptual research on various dimensions of technology policy, with a special interest in emerging socio-technical governance infrastructures and institutions in the platform economy. Since moving to Berlin, he has been organizing the WZB's Platform Politics and Policy Seminar series, coordinating the Platform Governance Research Network (PlatGovNet), and completing the research for his first book (published in 2024 […]