OII Webcasts

Digital technology empowers us to find and share information as never before, but we do not always foresee the consequences of these new powers. Can the dangers of everlasting digital memory be avoided? Can we reintroduce our capacity to forget?

Manuel Castells draws on arguments from his book Communication Power in discussing the structural causes and implications of the 2008 economic crisis, and in claiming that we are moving, without much understanding, towards a new form of global capitalism.

Duncan Watts discusses how the Internet is beginning to lift a long-time constraint of social science research on emergent collective behaviour: the difficulty of measuring interactions between people, at scale, over time, while also observing behaviour.

Robert Hahn discusses his recent paper responding to the US Federal Communications Commission's request for guidance in designing a national US broadband plan

What are the most important milestones in the evolution of social media? What factors have shaped their successes and limitations?

Among the traditional media, blogs and other contributions to citizen journalism have for a long time been regarded as posing a significant threat to 'quality' news reporting ... is this a valid view? What (if anything) can social media offer?

How have social media changed the nature of the scientific debate among scientists? Are they challenging the supremacy of editors, reviewers and science communicators? How have they impacted on engagement with the public understanding of science?

Can Web 2.0 tools (eg blogs, social networking and wikis) enhance our democratic freedoms? Or can we dismiss the socially egalitarian and politically democratic potential of these social media? Have any significant social impacts been ignored so far?