Anne Helmond
Utrecht University, Media and Culture Studies, Faculty Member
- New Media, Digital methods, Digital Culture, Digital Research, Social Media, Software Studies, and 17 moreWeb 2.0, Digital Sociology, The Social Web, Platform Studies, Digital Footprints, Big Data, Media Ecology, Web Studies, Internet research, Internet Studies, Media Studies, Facebook, Web Archiving, Information Technology, Media and Cultural Studies, Web History, and Platformizationedit
- Associate Professor of Media, Data & Society at Utrecht University. Anne co-leads the focus area ‘Governing the Digit... moreAssociate Professor of Media, Data & Society at Utrecht University. Anne co-leads the focus area ‘Governing the Digital Society’ with Prof. José van Dijck. Here, her research focuses on the processes of platformization, algorithmization, and datafication from an empirical and historical perspective. Her work emphasizes the material and programmable (data) infrastructures that underpin these processes.edit
In this special issue editorial, we introduce a research agenda for empirical app studies. First, we introduce the three main strands of scholarship that have engaged with (mobile) apps and infrastructures so far. This enables us to... more
In this special issue editorial, we introduce a research agenda for empirical app studies. First, we introduce the three main strands of scholarship that have engaged with (mobile) apps and infrastructures so far. This enables us to position the contributions to this special issue at the cutting edge of the research on apps and infrastructures. We present our theoretical perspective on the infrastructural situatedness of apps to foreground how apps are always relational and, therefore, situated in a technological as well as social and cultural sense. From this perspective, we outline the contours of the app/infrastructure stack, which proposes to account for the hierarchical layered structure of apps and infrastructures, including their various interrelations and interdependencies. Finally, we derive six emerging research themes for future app studies based on the eight contributions included in this special issue that we hope will motivate further innovative and critical research i...
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Social media platforms’ digital advertising revenues depend considerably on partnerships. Business partnerships are endemic and essential to the business of platforms, yet their role remains relatively underexplored in the literature on... more
Social media platforms’ digital advertising revenues depend considerably on partnerships. Business partnerships are endemic and essential to the business of platforms, yet their role remains relatively underexplored in the literature on platformisation and platform power. This article considers the significance of partnerships in the social media ecosystem to better understand how industry platforms, and the infrastructure they build, mediate and shape platform power and governance. We argue that partners contribute to ‘platformisation’ through their collective development of business-to-business platform infrastructures. Specifically, we examine how partners have integrated social media platforms with what we call the audience economy – an exceptionally complex global and interconnected marketplace of intermediaries involved in the creation, commodification, analysis, and circulation of data audiences for purposes including but not limited to digital advertising and marketing. We d...
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In this article, we empirically analyse the infrastructural relations between mobile apps and social media platforms and present a methodology to account for app–platform relations. Contrary to previous research on platforms and apps, we... more
In this article, we empirically analyse the infrastructural relations between mobile apps and social media platforms and present a methodology to account for app–platform relations. Contrary to previous research on platforms and apps, we develop our approach from the perspective of apps based on a relational understanding of infrastructure. Our app-centric approach to platforms and infrastructure provides critical insights into (i) the kinds of third-party apps developed on the peripheries of social media platforms, (ii) the diverse practices and features supported and extended by those apps, and (iii) the messy and contingent nature of the relations between apps and social media platforms. Our approach provides insights into alternative forms of platform programmability beyond APIs and into social media-based ‘innovation’ app ecosystems driven by creative developer workarounds. Drawing on quantitative and qualitative forms of analysis of Android and iOS apps related to Facebook, In...
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This article provides an exploratory systematic mapping of the global ecosystem of COVID-19 pandemic response apps. After considering policy updates by Google Play’s and Apple’s App Store, we analyse all the available response apps in... more
This article provides an exploratory systematic mapping of the global ecosystem of COVID-19 pandemic response apps. After considering policy updates by Google Play’s and Apple’s App Store, we analyse all the available response apps in July 2020;their different response types;the apps’ developers and geographical distribution;the ecosystem’s ‘generativity’ and developers’ responsiveness during the unfolding pandemic;the apps’ discursive positioning;and material conditions of their development. Google and Apple are gatekeepers of these app ecosystems and exercise control on different layers, shaping the pandemic app response as well as the relationships between governments, citizens, and other actors. We suggest that this global ecosystem of pandemic responses reflects an exceptional mode of what we call ‘pandemic platform governance’, where platforms have negotiated their commercial interests and the public interest in exceptional circumstances. © 2021, Alexander von Humboldt Institu...
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This paper documents the results of an intensive "data sprint" method for undertaking data and algorithmic work using application programming interfaces (APIs), which took place during the Digital Method Initiative 2013 Winter... more
This paper documents the results of an intensive "data sprint" method for undertaking data and algorithmic work using application programming interfaces (APIs), which took place during the Digital Method Initiative 2013 Winter School at the University of Amsterdam. During this data sprint, we developed a method to map the fields of Digital Humanities and Electronic Literature based on title recommendations from the largest online bookseller, Amazon, by retrieving similar purchased items from the Amazon API. A first step shows the overall Amazon recommendation network for Digital Humanities and allows us to detect clusters, aligned fields and bridging books. In a second step we looked into four country-specific Amazon stores (Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.fr and Amazon.de) to investigate the specificities of the Digital Humanities in these four countries. The third step is a network of all books suggested for the Electronic Literature field in the four Amazon stores we s...
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In this chapter I offer a historical perspective on the changing composition of a website over time. I propose to see the website as an ecosystem through which we can analyze the larger techno- commercial configurations that websites are... more
In this chapter I offer a historical perspective on the changing composition of a website over time. I propose to see the website as an ecosystem through which we can analyze the larger techno- commercial configurations that websites are embedded in. In doing so, I reconceptualize the study of websites as historical website ecology. The website’s ecosystem can be detected by examining the source code in which a website’s connections with third parties have become inscribed. If archived, this provides a way to examine changes in a website’s ecosystem as a way to transformations in the techno- commercial configurations of the web through the changing composition of a website. Moving the site of analysis from the content of websites to the context of websites opens up new areas for web historical research. Focusing on the archived source code of websites does not only enable analyzing web technologies used to construct them, which can tell us something about the web’s underlying infrastructure, providing insights to how the web is built and how websites are connected, but can also serve as a means to investigate the web’s economic underpinnings, to understand the business models of websites and third parties and trace the economically valuable data flowing between them. In this chapter I take a contextual approach to historical website analysis by viewing the website as an environment that is inhabited and shaped by third parties such as social media platforms, advertisers, analytics companies and content- delivery networks, embedding the website in various technological and commercial relations with these actors. This shift from website content to website context is what I refer to as the website’s ecosystem as a way to study changes in the techno- commercial environment of the web.
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In this chapter we want to reflect on the concept of affordance as a key term for understanding and analysing social media interfaces and the relations between technology and its users. We first describe five different–but related–ways in... more
In this chapter we want to reflect on the concept of affordance as a key term for understanding and analysing social media interfaces and the relations between technology and its users. We first describe five different–but related–ways in which affordance has been conceptualized and subsequently address how it has been employed to analyse social media in particular. We then outline a platform-sensitive approach to affordance as an analytical tool for examining social media based on recent examples of changes to the Twitter platform. Our approach is sensitive to the medium-specificity of platforms, as technological intermediaries and entities that can be built upon, and which draw different stakeholders together and orchestrate their relationships to each other (Gillespie, 2010; Helmond, 2015). Such a perspective requires taking into account how affordances relate not only to end-users and their activities but also to third-parties such as developers who extend the affordances offered by the platform, and advertisers who monetize platform activities. Affordances, we argue, manifest in relations between platforms and their different types of users—end-users, advertisers, developers, and researchers. We extend previous conceptualizations of affordances understood as the action possibilities made available to users by means of technology, not only by expanding the notion of the user, but also by considering the question of what users do to the technology.
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In this article, I inquire into Facebook’s development as a platform by situating it within the transformation of social network sites into social media platforms. I explore this shift with a historical perspective on, what I refer to as,... more
In this article, I inquire into Facebook’s development as a platform by situating it within the transformation of social network sites into social media platforms. I explore this shift with a historical perspective on, what I refer to as, platformization, or the rise of the platform as the dominant infrastructural and economic model of the social web and its consequences. Platformization entails the extension of social media platforms into the rest of the web and their drive to make external web data “platform ready.” The specific technological architecture and ontological distinctiveness of platforms will be examined by taking their programmability into account. I position platformization as a form of platform critique that inquires into the dynamics of the decentralization of platform features and the recentralization of “platform ready” data as a way to examine the consequences of the programmability of social media platforms for the web.
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This study looks at the history of the hyperlink from a medium-specific perspective by analyzing the technical reconfiguration of the hyperlink by engines and platforms over time. Hyperlinks may be seen as having different roles belonging... more
This study looks at the history of the hyperlink from a medium-specific perspective by analyzing the technical reconfiguration of the hyperlink by engines and platforms over time. Hyperlinks may be seen as having different roles belonging to specific periods, including the role of the hyperlink as a unit of navigation, a relationship marker, a reputation indicator and a currency of the web. The question here is how web devices have contributed to constituting these roles and how social media platforms have advanced the hyperlink from a navigational device into a data-rich analytical device. By following how hyperlinks have been handled by search engines and social media platforms, and in their turn have adapted to this treatment, this study traces the emergence of new link types and related linking practices. The focus is on the relations between hyperlinks, users, engines and platforms as mediated through software and in particular the process of the algorithmization of the hyperlink through short URLs by social media platforms. The important role these platforms play in the automation of hyperlinks through platform features and in the reconfiguration of the link as database call is illustrated in a case study on link sharing on Twitter.
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The paper examines Facebook’s ambition to extend into the entire web by focusing on social buttons and developing a medium-specific platform critique. It contextualises the rise of buttons and counters as metrics for user engagement and... more
The paper examines Facebook’s ambition to extend into the entire web by focusing on social buttons and developing a medium-specific platform critique. It contextualises the rise of buttons and counters as metrics for user engagement and links them to different web economies. Facebook’s Like buttons enable multiple data flows between various actors, contributing to a simultaneous de- and re-centralisation of the web. They allow the instant transformation of user engagement into numbers on button counters, which can be traded and multiplied but also function as tracking devices. The increasing presence of buttons and associated social plugins on the web creates new forms of connectivity between websites, introducing an alternative fabric of the web. Contrary to Facebook’s claim to promote a more social experience of the web, this paper explores the implementation and technical infrastructure of such buttons to conceptualise them as part of a so-called ‘Like economy’.
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All material supplied via Goldsmiths Library and Goldsmiths Research Online (GRO) is protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights. You may use this copy for personal study or research, or for educational purposes, as... more
All material supplied via Goldsmiths Library and Goldsmiths Research Online (GRO) is protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights. You may use this copy for personal study or research, or for educational purposes, as defined by UK copyright law. Other specific conditions may apply to individual items.
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Please note: This paper is a preliminary version and work in progress.
An English publication of the final paper "The Like economy" is currently in the making.
An English publication of the final paper "The Like economy" is currently in the making.
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ABSTRACT: This essay deals with the change of identity on the web as a result of the assemblage of social software platforms, engines and users. It can be stated that major platforms for presenting the self online have developed over... more
ABSTRACT: This essay deals with the change of identity on the web as a result of the assemblage of social software platforms, engines and users. It can be stated that major platforms for presenting the self online have developed over time: the homepage, the blog, the social networking profile, the micro-blog and the lifestream. They each have their own specific way for presenting the self online. The advent of the search engine has had a major impact on both the construction and the presentation of the online identity.
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This paper inquires in the making of realtime in online media. It suggests that realtime cannot be accounted for as universal temporal frame in which events happen, but explores the fabrication of realtime as mode of information... more
This paper inquires in the making of realtime in online media. It suggests that realtime cannot be accounted for as universal temporal frame in which events happen, but explores the fabrication of realtime as mode of information organization from a device perspective. Based on an empirical study focused on the pace of an issue across online media devices, we show how the interplay of devices, user practices and issues create different rhythms, patterns or tempos which are specific to device cultures. What emerges are specific forms of ‘realtimeness’ which are not external but immanent to devices cultures, in which realtime engagement with information is organized through socio-technical arrangements and distinct practices of use. Realtimeness not only unflattens general accounts of the realtime web and research, it draws attention to the agencies build into specific online temporalities and the political economies of time online.
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"In this paper I aim to contribute the emerging field of web historiography in two ways: First, by exploring the boundaries of a website and reconceptualizing the website as an ecology, and second, by proposing a new method to reconstruct... more
"In this paper I aim to contribute the emerging field of web historiography in two ways: First, by exploring the boundaries of a website and reconceptualizing the website as an ecology, and second, by proposing a new method to reconstruct historical website ecologies using Internet Archive data. Websites are increasingly shaped by dynamically generated, third-party content and functionality such as videos, images, widgets and social buttons. Third-party plugins can initiate data exchanges between platforms and websites and may come with trackers that create connections with platforms and central ad servers to exchange data flows. This networked nature of the website puts forward methodological challenges, as these dynamically generated objects may not be included in the website's archived snapshot in the Internet Archive. Traces of these objects may still be present in the archived source code, however. Thus, while the website itself is often considered the main unit to be archived, it is not only the single website, but also the traces of the larger web ecology the website is embedded in that are being archived. This ecology does not only consist of other websites, which may be made visible through the
practice of mapping outlinks, but also of widgets, plugins and trackers from third-party sources. Unveiling parts of this larger web ecology is undertaken in a case study using archived snapshots of the New York Times between 1996 and 2011 from the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, showing the traces of trackers such as web bugs, beacons, analytics and ads."
practice of mapping outlinks, but also of widgets, plugins and trackers from third-party sources. Unveiling parts of this larger web ecology is undertaken in a case study using archived snapshots of the New York Times between 1996 and 2011 from the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, showing the traces of trackers such as web bugs, beacons, analytics and ads."
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This lecture looks at how social media platforms structure relations by first looking into the history of Web 2.0 as "the web as platform." It will be argued that we need to take the platform-specificity of social media platforms into... more
This lecture looks at how social media platforms structure relations by first looking into the history of Web 2.0 as "the web as platform." It will be argued that we need to
take the platform-specificity of social media platforms into account and look at the assemblage of platforms, software, databases, interfaces and users to understand how the
relations between platforms and users are mediated by both human actors and non-human actors such as software. This will be illustrated with a specific case study on the Facebook
platform as one of the major infrastructures of the data-intensive social web.
take the platform-specificity of social media platforms into account and look at the assemblage of platforms, software, databases, interfaces and users to understand how the
relations between platforms and users are mediated by both human actors and non-human actors such as software. This will be illustrated with a specific case study on the Facebook
platform as one of the major infrastructures of the data-intensive social web.
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This talk addresses how Facebook is increasingly expanding beyond the limits of its platform, offering devices that can make every website and every web user part of Facebook. Through a case study on The Like button, now embedded in over... more
This talk addresses how Facebook is increasingly expanding beyond the
limits of its platform, offering devices that can make every website
and every web user part of Facebook. Through a case study on The Like
button, now embedded in over 2 million websites, it will be
illustrated how these social plugins form an important role in
extending Facebook’s platform features into the web. The Like button
is one of the main devices of the social web that allow data to flow
between what Felix Stalder (2012) refers to as the front-end of the
web, where users interact, and the back-end of the web, where these
interactions are turned into financial value. By connecting the two,
the platform creates a specific relation between economic value and
the social by turning user activity into valuable data which may be
sold to advertisers. This calls for a critical investigation into the
design of the platform and the politics of data by looking at the
medium-specific devices that create and organize data and dataflows in
the social web. Linking Facebook’s efforts to a historical perspective
on the hit and link economy, what might be in the making is not only a
social web, but a re-centralized, data intensive fabric - the Like
economy.
How can Facebook users and non-Facebook users respond to their
(un)willing contributions to the emerging Like Economy? How can we
make these practices visible, address them and possibly subvert them?
In this second part of the presentation we will look into a few
examples of tools that are designed to make users aware of the
previously discussed data-mining practices and disrupt the valuable
dataflows.
limits of its platform, offering devices that can make every website
and every web user part of Facebook. Through a case study on The Like
button, now embedded in over 2 million websites, it will be
illustrated how these social plugins form an important role in
extending Facebook’s platform features into the web. The Like button
is one of the main devices of the social web that allow data to flow
between what Felix Stalder (2012) refers to as the front-end of the
web, where users interact, and the back-end of the web, where these
interactions are turned into financial value. By connecting the two,
the platform creates a specific relation between economic value and
the social by turning user activity into valuable data which may be
sold to advertisers. This calls for a critical investigation into the
design of the platform and the politics of data by looking at the
medium-specific devices that create and organize data and dataflows in
the social web. Linking Facebook’s efforts to a historical perspective
on the hit and link economy, what might be in the making is not only a
social web, but a re-centralized, data intensive fabric - the Like
economy.
How can Facebook users and non-Facebook users respond to their
(un)willing contributions to the emerging Like Economy? How can we
make these practices visible, address them and possibly subvert them?
In this second part of the presentation we will look into a few
examples of tools that are designed to make users aware of the
previously discussed data-mining practices and disrupt the valuable
dataflows.
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Historically, the practice of web archiving has involved various institutions and the development of various practices, approaches and tools. Among them, three main approaches to web archiving have been developed: web archive research... more
Historically, the practice of web archiving has involved various institutions and the development of various practices, approaches and tools. Among them, three main approaches to web archiving have been developed: web archive research using the Internet Archive and Wayback Machine, the practice of archiving special collections of websites, and the national approach of archiving webs of specific countries. These approaches and practices do not only reflect the time in which they were conceived in the history of web archiving, but also put forward distinct ways in which they may be used and consequently what type of historiographical research can be done with them. However, there are also limits to what these tools and practices offer. The purpose of this talk is to introduce the limits of doing research with the Internet Archive with existing tools such as the Wayback Machine and in addition, to show how digital methods are used to repurpose the Wayback Machine in order to go beyond the single-site historical research that is enabled by the Internet Archive. This will be illustrated in a case study on the Dutch blogosphere where by means of custom tools built on top of the Wayback Machine yearly snapshots of the historical Dutch blogosphere were created between 1999-2009. By reconstructing the interlinked set of blogs, the blogosphere, one can trace and map transitions in linking technologies and practices in the Dutch blogosphere over time. This approach allows for studying the emergence and decline of blog platforms and social media platforms within the blogosphere and for investigating local blog cultures.
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In an afternoon session at HASTAC II, a panel comprised of Lev Manovich, Noah Wardrip-Fruin, Anne Helmond, Nick Montfort, Tristan Thielmann, and Jeremy Douglass discussed different aspects of the emerging field of software studies. By... more
In an afternoon session at HASTAC II, a panel comprised of Lev Manovich, Noah Wardrip-Fruin, Anne Helmond, Nick Montfort, Tristan Thielmann, and Jeremy Douglass discussed different aspects of the emerging field of software studies. By looking at everything from blogging to Google Maps software, the panelists argued for the importance of studying culture through software specifics. Such research seeks to approach society through everything from code to the underlying platforms that both enable and constrain particular modes of media production.