Networks

Artificial Intelligence and Peace

“We need the political will”

When people think of the use of AI in warfare, most of them think of “killer robots”, drones. But could it also be used for peacekeeping operations? In our interview, Angela Kane, former Under-Secretary-General of the UN, explains the implementation of AI in UN-operations and its up and downsides.

Artificial Intelligence and Covid

“AI is not a magic bullet”

What place does artificial intelligence have in the health sector, where human interaction is so important? In our interview, scientist Rahul Panicker points out some of the problems of AI - and how it could still help us in times of pandemics.

Shift Society

Exclusive Inclusion?

Why is the internet still full of barriers for people with disabilities? Or isn’t it? NGO founder Tiffany Brar, video influencer Daniel Jones, app developer Javier Montaner and researcher Shai Fuxman discuss the tensions between digital possibilities and their actual realisation – and what everyone in society can do.

Shift Society

Retweet and remember: digital approaches to the Holocaust

How does our digital age shape the memory of the Holocaust? Survivor Abba Naor, German scholar Ernst Hüttl, press officer of the Auschwitz Memorial Pawel Sawicki and student Emely Fuchs talk about experiences, opportunities and risks.

Conspiracy myths

“It will wipe the smile right off your face”

People are more vulnerable to conspiracy ideologies when they fear a loss of control, making the corona pandemic the perfect storm. In an interview, political scientist and net activist Katharina Nocun explains how we should react when encountering people who subscribe to conspiracy theories.

Darknet

Redeeming the darknet in five examples

The darknet is often seen as the Cain to the internet’s Abel, as a hub for weapons and drugs and a paradise for paedophiles and terrorists. But, as it turns out, it’s not really so dark after all.

Digital Divide

Decolonize the Internet

The internet is characterised by power structures. Digital colonialism shows how established hierarchies can also become entrenched on the World Wide Web. But activists and artists are growing increasingly resistant.

Nanjira Sambuli

A fair internet?

The image of a reality divided into an analog world of trams, afternoon coffee and postcards, on the one hand, and a digital world of ones and zeros, online shops and World of Warcraft gamers, on the other, is passé.

Coding da Vinci

The digitalisation of culture

Visitors to museums and archives usually interact with exhibits locked in display cases in darkened rooms. Yet modern technology has given us ways to more directly experience art and cultural artefacts. Coding da Vinci is an open, cultural data hackathon that digitally brings museum pieces to life.  

Afrika

“If there’s inequality in the analogue world, it’s the same for the digital world”

Hardly anyone in Africa writes for Wikipedia – especially not women. Isla Haddow-Flood wants to change that. We spoke to her about the “Wiki Loves Women” project.

Egometer

Your position on copyright regulation

How should copyright law be regulated in line with the times? Use our egometer to pinpoint your position on this question and find out where in the world people think the way you do!

Egometer

Your position on privacy regulation

How far should data protection go? Use our Egometer to find out where you stand on regulating privacy and where in the world people share your views!

Gaming

Machiavelli’s heirs

Very few computer games explicitly deal with current politics, but this in no way means the gaming world is apolitical. 

Staging the self on social media

Politics as a stage

Politics has always played out on stages: from the popular assemblies of antiquity and to the live-feed public parliamentary debates of today, politicians have performed for their voters. Social media have both expanded and fundamentally changed this political stage.

Media competence versus manipulation

What can libraries do against fake news?

Libraries are ill-equipped to fight fake news, critics say. Maybe they were celebrated too soon as bastions against misinformation. But as part of a network they can certainly act against manipulated reports.