Pub Date : 2021-11-03DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1997179
J. DeCook
Abstract The subreddit r/WatchRedditDie was founded in 2015 after reddit started implementing anti-harassment policies, and positions itself as a “fire alarm for reddit” meant to voyeuristically watch reddit’s impending (symbolic) death. As conversations around platform governance, moderation, and the role of platforms in controlling hate speech become more complex, r/WatchRedditDie and its affiliated subreddits are dedicated in maintaining a version of reddit tolerant of any and all speech, excluding other more vulnerable users from fully participating on the platform. r/WatchReditDie users advocate for no interference in their activities on the platform—meaning that although they rely on the reddit infrastructure to sustain their community, they aim to self-govern to uphold a libertarian and often manipulated interpretation of free expression. Responding to reddit’s evolving policies, they find community with one another by positioning the platform itself as their main antagonist. Through the social worlds framework, I examine the r/WatchRedditDie community’s responses to platform change, bringing up new questions about the possibility of shared governance between platform and user, as well as participatory culture’s promises and perils.
{"title":"r/WatchRedditDie and the politics of reddit’s bans and quarantines","authors":"J. DeCook","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1997179","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1997179","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The subreddit r/WatchRedditDie was founded in 2015 after reddit started implementing anti-harassment policies, and positions itself as a “fire alarm for reddit” meant to voyeuristically watch reddit’s impending (symbolic) death. As conversations around platform governance, moderation, and the role of platforms in controlling hate speech become more complex, r/WatchRedditDie and its affiliated subreddits are dedicated in maintaining a version of reddit tolerant of any and all speech, excluding other more vulnerable users from fully participating on the platform. r/WatchReditDie users advocate for no interference in their activities on the platform—meaning that although they rely on the reddit infrastructure to sustain their community, they aim to self-govern to uphold a libertarian and often manipulated interpretation of free expression. Responding to reddit’s evolving policies, they find community with one another by positioning the platform itself as their main antagonist. Through the social worlds framework, I examine the r/WatchRedditDie community’s responses to platform change, bringing up new questions about the possibility of shared governance between platform and user, as well as participatory culture’s promises and perils.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"6 1","pages":"206 - 222"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-11-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43736452","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-21DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1985835
J. Ogden
Abstract This article frames the cultural significance of web archiving through an ethnographic study of Archive Team and their efforts to archive “Not Safe for Work” posts on the popular social media platform, Tumblr. This research first sheds light on the origins and organisation of Archive Team, a long-running site of web archiving and “loose collective” of volunteers dedicated to saving websites in danger of going offline. I outline two Archive Team “tenets of practice” that reflect and frame an approach to web archiving centred on cultural values dedicated to the preservation of access. Using examples from their efforts to archive Tumblr NSFW, I examine how the entanglement of practice, participants and platform resistance ultimately shapes what was deemed worth saving (and conversely, not). I argue that web archiving is a transformative force that requires attentiveness to who is archiving, but also the cultural dimensions of practice that inform everyday decisions about how the Web is “saved.”
{"title":"“Everything on the internet can be saved”: Archive Team, Tumblr and the cultural significance of web archiving","authors":"J. Ogden","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1985835","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1985835","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article frames the cultural significance of web archiving through an ethnographic study of Archive Team and their efforts to archive “Not Safe for Work” posts on the popular social media platform, Tumblr. This research first sheds light on the origins and organisation of Archive Team, a long-running site of web archiving and “loose collective” of volunteers dedicated to saving websites in danger of going offline. I outline two Archive Team “tenets of practice” that reflect and frame an approach to web archiving centred on cultural values dedicated to the preservation of access. Using examples from their efforts to archive Tumblr NSFW, I examine how the entanglement of practice, participants and platform resistance ultimately shapes what was deemed worth saving (and conversely, not). I argue that web archiving is a transformative force that requires attentiveness to who is archiving, but also the cultural dimensions of practice that inform everyday decisions about how the Web is “saved.”","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"6 1","pages":"113 - 132"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-10-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42422801","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-07DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1985833
Diana Floegel
Abstract Queer transformative media fandoms have experienced multiple platform deaths due to “adult” content bans that remove queer content because it is considered “not safe for work” or pornographic. Such bans are biopolitically charged because they effectively regulate and erase queer sexualities and genders. Newer fan-created or moderated platforms such as Archive of Our Own (AO3) and Discord receive credit for rescuing queer fanworks and communities. These platforms are developed and used in direct response to content bans, and they therefore maintain a reputation for including queer people and their works. However, biopolitics continue to perpetuate marginalisation within newer fandom spaces because they ignore inequities that intersect with sexuality and gender. In particular, platforms like AO3 and Discord continue to perpetuate racism in fandom. Using data from interviews with queer fans and platforms’ features and policy statements, this paper traces how platform deaths and rebirths both respond to and perpetuate biopolitics throughout queer fandoms online.
酷儿转型媒体粉丝经历了多个平台的死亡，因为“成人”内容禁令删除了酷儿内容，因为这些内容被认为“不适合工作”或色情。这些禁令带有生物政治色彩，因为它们有效地规范和消除了酷儿性行为和性别。而像Archive of Our Own (AO3)和Discord等由粉丝创建或主持的新平台则因拯救酷儿同人作品和社区而获得赞誉。这些平台是为了直接回应内容禁令而开发和使用的，因此他们保持了包括酷儿和他们的作品的声誉。然而，在新兴的粉丝空间中，生物政治继续使边缘化永久化，因为它们忽视了与性和性别交叉的不平等。特别是像AO3和Discord这样的平台继续在粉丝圈中延续种族主义。本文利用对酷儿粉丝和平台的特征和政策声明的采访数据，追踪了平台的死亡和重生如何回应并延续了在线酷儿粉丝的生命政治。
{"title":"Porn bans, purges, and rebirths: the biopolitics of platform death in queer fandoms","authors":"Diana Floegel","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1985833","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1985833","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Queer transformative media fandoms have experienced multiple platform deaths due to “adult” content bans that remove queer content because it is considered “not safe for work” or pornographic. Such bans are biopolitically charged because they effectively regulate and erase queer sexualities and genders. Newer fan-created or moderated platforms such as Archive of Our Own (AO3) and Discord receive credit for rescuing queer fanworks and communities. These platforms are developed and used in direct response to content bans, and they therefore maintain a reputation for including queer people and their works. However, biopolitics continue to perpetuate marginalisation within newer fandom spaces because they ignore inequities that intersect with sexuality and gender. In particular, platforms like AO3 and Discord continue to perpetuate racism in fandom. Using data from interviews with queer fans and platforms’ features and policy statements, this paper traces how platform deaths and rebirths both respond to and perpetuate biopolitics throughout queer fandoms online.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"6 1","pages":"90 - 112"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-10-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48724182","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-07DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1985836
Kate M. Miltner, Y. Gerrard
Abstract This paper provides an analysis of a nostalgic Myspace discourse that contradicts the narrative of Myspace as a failed platform. The Myspace nostalgia discourse is especially dominant on Twitter and responds to what Miltner refers to as the “coding fetish discourse”. It re-imagines Myspace through the lens of digital skill development and reinforces the framing of coding as a net good for social mobility, particularly for women and people of colour. It also offers trenchant critiques aimed at platform capitalism and platform governance that position Myspace as a foil for “toxic” and “gentrified” contemporary social media platforms. Contrary to previous popular framings of Myspace as an unsafe environment, Myspace coding Tweets offer a generative reimagining of Myspace as a place where young people learned valuable skills. In doing so, these Tweets take the very elements that supposedly caused Myspace’s decline—its chaotic aesthetics and the dominance of people of colour and young women—and reposition them at the core of Myspace’s value and worth. We argue that these nostalgic reframings of Myspace ultimately reflect contemporary discourses about coding and social media platforms: Myspace may have “died”, but it is our current sociotechnical ideals and anxieties that brought it back to life.
{"title":"“Tom had us all doing front-end web development”: a nostalgic (re)imagining of Myspace","authors":"Kate M. Miltner, Y. Gerrard","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1985836","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1985836","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This paper provides an analysis of a nostalgic Myspace discourse that contradicts the narrative of Myspace as a failed platform. The Myspace nostalgia discourse is especially dominant on Twitter and responds to what Miltner refers to as the “coding fetish discourse”. It re-imagines Myspace through the lens of digital skill development and reinforces the framing of coding as a net good for social mobility, particularly for women and people of colour. It also offers trenchant critiques aimed at platform capitalism and platform governance that position Myspace as a foil for “toxic” and “gentrified” contemporary social media platforms. Contrary to previous popular framings of Myspace as an unsafe environment, Myspace coding Tweets offer a generative reimagining of Myspace as a place where young people learned valuable skills. In doing so, these Tweets take the very elements that supposedly caused Myspace’s decline—its chaotic aesthetics and the dominance of people of colour and young women—and reposition them at the core of Myspace’s value and worth. We argue that these nostalgic reframings of Myspace ultimately reflect contemporary discourses about coding and social media platforms: Myspace may have “died”, but it is our current sociotechnical ideals and anxieties that brought it back to life.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"6 1","pages":"48 - 67"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-10-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45331787","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-06DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1985360
Frances Corry
ABSTRACT This study of shuttered social network Friendster draws on interviews with 13 former employees to explore the discursive negotiation of this platform’s death. It chronicles the four central ways that employees related to Friendster’s end: through three diagnoses of the reasons behind its closure, or through claiming its persistence in platforms that thrive today. Arguing for the utility of technological death as a lens–especially within Silicon Valley techno-cultures saturated with death discourses–this article critically analyses these narratives to reveal otherwise obscured power dynamics, especially in regard to platforms’ purported support of global community. Finally, the article notes how death discourses are productive within Silicon Valley techno-cultures, as employees mobilize these failures as instructive assets in their careers.
{"title":"Why does a platform die? Diagnosing platform death at Friendster’s end","authors":"Frances Corry","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1985360","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1985360","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This study of shuttered social network Friendster draws on interviews with 13 former employees to explore the discursive negotiation of this platform’s death. It chronicles the four central ways that employees related to Friendster’s end: through three diagnoses of the reasons behind its closure, or through claiming its persistence in platforms that thrive today. Arguing for the utility of technological death as a lens–especially within Silicon Valley techno-cultures saturated with death discourses–this article critically analyses these narratives to reveal otherwise obscured power dynamics, especially in regard to platforms’ purported support of global community. Finally, the article notes how death discourses are productive within Silicon Valley techno-cultures, as employees mobilize these failures as instructive assets in their careers.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"6 1","pages":"31 - 47"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-10-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44221578","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-02DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1988239
G. Goggin, Haiqing Yu, Kwang-Suk Lee
Abstract This paper provides an introduction to a special double-issue of Internet Histories journal on ‘Asian Internet Histories’. As the editors, we provide context and discussion of the exciting emerging work on Asian Internet histories, and identifies challenges ahead. We suggest that the histories of Asian Internet stand to make a precious and shape-shifting contribution to our understanding of the Internet and its evolution –– as well as ways in which its futures are being framed and approached in the present.
{"title":"Asian internet histories: an introduction","authors":"G. Goggin, Haiqing Yu, Kwang-Suk Lee","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1988239","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1988239","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This paper provides an introduction to a special double-issue of Internet Histories journal on ‘Asian Internet Histories’. As the editors, we provide context and discussion of the exciting emerging work on Asian Internet histories, and identifies challenges ahead. We suggest that the histories of Asian Internet stand to make a precious and shape-shifting contribution to our understanding of the Internet and its evolution –– as well as ways in which its futures are being framed and approached in the present.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"5 1","pages":"207 - 213"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49080186","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-01DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1984732
M. I. Parray
Abstract This article complicates India’s Internet history by offering a ‘particular’ account of the Internet in a ‘geographical context’ of the country’s conflictual relationship with its peripheral regions such as Kashmir and the northeast. Drawing on Giorgio Agamben’s concept of the ‘state of exception’ and Partha Chatterjee’s notion of ‘the rule of colonial difference,’ the article seeks to interrogate India’s Internet governance practices in peripheral regions and the disabling impact of shutdowns and filtering on local e-communities. In critiquing the Internet historiography of the technology predicated on its materiality, rendered through numbers and events and centred around the nation’s urban technoscape, it explores local imaginations of the Internet in particular regions alternative to the one perpetuated by the Indian state and market forces while highlighting the strategies used by e-communities to circumvent state filtering mechanisms.
{"title":"Choking the ‘periphery’: pride and prejudice in India’s globalizing Internet imaginary","authors":"M. I. Parray","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1984732","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1984732","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article complicates India’s Internet history by offering a ‘particular’ account of the Internet in a ‘geographical context’ of the country’s conflictual relationship with its peripheral regions such as Kashmir and the northeast. Drawing on Giorgio Agamben’s concept of the ‘state of exception’ and Partha Chatterjee’s notion of ‘the rule of colonial difference,’ the article seeks to interrogate India’s Internet governance practices in peripheral regions and the disabling impact of shutdowns and filtering on local e-communities. In critiquing the Internet historiography of the technology predicated on its materiality, rendered through numbers and events and centred around the nation’s urban technoscape, it explores local imaginations of the Internet in particular regions alternative to the one perpetuated by the Indian state and market forces while highlighting the strategies used by e-communities to circumvent state filtering mechanisms.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"5 1","pages":"323 - 340"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48232925","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-09-28DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1982166
Emilie Xie, Maxwell Foxman, Shuo Xu
Abstract This paper reassesses comparisons of online Chinese networks to the Habermasian public sphere through a dialogue between sinology and ludology. Play has long been considered an integral component of public activity and of the Chinese internet. Researchers emphasised the importance of playful behavior and creative self-expressions for various purposes, including the formation of community ties and identities. However, studies tend to scrutinise the socio-political effects of playing rather than the fundamental connections between play and cultural life. This paper investigates the underlying cultural elements of play that are absent from or underdeveloped in the rational-critical framework and discourses of the public sphere. Building upon this ludological tradition, and specifically focusing on the autotelic, contextual, and appropriative nature of play, we conduct an exploratory, inductive thematic analysis of three case studies that garnered significant domestic and international attention – the abolishment of term limits in China, the #MeToo movement, and the COVID-19 pandemic – to understand the role of play in public communication. Our analysis reveals insights into the creative structural dynamics that underpin the Chinese internet – rules, reciprocity, and irrationality – three aspects that broaden discussions of online activity and engagement. The paper centers itself at the nexus of three separate strands of histories – the public sphere debate, ludology, and the Chinese internet – that have rarely been in dialogue with one another and, in doing so, examines and explains the Chinese cybersphere’s current formation.
{"title":"From public sphere to magic circle: playful publics on the Chinese internet","authors":"Emilie Xie, Maxwell Foxman, Shuo Xu","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1982166","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1982166","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This paper reassesses comparisons of online Chinese networks to the Habermasian public sphere through a dialogue between sinology and ludology. Play has long been considered an integral component of public activity and of the Chinese internet. Researchers emphasised the importance of playful behavior and creative self-expressions for various purposes, including the formation of community ties and identities. However, studies tend to scrutinise the socio-political effects of playing rather than the fundamental connections between play and cultural life. This paper investigates the underlying cultural elements of play that are absent from or underdeveloped in the rational-critical framework and discourses of the public sphere. Building upon this ludological tradition, and specifically focusing on the autotelic, contextual, and appropriative nature of play, we conduct an exploratory, inductive thematic analysis of three case studies that garnered significant domestic and international attention – the abolishment of term limits in China, the #MeToo movement, and the COVID-19 pandemic – to understand the role of play in public communication. Our analysis reveals insights into the creative structural dynamics that underpin the Chinese internet – rules, reciprocity, and irrationality – three aspects that broaden discussions of online activity and engagement. The paper centers itself at the nexus of three separate strands of histories – the public sphere debate, ludology, and the Chinese internet – that have rarely been in dialogue with one another and, in doing so, examines and explains the Chinese cybersphere’s current formation.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"5 1","pages":"359 - 375"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-09-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41584124","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-09-23DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1982167
Camille Paloque-Bergès
Chon is an archetypal figure of Internet pioneer – and more specifically of “Global connector”, as he is acknowledged in the Internet Hall of Fame. He is a computer scientist who, thanks to an exemplary international academic trajectory and good socio-professional and political connections, got an early taste of Internet technologies. He played a leading role when South Korea joined the global race in technological innovation, and is generally considered key to the entrance of the Internet on the Asian continent. I wanted to discuss with Chon about the hypothesis that himself and his peers from South Korea and Asia got a kickstart from Unix culture and did initially follow UUCP routes, in close connection with their Internet pioneering.
{"title":"The real “poor man’s Arpanet”? A conversation about Unix networks with Kilnam Chon, godfather of the Asian Internet","authors":"Camille Paloque-Bergès","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1982167","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1982167","url":null,"abstract":"Chon is an archetypal figure of Internet pioneer – and more specifically of “Global connector”, as he is acknowledged in the Internet Hall of Fame. He is a computer scientist who, thanks to an exemplary international academic trajectory and good socio-professional and political connections, got an early taste of Internet technologies. He played a leading role when South Korea joined the global race in technological innovation, and is generally considered key to the entrance of the Internet on the Asian continent. I wanted to discuss with Chon about the hypothesis that himself and his peers from South Korea and Asia got a kickstart from Unix culture and did initially follow UUCP routes, in close connection with their Internet pioneering.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-09-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43755804","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-09-02DOI: 10.1080/24701475.2021.1951962
Shaohua Guo
Abstract The escalation in geopolitical tensions between China and the United States raises the critical issue of revisiting cyber nationalism in various contexts. A topic of critical inquiry, recent scholarship addresses the changing face of Chinese cyber nationalism since the 2010s, focussing on its connection with fan communities, cosmopolitan visions and the interplay of multifarious stakeholders. However, the ways in which emerging forms of cyber nationalism connect with its predecessors remain to be studied. To explore the historical connections of cyber nationalism across media platforms, this article investigates the role that MIT BBS, one of the most influential forums among overseas Chinese communities, played in organising pro-China protests during the 2008 Beijing Olympics torch relay. An examination of online political expressions not only unravels the multifaceted dimensions of nationalism, but it also deepens scholarly understanding of discursive activism, which emerged from text-based platforms prior to the dominance of mobile communication applications.
{"title":"Discursive activism in the age of BBS: revisiting overseas Chinese protests during the 2008 Beijing Olympics torch relay","authors":"Shaohua Guo","doi":"10.1080/24701475.2021.1951962","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/24701475.2021.1951962","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The escalation in geopolitical tensions between China and the United States raises the critical issue of revisiting cyber nationalism in various contexts. A topic of critical inquiry, recent scholarship addresses the changing face of Chinese cyber nationalism since the 2010s, focussing on its connection with fan communities, cosmopolitan visions and the interplay of multifarious stakeholders. However, the ways in which emerging forms of cyber nationalism connect with its predecessors remain to be studied. To explore the historical connections of cyber nationalism across media platforms, this article investigates the role that MIT BBS, one of the most influential forums among overseas Chinese communities, played in organising pro-China protests during the 2008 Beijing Olympics torch relay. An examination of online political expressions not only unravels the multifaceted dimensions of nationalism, but it also deepens scholarly understanding of discursive activism, which emerged from text-based platforms prior to the dominance of mobile communication applications.","PeriodicalId":52252,"journal":{"name":"Internet Histories","volume":"5 1","pages":"341 - 358"},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2021-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43816793","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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