1000 Intro http://pad.constantvzw.org/p/letsfirstgetthingsdone_intro
2000 Division of labor  http://pad.constantvzw.org/p/letsfirstgetthingsdone_division
2000 Universalism + situated http://pad.constantvzw.org/p/letsfirstgetthingsdone_universalism
2000 Analysis http://pad.constantvzw.org/p/letsfirstgetthingsdone_analysis
1000 Conclusion http://pad.constantvzw.org/p/letsfirstgetthingsdone_conclusion
Bibliography

notes: http://pad.constantvzw.org/public_pad/letsfirstgetthingsdone
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NEW DEADLINES (5th of October, 2014)

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Thinking of large infrastructures often brings about abstraction from specific situations in which the technology will be deployed. Once the basics are clarified, focus easily shifts to developing systems for universal access most often based on universal values. Even for smaller projects like tools or applications, developers and designers are expected to build tools that can be picked up by anyone who has an interest in the relevant use. While the imaginary of the universal infrastructure and the universal user are admittedly seen as ideals, they are modes of thinking that allow engineers to abstract away from situated knowledge of a specific context, shifting the premises of development to the context of technology (here something can be said about path dependency in technology development as what becomes a primary concern once you abstract away other worldly complexities). In a sense, there will always be a moment, in which engineers or developers run off with the requirements of a system and labor over a new tool or protocol mainly in a technical sphere of production. More participatory modes of design propose to include "end-users" or other "stakeholders" in this process in order to "democratize" design, and also include these parties in the testing/deployment of system implementations, nevertheless, at the end of the day, a division of labor due to specialization is inevitable.


The question is, what happens when the organization of political activities get meshed up with what we may short hand universalist systems of design and development. And, what happens, when the universalism is not limited to the "making" of the underlying infrastructures, i.e., when developers ideology used in the creation of artifacts starts also guiding the making of political ideologies in collectives? According to Johan Soderberg, one key notion in engineering ideology is that " nature and society are governed by laws that are accessible to human knowledge...and [it was] through the manipulation of nature's laws engineering could exercise influence over society". Could we argue that it is exactly such thinking which propels ideals of the "open internet being able to bring openness and freedom to society" and why loss of privacy on networks is seen as equivalent to loss of privacy in all aspects of social and political interaction (with the underlying assumption that privacy, more than many other aspects, are key to those interactions across the globe)? While it is possible to shake this off as a techno-determinist claim, it doesn't change the fact that entanglements of political projects in engineering ideology has a significant impact on how collectives imagine themselves and how they organize their interactions with others in society.


We claim that the techno-universalism almost necessary to build "universal access" tools and platforms inevitably brings about a flattening of politics and a selective attention to situated challenges that collectives face. This becomes especially evident in the post-snowden counter-surveillance tech talk, which we are for now imagining might be a leading thread throughout our paper. Engineers have responded with great anger to the revelations that the Internet infrastructure and many of the applications that run above it are now leveraged by nation-states, and in particular by the US and the UK, to put most of the world under surveillance. This anger has quickly been followed by a rational response, supported with economic arguments, as to how at least part of the problem, mass surveillance, can be engineered away. The problem definition is short and simple: mass surveillance means we loose our privacy; solution idea: in order to re-instate our privacy we need to make mass surveillance expensive (it has become too cheap). And finally the solution: mass-surveillance can be made more expensive by introducing encryption into the internet's underlying protocols as well as into the overlaying applications. Hence, resetthenet and encrypt everything.


While a logical response to current affairs, there are many problems that this proposal for an encryption based solution does not manage to design away, and in fact it may just as well be producing new ones. What is posed as a progressive solution against mass surveillance, now also trendy in many radical activist groups as operational security matters, bears a number of problems. First, the increasing of the costs of surveillance agencies inevitably also increases costs and burdens on the rest of the world that is expected to implement encryption. One could of course argue that providing internet responsibly makes this a natural cost for all involved. However, we do not know at this point who has the capacity to carry this burden, and who may be left "in the clear". Hence, what is couched as a universal solution, is in fact a solution that is likely to be only available to a few, and possibly likely to privilege the few large companies that may claim to provide "privacy preserving services", strengthening what Ulises Mejias calls "monopsonies". 


Second, the proposals suggest that loss of privacy is the main issue with the surveillance programs. While this is true for some, the surveillance programs also serve to assert economic dominance, wage wars, undermine political groups, and sand down the teeth of vampire babies. While increasing the costs of such surveillance programs are likely to decrease their efficiency, it is unlikely to convince the forces that want to accomplish these goals that they should reconsider whether they want to pursue these goals. Further, while the uproar against mass surveillance, for which there is a possible design solution, has marshaled many groups on the streets and to their keyboards, few of these initiatives have also seen this as an opportunity to be in solidarity with those political groups that suffer under the violence of these surveillance programs. This is unfortunately a violence that cannot just be "designed away". In fact, ever since the revelations, little has been done to reach out to communities in Oakland and NY that organize against police violence, or with families in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen or Kurdistan that are subject to massive amounts of surveillance based violence. Hence, if the problem would only be loss of privacy due to mass surveillance, then encryption would be a possible universal solution. But, we see here that the problem definition in itself  already excludes certain parties from the both being part of the problem that needs to be solved or designed away.


Third, the liberatory spin that comes with mechanisms of control like encryption and anonymous communications, tends to blur critique of corporate technologies (ulises has some nice arguments), but also the ways in which hegemonic divisions of labor are reproduced in open and free encryption/security communities. It would be unfair to equate the security industry that jumped the opportunity to increase their market size after the snowden revelations with the dedicated hackers who put their lives into building community solutions for political activists. However,  there is a continuum in practice between corporate security engineers, activist developers increasingly financed by government agencies  (especially the US Department of State), and autonomous initiatives (like that of Calafou). One could argue that the continuum that is at time visible between this cadre of very different minded engineers is on the one hand a product of their interest in the same thing, e.g., engineering secure systems as an occupational interest. Hence, their collaboration can be seen as symbolic of the tradition of strategic alliances between blackhats and whitehats etc. (i would need to read up on this, too), a necessary evil of knowing your adversary, i.e., good security practice. At the same time, the continuum may be symbolic of the way in which software developers have liberated themselves from corporate hierarchies. This also means that they have "liberated" themselves from contractual employment, and work on the frontiers of what again Soderberg calls "work without wages". Especially here I think something can be said about "reproduction" vs. "production". 


This is not all to say that encryption and security or alternative networks that allow for an exodus from Fortune 500 companies is unreasonable. In fact, delegate Miriyam shows wonderfully the way in which tactical use of these tools maybe necessary in moments of urgency and they may be fundamental to organizing (vs mobilizing). We are of course also aware of all the problems with using those services etc. However, in delegating our activism to both Fortune500s and hacker activists that we have to think about the ways that multiple political ideologies are consolidated, whether we wish for it, intend to consolidate, or it just happens inadvertently. What does it mean to be conscious of these processes, especially in divisions of labor, and what are ways in which Freeman, Femke, Jara, Miriyam, and Seda can help us rethink this relationship? 



Conflict avoidance/designing the conflict away:


Delegation:




FREEMAN: TYRANNY OF STRUCTURELESSNESS
as jo freeman puts it:
in structurelessness: 
"hegemony can easily be established because the idea of "structurelessness" does not prevent the formation of informal structures, but only formal ones."


and then she claims:
The rules of decision making must be OPEN and available to everyone, and this can only happen if they are formalized. 
but the openness is not doing it either, that is a bit of the problem that we are addressing...
in fact, maybe we are saying that division of labor is in a way a limitation of openness...


ELITE:
an elite refers to a small group of people who have power over a larger group of which they are part, usually without direct responsibility to the larger group, and often without their knowledge or consent.


ELITES ARE NOT CONSPIRACIES:
Elites are nothing more or less than a group of friends who also happen to participate in the same political activities. They would probablymaintain their friendship whether or not they were involved in political activities; they would be involved in political activities whether or not they maintained their friendships. It is the coincidence of these two phenomena which creates elites in any groups and makes them so difficult to break.

STRUCTURE VS. STRUCTURELESSNESS
If there are two or more such network of friends (elites), they may compete for power within the group, thus forming factions, or one may deliberately opt out of the competition leaving the other as the elite. In a structured group, two or more such friendship networks usually compete with each other for formal power. This is often the healthiest situation. The other members are in a position to arbitrate between the two competitors for power and thus are able to make demands of the group to whom they give their temporary allegiance.


FRIENDSHIP AS THE ONLY FORM OF ORGANISATION
As long as friendship groups are the main means of organizational activity, elitism becomes institutionalized.


POLITICAL EFFICIENCY
The more unstructured a movement is, the less control it has over the directions in which it develop and the political actions in which it engages. This does not mean that its ideas do not spread. Given a certain amount of interest by the media and the appropriateness of social conditions, the ideas will still be diffused widely. But diffusion of ideas does not mean they are implemented: it only means they are talked about.


STRUCTURE IS NOT BAD:
there is nothing inherently bad about structure itself - only its excessive use.


DELEGATION:
1) delegation of a specific authority to specific individuals for specific tasks by democratic procedures. Letting people assume jobs or tasks by default only means they are not dependably done. If people are selected to do a task, preferably after expressing an interest or willingness to do it, they have made a commitment, which cannot be easily ignored.


2) Requiring all those to whom authority has been delegated to be responsible to all those who selected them. This is how the group has control over people in positions of authority. Individuals may exercise power, but it is the group that has the ultimate say over how the power is exercised.


3) Distribution of authority among as many people as is reasonably possible This prevents monopoly of power and requires those in positions of authority to consult with many others in the process of exercising it. It also gives many people an opportunity to have responsibility for specific tasks and thereby learn specific skills.


4) Rotation of tasks among individuals. Responsibilities which are held too long by one person, formally or informally, come to be seen as that person's property and are not easily relinquished or controlled by the group. Conversely, if tasks are rotated too frequently they individual does not have time to learn her job well and acquire a sense of satisfaction of doing a good job.


5) Allocation of tasks along rational criteria. Selecting someone for a position because they are liked by the group, or giving them hard work because they are disliked, serves neither the group not the person in the long run. Ability, interest and responsibility have got to be the major concerns in such selection. People should be given an opportunity to learn skills they do not have, but this is best done through some sort of apprenticeship program me, rather than the sink or swim method. Having a responsibility one cannot handle well is demoralizing. Conversely, being blackballed from what one can do well does not encourage one to develop one's skills. Women have been punished for being competent throughout history - the movement does not need to repeat this process.


6) Diffusion of information to everyone as frequently as possible. Information is power. Access to information enhances one's power. When an informal network spreads new ideas and information among themselves outside the group, they are already engaged in the process of forming an opinion - without the group participating. The more one knows about how things work, the more politically effective one can be.


7) Equal access to resources needed by the group. A person who maintains a monopoly over a resource can unduly influence the use of that resource. Skills and information are also resources.


THE PHANTASY AND ABUSE OF THE MANIPULABLE USER:
Betsy Haibel


The hacker mythos has long been driven by a narrow notion of “meritocracy.” Hacker meritocracy, like all “meritocracies,” reinscribes systems of oppression by victim-blaming those who aren’t allowed to succeed within it, or gain the skills it values. Hacker meritocracy casts non-technical skills as irrelevant, and punishes those who lack technical skills. Having “technical merit” becomes a requirement to defend oneself online.



NOTES TO SELF AS I READ THROUGH OUR NOTES:

CRYPTO ACTIVISTS LEVERAGE THE CONCEPT OF THE 'DISSIDENT ACTIVIST'
miriyam: they are based in different environments and have different priorities
the techno-activists understanding of political situation is dominated by a framing of security and risks, rather than matters of content that may be primary to the invoked activist
while crypto-activists gets her legitimacy from the existence of the activist on the ground, part of her discourse is about the delegitimacy of their cause (vs. security concerns).


in general, and most probably by virtue of thinking politics at the scale of global or at least international infrastructures, there is a tendency among tech activists to think of politics universally. Think of almost "use cases" of being political that may apply universally. There is also a shyness here with respect to getting your hands dirty with politics, when coding could be a form of escaping or avoiding conflict. 
see johan soderberg's article on engineers and conflict avoidance


THE MANY RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN DESIGN, COLLECTIVES AND CONFLICT:
collective design
design for collectives
design collectives

and

design for conflict
conflictual design/ jara: cultural mediation that aspires consensus but also dissesnsus (for whom, at the cost of whom)
design in conflict



JARA: infrastructure as agent, the squares as agents, as practices of mediation!!!



FEMKE: we want to explore the relationships between tools and practice
division of labor between users and developers
between designers and developers
men and women: bodies were not on the table
free vs. proprietary software


WHERE ARE YOU IN ACTION:
MIRIYAM: 
the urgency of the moment matters
are you amidst a revolution, post-revolution, counter-revolution?
is it a time for reflection, is there time for reflection, and to learn ways of using tech for avoiding oppression.
ABSTRACT NEEDS TO BE SITUATED: every statement will mean very different thing in different geographies, with different tech penetration etc. this must be reflected on


PATH DEPENDENCY, PRACTICE AND TOOLS:
we do things because that is the way they have been done
social and practice norms can/do/should prevail
FEMKE: I look at layout software: Gutenberg is there.How do you know, how do you read, does it need to be like that?
seda notes: if path dependency is so determining, can you ever start something new, and why do certain new things work?
maybe also need to think about habits, doing things because you a re used to doing it that way
this might explain why security doesn't sell, because habits of security practice do not (yet) translate to other common practices and habits. in fact, maybe they never will. 


WHAT CAN WE DO:
FEMKE: how could you make documents that would somehow make the naturalization of the division of labor visible, in a way that would not stop them from working, but also refuse to accept that the division of labor is the way it is.
to deal with the conventional roles that we find ourselves in


 types of activist organizations (network theory):
http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=VKFMTDnapl4C&oi=fnd&pg=PA289&dq=%22division+of+labor%22+technology+programmers+activists&ots=jFbzPaVmD9&sig=GBisljfOyTlbnkMHQsRpEdibVVU#v=onepage&q=%22division%20of%20labor%22%20technology%20programmers%20activists&f=false


 WE HAVE BETTER THINGS TO DO AND ITS BACKLASH:
at the tipping moment, it is understandable to say we have better things to do
the root of the current problems lies in that phase
in 2011, it really was now and never
there was no time to think about the negative side effects of technology
the need and necessity was to mobilize
as many people as possible
in terms of what is the tool that makes that possible
the mainstream commercial tool is what makes that possible
you are not in a position to philosophize about whether it is correct, we should create our own alternative
you have to, 
i consider that we are now in a post phase: there is a counter revolution everywhere
the backlash appears
it now becomes clear that it is easier to ...
the corporations give data to states
the arab region is in the top 5 states requesting information from Facebook and receiving them
so in the post phase, we have better things to do, we see the backlash of that


 MIRIYAM (cyber-orientalism)
 we can call it "cyber-orientalism"
        a sudden interest in the region
        after for years being portrayed as meak, feeble
        were now seen as agents
        they were allowed to be part of the mediation
        by inserting technology as the actual agent
        hence the label Facebook revolution
        which started in iran in 2009
        the selective choosing of spokespersons
        in egypt, for instance, whaled ghanim, who was a google manage of the region
        who had started a Facebook group secretly
        he was the ambassador of the arab revolutions
        he quickly
        we need to name and shame
        he was quickly invited by the us state department

  but the price is that the actual actions of the 100.000s of people who created the tipping point is not part of the narrative
        it is a way to de-politicize the revolution
        to not talk about class and the reasons why people revolted
        but to see it as a coincidental moment that coincided with the introduction of a certain technology
        this is why people are very angry
        irony is that the response to that anger is redefined as techno-distopian
        the people whoa re outspoken against this narrative are the internet techies
        people who really the designers who made that harsh critique
        the wikileaks came out 2 months before the uprising in tunisia
        so people said that wikileaks shows the people that their president is corrupt
        the same people who are writing about the arab spring

 in syria: the whole idea of security and anonymity that is part of the reflex of activists in syria have disappeared almost over night


 CORPORATE COMPLICITY:
     where mobile penetration was 100percent
the penetration of social networking sites tripled between january and february
even twitter was 2-3 percent but it made a huge leap
people thought it was a key to the revolution even if you don't understand what it is
this is the concrete environment that activists have to maneuver through
if we take internet and technology as part of our environment
these are the points that activists have to maneuver through
the internet is a moment of corporate complicity: 
a pace for government propaganda
and the mukhabarat makes use of these networks for their own means

this is how you have to maneuver to still use the technology but not be captured
there are 100s of dilemmas in this story


 jara:
femke:
jara:
KEM GOZLERE SIS:

Encrypting information is easier than decrypting information. Julian Assange

ICTs are being abused by companies and governments, users engage in uninformed practices, and all of these combined threaten our privacy and security. But, at the same time, technology comes with solutions to these problems. The objective of this project is to provide practical information about how to protect us from the "evil eyes" that are watching us and to contribute to the creation of a community aware of these mattters.

here you have references to companies and governments being the culprits of surveillance, but also users are obviously not informed. yet, there is technology to solveth the problems that technology maketh. or, let's say, there are these nice guys, who are informed about tech, who are not part of governments or companies (?), who have the ability to teach and adorn a public about ways to protect their privacy and security. so two approaches: individual protectino + community awareness and action.

then comes the big red button: about this project


the first paragraph is the same except that it says: our voice, our image, our personal files, and all our communications happen in digital spaces.

this is quite an assumption for even high brow istanbulites.

legal loopholes, the greediness of companies and their unethical and illegal activities, and the governments' oppressive, paranoid security policies expands the boundaries of digital surveillance everyday. companies see data as a meta [product] to sell, governments use it to profile their citizens under the disguise of fighting potential threats. in mos cases the companies and governments collaborate

the surveillance technology is reproduced every year with budget of billions of dollars

on other side, there are people who are resisting surveillance and those justice and freedom initiatives who fight for the protection of privacy. they pressure governments and companies, and put efforts into introducing legal protections.

while these groups are one leg of the  resistance to surveillance, the other leg is the introduction of encryption tools introduced by hacktivisty and cypherpunks. with these tools, the users  can protect the security of their communications, their devices and their personal data. so, technology comes up with solutions, too!

the objective of this project is to assist those users who need privacy protection, to give them practical tips to protect themselves from "evil eyes", and to contribute to a growing community that is aware of these issues.

how can i make use of this site?


help us
you can send your comments and suggestions by email. 
it is possible to contact these guys through twitter, indy.im, diaspora


the contact information includes a link to description of alternative social networks.

i sent them an email for an indy.im invitation to kemgozler@, the mail address didn't work anymore.

the help us is repeated on most pages (maybe all, i have to check), and also includes the following statement:
    we ask you to inform us about mistakes in any of the documents we provide. if you have suggestions for better solutions, please let us know. you can also contact us with questions about use. (rather conversational.)

QUESTIONS
in the contact page, in addition to social networks, there is the option to send questions:

CONTRIBUTE:
    if you want to contrubte send us an email at kemgozler@ (this time the email address with public key)

ACTIVITIES:
    we can help you organize events to explain encryption tools to people, eg. cryptoparties. please send an email to activities@

back to the HOME PAGE
going below the big red button

left to right: desktops, mobile, and faq
i started with the faq: it is empty, they say over time this page will fill up with questions we receive from you!

MOBILE:
split into three:
    mobile instant messsaging
    mobile browser
    mobile connectivity

messaging, connectivity and browsing are obviously important, but there are thousands of other topics, why these? you wonder why there is no list of tools that they can reference from other sites. in fact, generally, it is about recreating the wheel from scratch rather than thinking about networks of initiatives.


mobile instant messaging:
    they only recommend chatsecure, they provide for instructions on android and iphone...

    description:chatsecure allows users to chat securely over facebook and google with your friends.
    it suppors the following services:
who can you speak with:
there is support in turkish (!).
if these services are blocked within the country (turkey), then you can still use orbot (browser that runs tor) to reach these services. this way your communications cannot be stopped i you are subject to censorship, blocking or similar situations


(seda: this shows the sensitivity of matters for turkish users, censorship is quite an issue as well as surveillance, although censorship was nowhere mentioned in the introduction text).

the application does not store any records of past activities. this keeps from other malicious apps from collecting information about your chat activities.

you can download this app from android market and using the instruction below start using it.
MOBILE BROWSERS:
    three options are available: orbot and orweb for android, onion browser for ios.
    what is interesting is tha there is no explanation as to why these browsers should be preferred over existing browers, there is also no explanation with respect to why you need to reach the tor network using orbot, and why this is a separate matter from having the tor browser (orweb), or any other service that you want to run over tor.


    orbot android
DESKTOP:

    the following services are shortly listed and described

    instant messaging
    browser
    email
    computer security
    internet connection security


    INSTANT MESSAGING
EMAIL
COMPUTER SECURITY: