Social Design Notes

On the pace of change from an interview with investigative journalist Inga Springe : > "It might take maybe five years for something to happen, like I've > been reporting about ...

http://backspace.com/notes/2023/01/gradually-then-suddenly.php

Popular culture is blown by many winds: trends, talent, tradition, technology, treasure... But I haven't seen much on the influence of public policy. Three interesting data points that crossed my...

http://backspace.com/notes/2022/03/public-policy-and-popular-music.php

I knew about the role of printing and English coffee houses in germinating the seeds of the British Enlightenment, but today I learned about the 1662 Licensing Act "An Act for preventing the fre...

http://backspace.com/notes/2020/12/printing-without-a-license.php

Brushing up on some accessibility and listening to the new 13 Letters podcast , I ran into this moving story from an interview with Haben Girma , a lawyer and the first deafblind graduate of Harv...

http://backspace.com/notes/2020/04/dancing-in-the-dark.php

From Sasha Costanza-Chock, Design Justice: towards an intersectional feminist framework for design theory and practice : > "Design is key to our collective liberation, but most design...

http://backspace.com/notes/2018/07/design-justice.php

On becoming Klan (1982) (via) > “ testified that the Klan had four basic components. > One is what he called ‘one hundred percent Americanism.’ The > Klan is as o...

http://backspace.com/notes/2018/02/hearts-and-minds.php

TOOLKIT NOW AVAILABLE Using data visualization can improve the effectiveness of human rights work that involves data. In particular, combining data and visuals in the promotion of human rights ...

http://backspace.com/notes/2018/01/an-introduction-to-data-visualization-for-human-rights.php

Reading this essay by Jeff Jarvis on the future of newspapers (which encourages, among other things, radical experimentation as community-centric service delivery internet start-ups) I ran into ...

http://backspace.com/notes/2017/08/thresholds-of-knowledge.php

> “Instead of always thinking that we need to make an app to 'solve' > some problem, there are often really strong existing community > processes. Wherever community i...

http://backspace.com/notes/2017/06/amp.php

Below, a visualization of use of force complaints against NYPD officers to the Civilian Complaint Review Board in 2016, via : FLASHLIGHT AS CLUB: 6 GUN FIRED: 10 GUN AS CLUB: 12 Continue »...

http://backspace.com/notes/2017/06/nypd-use-of-force-complaints.php

The Internet Movie Database is shutting down its message boards. Acquired by Amazon in 1998, ongoing expense of community management and backend maintenance no longer justified itself to the bean...

http://backspace.com/notes/2017/02/message-boards.php

> I built a thing: text your US postal address to (520) 200-2223 and > get a text back with your state & federal legislative rep phone > numbers.— John Emerson (@ba...

http://backspace.com/notes/2016/12/lobbyphone.php

Violence Is Mine , September 26, 2014: > " video In Free Fall (2010) in particular > demonstrates how sites of apparent digital illusion are tied to the > real world. She�...

http://backspace.com/notes/2016/10/in-free-fall.php

Towards an ironic history of George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, a book about pervasive surveillance and censorship under totalitarianism. Egypt, November 2014 : > “An Egyptian c...

http://backspace.com/notes/2016/10/nineteen-eighty-four.php

A first year law school student wrote a complaint about her professor having worn a Black Lives Matter T-shirt during class. The professor’s response is priceless. Continue »

http://backspace.com/notes/2016/07/law-professors-response-to-black-lives-matter-shirt-complaint.php