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Title: Introduction: Harm in Computational Infrastructures Slug: 01-s2-introduction Date: 2020-11-01 12:00 Summary: Previously we have become acquainted with a view on digital infrastructures that highlights their reparative and connective characteristics. In this track we will trace the term computational infrastructures, which forefronts how infrastructures are made from material elements and how they move said elements in the world.
Previously we have become acquainted with a view on digital infrastructures that highlights their reparative and connective characteristics. In this track we will trace the term computational infrastructures, which forefronts how infrastructures are made from material elements and how they move said elements in the world.
Seda Gürses' work on computational infrastructures which was developed in collaboration with Martha Poon and Roel Dobbe provides us with handles to study them.1
Computational infrastructures are complex entities shaped by different technological, social, economical and political dimensions. As is the case with any type of infrastructure, they come with embedded values. Their specificities and configurations shape the possibilities and restrictions of the whole system, defining what can be built on top of them and what not. The logics of computational infrastructures are shaped by global capital, material components, political values, and in turn shape labour relations, environmental ecosystems, as well as the political economies in which they operate.
Footnotes
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Seda Gürses, Roel Dobbe, Martha Poon "Seminar on Programmable Infrastructures" (2020) https://www.tudelft.nl/tbm/programmable-infrastructures/ ↩︎