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Title: Introduction: Seda Gürses Slug: 02-s2-introduction Date: 2020-11-01 12:01 Summary: Seda Gürses, computational infrastructures & POTs (Protective Optimization Technologies)
The work of Seda Gürses provides us with handles to XXX [unpack, look closer into, study, explore] computational infrastructures. Throughout her work she has questioned the notion of "fair" technologies, the limits of such practices and who is involved in reviewing their impact. An important factor in her work is to approach computational infrastructures as systems that are far more than a technological ecosystems alone.
Her work on POTs (Protective Optimization Technologies)1 proposes forms of critical optimization. By questioning how protective technologies could optimize their mode of operation in a truly fair way, it provides means for affected parties to address negative impacts of digital systems. The work departs from a thorough consideration of multiple forms of harm to externalities caused by computational infrastructures, such as privacy, discrimination, low wages, surveillance and exploration risks. How a POT could possible engage with these externalities is furthermore illustrated through a range of activistic, artistic and deployed examples of repurposed optimization technologies that correct, shift of expose these harms.
Seda is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Multi-Actor Systems at TU Delft at the Faculty of Technology Policy and Management, and an affiliate at the COSIC Group at the Department of Electrical Engineering (ESAT), KU Leuven. Beyond her academic work, she also collaborated with artistic initiatives including Constant vzw, Bootlab, De-center, ESC in Brussels, Graz and Berlin.
Footnotes
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Bogdan Lulynych, Rebekah Overdorf, Carmela Troncoso, Seda Gürses "POTs: Protective Optimization Technologies" (2020). https://arxiv.org/pdf/1806.02711.pdf ↩︎