Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Ingrid Robeyns @ingridrobeyns.bsky.social · 3d

Today, 250.000 people took to the streets of Amsterdam to protest Israel's genocidal violence in Gaza and the cowardly response by the Dutch government. It followed on two earlier protests, one with 150.000 protesters, and the first one with about 100.000. By Dutch standards, these are huge numbers.

Oxfam Novib @oxfamnovib.bsky.social · 3d

WIJ ZIJN MET MEER❗

#RodeLijn

1 41 120

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Platforms & Society @platformsnsociety.bsky.social · 22d

Hot off the press: Chris J Young, Daniel J Joseph and @nieborg.bsky.social trace a platform historiography of #Unity to discuss how workflows create dexterous corporate lockins in cultural production journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/... enjoy!

5 6

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Platforms & Society @platformsnsociety.bsky.social · 16d

A longish thread to announce that the Themed Issue "Digital Platform Economies: Value from Data?" is now fully available online
"https://journals.sagepub.com/topic/collections-pns/pns-1-digital_platform_economies_value_from_data/pns

1 6 9

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · 16d

🛎️
@platformsnsociety.bsky.social

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · 16d

Thanks to guest editors Janet Roitman, Leila Lin & Andrew Moon for putting this collection together!

And thank you to all the wonderful contributors, including @puellaludens.bsky.social, @franziscool.bsky.social, @markandrejevic.bsky.social, @kelsiemvn.bsky.social, @jakegoldenfein.bsky.social

♥️

1 1

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · 16d

Very happy to share that the TI ‘Digital Platform Economies: Value from Data?’ is now available online.

The essays critically examine the multifaceted and complex relation between platforms, data & value, asking how forms of “data-value” are made actionable:

journals.sagepub.com/topic/collec...

journals.sagepub.com

1 1 4

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Marc Steinberg @msteinbrg.bsky.social · 17d

If you want to ignore the news for a moment and read something whip smart that teaches you about Alipay’s global interoperability, allowing Kakao users to pay in Japan and much else - read this 👇

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · 21d

I am very pleased to see this super insightful piece by @jingwangnyu.bsky.social out in @platformsnsociety.bsky.social! It examines how the “productization of APIs allows Alipay+ to extend its platform logic into global financial infrastructures.

Read it here: doi.org/10.1177/2976...

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

doi.org

2 9

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · 21d

Will certainly be of interest to people like @fvandervlist.bsky.social, @silvertje.bsky.social, @msteinbrg.bsky.social and @paullangley.bsky.social.

3

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · 21d

I am very pleased to see this super insightful piece by @jingwangnyu.bsky.social out in @platformsnsociety.bsky.social! It examines how the “productization of APIs allows Alipay+ to extend its platform logic into global financial infrastructures.

Read it here: doi.org/10.1177/2976...

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

doi.org

2 3 8

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Platforms & Society @platformsnsociety.bsky.social · Jul 8

Digital payments against the convenience of cash? Read more from our editor @msteinbrg.bsky.social writing about PayPay, Japanese convenience stores, and the digital payment wars of the late 2010s. journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

3 4

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

SFB 1265 @sfb1265.bsky.social · 29d

New article out in @platformsnsociety.bsky.social!
"Toward a platform–labor–territory nexus: Platform-driven deterritorialization and reterritorialization processes in the Chilean Andes"
by #sfb1265 PhD Scholar @jyelee.bsky.social 👇📰
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

journals.sagepub.com

4 5

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Platforms & Society @platformsnsociety.bsky.social · 26d

A belated catch-up with the papers that came out this (boreal) summer: we start with @alexturvy.bsky.social with a comparative analysis of how TikTok and Instagram shape the conditions for cultural production through their platform configurations. Read more here journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

2 4

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Platforms & Society @platformsnsociety.bsky.social · 26d

And another gem from the summer: Nicholas Proferes @kelleyhas2es.bsky.social @kthorson.bsky.social @ankolika.bsky.social Chia-Fang Chang and Ava Francesca Battocchio write about the rhetoric of localism in platform content moderation. Read more here journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

4 6

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Platforms & Society @platformsnsociety.bsky.social · 26d

And another piece for our readers: Margherita Di Cicco & Davide Beraldo explore how sex workers engage in cross-platform promotion more than in the production of sexual content itself, arguing that precarious success on OF depends on cross-platform dependency journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

3 7

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Veena Dubal @veenadubal.bsky.social · Aug 27

“As authorities round up their work force, the big players in the world of Silicon Valley-developed delivery apps have largely remained silent. Three of the biggest — Uber, Grubhub, and DoorDash — did not respond to requests for comment.”

theintercept.com/2025/08/26/t...

ICE Targets App Delivery Drivers — and the Tech Giants They Work for Stay Silent

As part of the federal takeover of D.C., ICE agents have been targeting delivery drivers for the likes of Uber, Grubhub, and DoorDash.

theintercept.com

5 63 110

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Katie J. Wells @katiejwells.bsky.social · Aug 19

This summer's interviews with instant delivery workers made it clear: 7 countries were traveled to bring you a burrito. The scars on their faces, the rented bikes, the women who show up w/ trunks full of prepared meals to sell to these deliveristas, the long waits...

Leah McElrath @leahmcelrath.bsky.social · Aug 19

ICE and DC police arrest a delivery driver in DC

Via @arielcohen37.bsky.social

Ariel Cohen
@ArielCohen37
Follow
Roughly 20 police and ICE officers on 13th & I NE to arrest a delivery driver. He is sobbing and asking to call his family.
A group of neighbors have assembled to try and help him but the agents are yelling at us to go away.
POLICE

9:03 AM • 8/19/25 • 4K Views

1 4 8

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Matthew Kirschenbaum @mkirschenbaum.bsky.social · Aug 12

Instead of regurgitating the bromide that LLMs are just "autocomplete on steroids" (even by people who know better), maybe we can actually engage in some public education. The problem with genAI is better expressed through a classic computer science concept, known as SYMBOL GROUNDING. 🧵

33 290 820

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · Aug 11

This text is life-giving.

Mary Dudziak @marydudziak.bsky.social · Aug 11

Assigning the MIT study alongside Lynn Hunt, How Writing Leads to Thinking.
AND: we'll do mandatory in-class writing with pen and paper.
www.historians.org/perspectives...

How Writing Leads to Thinking (and Not the Other Way Around) – AHA

Writing is stressful. Sitting in my computer chair my neck and shoulder muscles almost immediately tense up as I dig around in my brain for the best phrase or even any coherent string of words.

www.historians.org

1 5

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Daniela Gabor @danielagabor.bsky.social · Aug 7

The Trump presidency has three pillars:

- transformative tariffs
- American hegemony via AI/stablecoins
- accelerate Big Finance occupation of welfare state

1 4 11

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Tiziana Terranova @synthesiastica.bsky.social · Aug 6

Tech giants are lavishing on AI development the kind of capital that would be needed to secure the social and ecological transition necessary to counter the apocalyptic horizon that is looming over the planet and the human species....
www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

Big tech has spent $155bn on AI this year. It’s about to spend hundreds of billions more

Tech giants have spent more on AI than the US government has on education, jobs and social services in 2025 so far

www.theguardian.com

1 2 7

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

ali alkhatib @ali-alkhatib.com · Aug 6

sorry to post about myself, but i'm getting pretty desperate, so

if anyone has a lead on any jobs in AI policy or research, i would be very grateful for a positive reference or just a pointer in the direction of the job listing.

thanks a ton in advance.

3 37 61

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · Aug 5

Platform churn, or rapid turnover, is a feature not a bug. As long as the costs of hiring and firing remain lower than the surplus value generated through exploitative platform decay/progressive work degradation this will remain part of the business model.

2

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · Aug 5

The people who take their place enter a very diferent gig economy. Newcomers often lack the institutional memory regarding labor and payment standards that the previous generation took with them when they moved on. This is why online forums and app groups are so important.

1 1 2

Niels van Doorn @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social · Aug 5

This is an important “long view” contribution to the gig economy/platform work scholarship. Congrats @maffie.bsky.social!

I recognize many of the decay/degradation mechanisms you describe. They’re why so many seasoned gig workers have left these platforms, when possible.

Michael Maffie @maffie.bsky.social · Aug 5

🚨 I’m excited to announce that, “The Enshittification of Work: Platform Decay and Labour Conditions in the Gig Economy” is now available online !

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

The Enshittification of Work: Platform Decay and Labour Conditions in the Gig Economy

This study investigates the mechanisms by which gig platforms degrade labour conditions over time, building on the concept of platform decay, or ‘enshittification’, initially developed in the context...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

1 1 7

Reposted by Niels van Doorn

Aju John @islandexpress.bsky.social · Jul 1

Fresh!

The first episode of the second season of Delivery Charge. It's about migrants from South Asia doing food delivery work in Berlin.

Spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/1tDm...

Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/e...

Podbean: deliverycharge.podbean.com/e/e1-punjab-...

E1: Punjab to Potsdamer Platz

Delivery Charge · Episode

open.spotify.com

5 5