Algorithmic search is entangled with a positivist ideology biased towards the assumption that neutrality can only be provided when search is performed by computational processes while shielded from human agencies. This article critically examines the ideological nature of algorithmic search, by showing how, between the mid-1970s and late-1980s, long before the birth of algorithmic search by search engines in the 1990s, a transformation from human interfaces to menu interfaces in online search helped encourage and normalise algorithmic ideology at the expense of a more humanistic ideology of search connected to library traditions. Based on a study of a broad corpus of archival materials in which online search appeared as a central object of description and discussion, it argues that the rise of menu interfaces in the 1980s encouraged the positivist nature of algorithmic search by decoupling a democratic service function at the front-end from the editorial function in the back-end, and by discouraging the use of human selection power and intellectual labour in the search process.
In this essay, Niels Kerssens and José van Dijck discuss the implications of platformization on the key public value of pedagogical autonomy in K–12 education. They focus on two interconnected concerns: how the integration of education into a global digital infrastructure contests the institutional pedagogical autonomy of schools and how the integration of digital platforms with educational practices in classrooms challenges the professional pedagogical autonomy of teachers. The authors engage with the symposium contributions by Williamson, Gulson, Perrotta & Witzenberger on the Amazon infrastructure and by Pangrazio, Stornaiuolo, Nichols, Garcia & Philip on platform practices at the classroom level. With this dual focus, Kerssens and van Dijck explore how critical research in the emerging field of platform studies in education pertains to both the political-economic level of building educational platform infrastructures and the social-technical level of how teaching and learning are (re)shaped by digital platforms. The essay concludes with a brief discussion of recommendations for the future governance of edtech to serve the pedagogical interest of schools and teachers.
Introduction: data mining as extraction of natural resources Big Data represents a tremendous opportunity to drill down and tap into these critical insights. In fact, the powerful potential to mine and refine this vital, valuable resource points to a direct comparison to a similarly vital resource in the modern economy: crude oil. 1 Meanwhile, artificial-intelligence (AI) techniques such as machine learning extract more value from data. 2
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.