Amelia Acker
Biographic Data
| ID | 296545 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Amelia Acker |
| GIVEN NAMES | Amelia |
| FAMILY NAME | Acker |
| SIGNATURE | ACKER A |
| AFFILIATIONS | The University of Texas at Austin |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5332-0487 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 15 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 14 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2013 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Platformization of research data infrastructure: A decadal analysis of scientific data management plans
New federal research policies support data-driven science by requiring data management planning and data preservation for open access to scientific data and research products. This article shows a “platform effect” in how scientists plan for data preservation. By examining 976 data management plans for projects funded between 2011 and 2021 by the United States’ National Science Foundation (NSF) in five research areas, we document a shift in plann…
Accessing Software: Emulation in Information Institutions
This article presents a study of preservationists implementing emulation workflows in three information institutions that collect and provide access to software: an academic research library, a university technology lab and archive, and a museum of technology. Drawing on participant observation and interviews ( N = 25), I present a theory of emulation for preservation based on visions of accessing software, building a vocabulary to represent the …
Epistemologies of missing data: Covid dashboard builders and the production and maintenance of marginalized Covid data
During COVID-19, countless dashboards served as the central media for people to learn critical information about the pandemic. Varied actors, including news organizations, government agencies, universities, and nongovernmental organizations, created and maintained these dashboards, through the onerous labor of collecting, categorizing, and circulating COVID data. This study uncovers different forms of labor and data practices—the work of “COVID d…
Infrastructures of Manipulation
This panel presents research on web and information infrastructures used for manipulative purposes. In contrast to platform manipulation (Woolley & Howard, 2018; Benkler et al., 2018), where users such as bad actors seek to gamify and exploit the weaknesses of online social media platforms like Twitter and TikTok, the papers in the present panel describe studies where web or information infrastructures such as those involved in search and informa…
The seer and the seen: Surveying Palantir’s surveillance platform
Palantir is among the most secretive and understudied surveillance firms globally. The company supplies information technology solutions for data integration and tracking to police and government agencies, humanitarian organizations, and corporations. To illuminate and learn more about Palantir’s opaque surveillance practices, we begin by sketching Palantir’s company history and contract network, followed by an explanation of key terms associated…
The Seer and the Seen: A Survey of Topics Found in Palantir Patents
Palantir is one of the most secretive technology firms in the US. The company supplies information technology (IT) solutions to governments, nonprofits, and corporations, focusing on data integration and surveillance services. To investigate Palantir’s opaque technology practices, this article presents findings from a topic modeling of Palantir patents (n=155) filed from 2006-2019 in the US, Germany, Australia, UK, and EU. This approach follows r…
Platformizing Knowledge: Mess and Meaning in Web 3.0 Infrastructures
This panel focuses on the way that platforms have become key players in the representation of knowledge. Recently, there have been calls to combine infrastructure and platform-based frameworks to understand the nature of information exchange on the web through digital tools for knowledge sharing. The present panel builds and extends work on platform and infrastructure studies in what has been referred to as “knowledge as programmable object” (Pla…
Understanding the meaning of emoji in mobile social payments: Exploring the use of mobile payments as hedonic versus utilitarian through skin tone modified emoji usage
Despite research establishing emojis as sites of critical racial discourse, there is a paucity of literature examining their importance in the increasingly popular context of mobile payments. This is particularly important as new forms of social payment platforms such as Venmo bridge the seamlessness of mobile payments with the vibrant communicative practices of social networks. As such, they provide a unique medium to examine how emojis are used…
To oblivion and beyond: Imagining infrastructure after collapse
Theorists of infrastructure have thought a great deal about time and temporality but have not often seriously considered the future of these massive and durable objects. This elision is notable due to infrastructures' current role in our world: highly vulnerable to crises such as those brought about by climate change yet also playing a role in hastening such events. Following Lauren Berlant and Dominic Boyer, we take the current moment as an oppo…
Data Cultures, Culture as Data – Special Issue of Cultural Analytics
Data have become pervasive in research in the humanities and the social sci- ences. New areas, objects, and situations for study have developed; and new methods for working with data are shepherded by new epistemologies and (po- tential) paradigm shifts. But data didn’t just happen to us. We have happened to data
Data craft: A theory/methods package for critical internet studies
Disinformation campaigns continue to thrive online, despite social media companies’ efforts at identifying and culling manipulation on their platforms. Framing these manipulation tactics as ‘coordinated inauthentic behavior,’ major platforms have banned culprits and deleted the evidence of their actions from social activity streams, making independent assessment and auditing impossible. While researchers, journalists, and civil society groups use…
Social media data archives in an API-driven world
In this article, we explore the long-term preservation implications of application programming interfaces (APIs) which govern access to data extracted from social media platforms. We begin by introducing the preservation problems that arise when APIs are the primary way to extract data from platforms, and how tensions fit with existing models of archives and digital repository development. We then define a range of possible types of API users mot…
Debating Data Science
Students and scholars working at the intersections of history and science and technology studies (STS) have an unexpected opportunity when it comes to the growing profession of data science: the chance not only to document but also to actively shape a "new" scientific profession, one that seems intent to scale up swiftly and determined to claim considerable global influence. Of course, charting origins and tracing the early histories of scientifi…
How cells became records: Standardization and infrastructure in tissue culture
Social media data archives in an API-driven world
In this article, we explore the long-term preservation implications of application programming interfaces (APIs) which govern access to data extracted from social media platforms. We begin by introducing the preservation problems that arise when APIs are the primary way to extract data from platforms, and how tensions fit with existing models of archives and digital repository development. We then define a range of possible types of API users mot…
To oblivion and beyond: Imagining infrastructure after collapse
Theorists of infrastructure have thought a great deal about time and temporality but have not often seriously considered the future of these massive and durable objects. This elision is notable due to infrastructures' current role in our world: highly vulnerable to crises such as those brought about by climate change yet also playing a role in hastening such events. Following Lauren Berlant and Dominic Boyer, we take the current moment as an oppo…
The seer and the seen: Surveying Palantir’s surveillance platform
Palantir is among the most secretive and understudied surveillance firms globally. The company supplies information technology solutions for data integration and tracking to police and government agencies, humanitarian organizations, and corporations. To illuminate and learn more about Palantir’s opaque surveillance practices, we begin by sketching Palantir’s company history and contract network, followed by an explanation of key terms associated…
How cells became records: Standardization and infrastructure in tissue culture
How cells became records: Standardization and infrastructure in tissue culture
Debating Data Science
Students and scholars working at the intersections of history and science and technology studies (STS) have an unexpected opportunity when it comes to the growing profession of data science: the chance not only to document but also to actively shape a "new" scientific profession, one that seems intent to scale up swiftly and determined to claim considerable global influence. Of course, charting origins and tracing the early histories of scientifi…
Data Cultures, Culture as Data – Special Issue of Cultural Analytics
Data have become pervasive in research in the humanities and the social sci- ences. New areas, objects, and situations for study have developed; and new methods for working with data are shepherded by new epistemologies and (po- tential) paradigm shifts. But data didn’t just happen to us. We have happened to data
Data craft: A theory/methods package for critical internet studies
Disinformation campaigns continue to thrive online, despite social media companies’ efforts at identifying and culling manipulation on their platforms. Framing these manipulation tactics as ‘coordinated inauthentic behavior,’ major platforms have banned culprits and deleted the evidence of their actions from social activity streams, making independent assessment and auditing impossible. While researchers, journalists, and civil society groups use…
Social media data archives in an API-driven world
In this article, we explore the long-term preservation implications of application programming interfaces (APIs) which govern access to data extracted from social media platforms. We begin by introducing the preservation problems that arise when APIs are the primary way to extract data from platforms, and how tensions fit with existing models of archives and digital repository development. We then define a range of possible types of API users mot…
Platformizing Knowledge: Mess and Meaning in Web 3.0 Infrastructures
This panel focuses on the way that platforms have become key players in the representation of knowledge. Recently, there have been calls to combine infrastructure and platform-based frameworks to understand the nature of information exchange on the web through digital tools for knowledge sharing. The present panel builds and extends work on platform and infrastructure studies in what has been referred to as “knowledge as programmable object” (Pla…
Understanding the meaning of emoji in mobile social payments: Exploring the use of mobile payments as hedonic versus utilitarian through skin tone modified emoji usage
Despite research establishing emojis as sites of critical racial discourse, there is a paucity of literature examining their importance in the increasingly popular context of mobile payments. This is particularly important as new forms of social payment platforms such as Venmo bridge the seamlessness of mobile payments with the vibrant communicative practices of social networks. As such, they provide a unique medium to examine how emojis are used…
To oblivion and beyond: Imagining infrastructure after collapse
Theorists of infrastructure have thought a great deal about time and temporality but have not often seriously considered the future of these massive and durable objects. This elision is notable due to infrastructures' current role in our world: highly vulnerable to crises such as those brought about by climate change yet also playing a role in hastening such events. Following Lauren Berlant and Dominic Boyer, we take the current moment as an oppo…
The Seer and the Seen: A Survey of Topics Found in Palantir Patents
Palantir is one of the most secretive technology firms in the US. The company supplies information technology (IT) solutions to governments, nonprofits, and corporations, focusing on data integration and surveillance services. To investigate Palantir’s opaque technology practices, this article presents findings from a topic modeling of Palantir patents (n=155) filed from 2006-2019 in the US, Germany, Australia, UK, and EU. This approach follows r…
The seer and the seen: Surveying Palantir’s surveillance platform
Palantir is among the most secretive and understudied surveillance firms globally. The company supplies information technology solutions for data integration and tracking to police and government agencies, humanitarian organizations, and corporations. To illuminate and learn more about Palantir’s opaque surveillance practices, we begin by sketching Palantir’s company history and contract network, followed by an explanation of key terms associated…
Infrastructures of Manipulation
This panel presents research on web and information infrastructures used for manipulative purposes. In contrast to platform manipulation (Woolley & Howard, 2018; Benkler et al., 2018), where users such as bad actors seek to gamify and exploit the weaknesses of online social media platforms like Twitter and TikTok, the papers in the present panel describe studies where web or information infrastructures such as those involved in search and informa…
Accessing Software: Emulation in Information Institutions
This article presents a study of preservationists implementing emulation workflows in three information institutions that collect and provide access to software: an academic research library, a university technology lab and archive, and a museum of technology. Drawing on participant observation and interviews ( N = 25), I present a theory of emulation for preservation based on visions of accessing software, building a vocabulary to represent the …
Epistemologies of missing data: Covid dashboard builders and the production and maintenance of marginalized Covid data
During COVID-19, countless dashboards served as the central media for people to learn critical information about the pandemic. Varied actors, including news organizations, government agencies, universities, and nongovernmental organizations, created and maintained these dashboards, through the onerous labor of collecting, categorizing, and circulating COVID data. This study uncovers different forms of labor and data practices—the work of “COVID d…
Platformization of research data infrastructure: A decadal analysis of scientific data management plans
New federal research policies support data-driven science by requiring data management planning and data preservation for open access to scientific data and research products. This article shows a “platform effect” in how scientists plan for data preservation. By examining 976 data management plans for projects funded between 2011 and 2021 by the United States’ National Science Foundation (NSF) in five research areas, we document a shift in plann…
Computer Science (12 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Political science (7 works) · World Wide Web (7 works) · Business (5 works) · Data science (5 works) · Knowledge management (4 works) · Law (4 works) · Metadata (4 works) · Digital and Traditional Archives Management (3 works)