Institute of Network Cultures

Music Streaming, but Make It Cooperative: Interview with Firuza Huseynova about Subvert Interdisciplinary researcher, iPod baby, and Montréal-based radio DJ Firuza Huseynova met the INC crew at the Exit Fest, and has been publishing with us since then. Sepp Eckenhaussen spoke to Firuza about her research on cooperative music streaming platform Subvert. We know the perils of music streaming platforms ~ lock-in syndrome, filter bubbles, exploitation of musicians, endemic AI slop. But what is happening beyond the doom and gloom? Can platform co-operativism be a joyful antidote to enshittification? ▷ https://networkcultures.org/ourcreativereset/2026/08/10/music-streaming-but-make-it-cooperative-interview-with-firuza-huseynova-about-subvert

Note to Self by Geert Lovink Devoted to the Study of the Wretched Subject “Things I saw: Man with two oxygen tanks circling 6 amusement machines. Woman wiped nose with rucksack. Mother looking at phone, asking her child to 'Use both feet!' when walking; man hyperventilating, eating loaded fries. Child apologizing to seagull for not giving it a chip.” James de Lils ▷ https://networkcultures.org/geert/2026/08/10/note-to-self/

Depth Without Friction: Notes on Technoromanticism, an INC Longform by Alex Belli By technoromanticism I do not mean a romantic fascination with technology, nor simply an aesthetic produced by technological media. I use the term to describe the technical stabilization of a romantic structure: exteriority becomes a reproducible scene of subjective intensification. Where historical romanticism often found its privileged scenes in nature, night, ruins, infinity, or the sublime, technoromanticism finds them in interface, surface, polish, emptiness, controlled darkness, and the highly legible object. Its promise is simple and powerful: the world has depth again. Matter returns. Objects return. Silence returns. Space returns. ▷ https://networkcultures.org/longform/2026/08/09/notes-on-technoromanticism/

The Institute of Network Cultures is proud to present the first publication of its last intern at HvA, Noah Pellikaan, produced at INC in the first half of 2026: Art, Activism, Academia: Changemaking in Contemporary Amsterdam is a collected, fragmentary volume speaking on left-wing social movements in Amsterdam’s artistic and academic spheres, with an emphasis on the 2015-2024 period. This book contains writings and interviews of varying literary style and formula, with collaborators across and surpassing fields of academic, political, and artistic practice. It’s lessons are resultant from Amsterdam, yes, though applicable far beyond it. The intent of Art, Activism, Academia is that of the generative archive, to create and curate activistic memory so as to intervene toward a better today. ▷ https://networkcultures.org/blog/publication/art-activism-academia-changemaking-in-contemporary-amsterdam/

Via Trebor Scholtz in New York. He recommends two courses: 1. AI Without Bosses asks who controls the direction of AI, whose interests it serves, and what democratic, community-based, and cooperative alternatives are already emerging.  The course is closely tied to the Solidarity AI Conference in Bangkok this November (Nov 12–15).  The AI Without Bosses course runs August 27–December 10, 2026, meeting Thursdays, 12:10–2:00 PM New York time (online). Invited guest speakers include Frank Pasquale, Alek Tarkovski, Sandeep Mertia, Tara Merk, Marcelo Vieta, Kenzo Soares Seto, Dorleta Urrutia Oñate, Phakin Nimmannorrawong, Morshed Mannan, and Melissa Terras. How to sign up: register through The New School's Continuing and Professional Education (CPE) site, create an account (or log in), and enroll in AI Without Bosses (NMGM 0208, CRN 18408). The fee is $60 plus a $47 New School registration fee. If you need help signing up, please write to continuinged@newschool.edu. Further reading: the syllabus and the payment & enrollment explainer. 2. Trebor also warmly invites you to this companion course, Eco Radicals: The Legacy of Revolutionary Cooperatives (NMGM 0207, CRN 17249), Wednesdays 12:10–2:00 PM ET, online. Eco Radicals traces the radical roots of the cooperative movement, from Robert Owen and W.E.B. Du Bois, as a living toolkit for reimagining today's economy and community. Case studies in this course are drawn from around the world. Further reading: the syllabus.  There is no tuition, only the registration fee; click "Available" to enroll here.

Lines of Code: Your AI is on Cocaine - Modes of Production in Taiwan, an INC longform by Lua Vollaard & Ying-Tzu Lin The current global supply chains of microchips largely overlap with the plantation and production sites of cocaine in the twentieth century. This is neither conjecture, nor coincidental. The places where much of the production of microchips currently takes place - the United States, the Netherlands, Taiwan, and Japan – are the same places that were involved in monopolising worldwide cocaine production for medicinal use by the late 19th century. ▷ https://networkcultures.org/longform/2026/07/16/lines-of-code/

Body is a Lost Media, Pixels Are All You're Gonna See - Reframing the Blur and the Body Across Palestine Online by Geremia Trinchese I remember scrolling the Instagram account @eyeonpalestine for months, and how you start to feel like when you stay there long enough. The feeling is both physical and emotional. It’s like being somewhere after an explosion. You got blurry vision, your ears are buzzing.Why are you still looking for destruction, atrocity, death? Why, scrolling on a feed through image after image of painful destruction, would you stop specifically on the blurred one and choose to unlock it? What are you trying to see?   ▷ https://networkcultures.org/blog/2026/07/23/body-is-a-lost-media/

The Uses of Embarrassment: Gossip, Testimony, and the Unmaking of Heteronormativity by Morgane Billuart If you’re chronically online, you probably have come across the Vogue article “Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing Now?” The controversial title sparked viral curiosity. Influencers, writers, and internet researchers alike had started to reflect on its broader analysis and implications. But what was truly so novel and exciting about such a statement? Scroll through the internet today and immerse yourself in self-taped stories centered on embarrassment and disillusionment surrounding heterosexual partnerships. In that context, does this Vogue article signal a revolutionary shift in how relationships are perceived, or does it mark the tipping point of a critique that has been steadily gaining visibility for years, now taking a novel, condensed, and viral form?   ▷ https://networkcultures.org/blog/2026/07/22/beyond-and-above-the-boyfriend-embarrassment-negotiating-heterosexual-normativity-online/

Implying Writing Has a Future – Greentext, Post-Irony, and Agency in the Age of ‘Agents’ by Myles Badger This INC Longform reads greentext — a 4chan-native writing form marked by >-prefixed lines — as a test case for media determinism in line of Friedirch Kittler. Tracing the form from a single line of inherited PHP, it argues greentext is more human than hardware—it emerged on 4chan, but is conspicuously absent from earlier platforms that share the same code. Suspended between quotation and imperative, greentext forces the reader to inhabit a borrowed first person and withholds verification of the author's presence in the text, blurring the line between confession, irony, and performance. By never certifying the "me" behind ">be me," greentext proves AI-proof: you can't counterfeit a thing that was never certified to begin with.   ▷ https://networkcultures.org/longform/2026/07/12/implying-writing-has-a-future/

⚡️Antifascist Network Cultures w/ Elke Uitentuis, Geert Lovink & Tibor Dieters⚡️ What is the role of art in building new social movements and media? Artists Elke Uitentuis and Tibor Dieters, and media theorist Geert Lovink join us in the studio to discuss what kind of media conglomerates we dream of, the models that inspire us, and the kind of coalitions we are ought to build. As you will hear, we all want to break away from the art world’s cozy bubble of empty political statements and build something else. The fundamental point, in Geert’s words, is to move art from policing at the discursive level to mobilising at the image level. 🔗 Listen to the pod via https://rss.com/podcasts/duckrabbits-talk-back, or on any major podcast platform. Cover illustration by Kacper Greń

Interview with Sebastian Gießmann on The Credit Card Book-History and Theory of Digital Payments By Geert Lovink German media theorist Sebastian Gießmann has written an accessible book on the history of the credit card. As the book was written in German, we conducted the email interview in English. With great ease, Gießmann takes the reader through the US industrialization of debt, from the 19th century credit reports that would judge clients on character, capacity and capital to the post-war Diners’ Club card and the invention of the magnetic stripe encoding. The story continues with the rollout of ATMs and the market dominance of Visa and Mastercard. A special chapter is dedicated to Eurocard and the failure of Europe to come up with viable alternatives. It’s interesting to read how the introduction of the chip on the credit card coincided with the rise of online and then smart smartphone payments. ▷https://networkcultures.org/moneylab/2026/07/07/interview-with-sebastian-giesmann-on-the-credit-card-book/

Slopification, Mon Amour: How I Stopped Hating the Algorithm and Became a Sloppy Research Persona by Elana Pilipets What if Donald Trump were the Pope? Jesus, a shrimp? Instead of mere noise, what happens when memes and AI slopme become the new frame of reference, guided by platform incentives and affective uptake? In times of global meme wars and generic AI, culture is once again presumed dead—and so is context. The endless recycling of online data takes on a world-making function. Dancing cats, copulating fruit, collapsing buildings, and longboarding soldiers all blur into a relentless stream of recommendations, detached from any personal preference. ▷https://networkcultures.org/longform/2026/07/01/slopification/

The Manosphere, the Male Body, and the Powers that Be. Join us for an early evening with a talk, a video and cold drinks with Merthe Voorhoeve and Jade van Doesburg. July 10, 2026, 17.30, Rozenstraat 59, Amsterdam. We live in precarious times. Political regression and technological acceleration are destabilising society while right-wing populist politics reign. At the same time, large numbers of men feel threatened from another direction: they see feminism and multiculturalism as the true evil forces of today. Patriarchy may be one of the oldest systems of power, but today hegemonic masculinity often emerges in a specific context: the online realm, where it has been termed ‘the Manosphere’. This online sphere revolves around misogyny, a reactionary longing for traditional gender roles, an idealization of (hyper) masculinity, and a cultus of the body. In Julika Rudelius’ work, the (muscular) male body often takes central stage. The body becomes a site for control, discipline, and power. This talk will explore the body-politics of the Manosphere: from incels and gooners, disciplinary practices like fitness and looksmaxxing, to meme characters like ‘Giga Chad’. Some of these phenomena can be seen as a form of ‘body armour’, theorised by Klaus Theweleit as a psychological and physical defense structure, a shield both emotional and muscular, to protect the fragile male ego against anything fluid and uncontrollable. We will also look at the role of Big Tech when it comes to these discussions. The world’s economic and political developments are increasingly driven by investment capitalists and a handful of Silicon Valley billionaires. Moreover, not only the economy, but also our most intimate inner worlds are at their service. Big Tech wields almost complete control over the current means of influence, specifically through social media platforms. Does the Manosphere, as troubling as it is, not just distract from these techno overlords’ growing power? We end the evening with a screening of Scanning (2020) by Jade van Doesburg, a quietly intimate video portrait of young men speaking about, and judging, their own bodies and those of their friends. Their conversations reveal moments of uncertainty, vulnerability, and openness, resulting in a disarmingly honest reflection on masculinity and self-image. https://www.rozenstraat.com/event/talk-the-manosphere-the-male-body-and-the-powers-that-be/

⚡Out now: Grindr’s Homonationalist Frontiers: Part 1 + 2 by Mallika Dharmaraj⚡ These Longforms aim to intervene in Grindr Studies by introducing theoretics of Zionism and homonationalism to contextualize harms on the Israeli-founded app. Part 1 thinks through desirability-based filtering on Grindr as an exercise in Zionist-homonationalist eugenics, focusing on “Right Now” as a key feature in the construction of the homosexual settler self. Part 2 explores Grindr’s distinct geolocative surveillance interface and its commitment to capital, through the lens of pinkwashed benevolent branding. 🔗 Read them here: https://networkcultures.org/longform/author/mallikadharmaraj/

THE HEAT OF OTHERS - BOOK LAUNCH On the 1st of July at 8 PM, OT301 invites you to the book launch of The Heat of Others by Morgane Billuart (@billuartmc). The reading will be accompanied by a prologue by Macarena Magaña (@macamagana) and a soundscape by Jiji Jizu (@jiji_jizu). The Heat of Others follows Max, a young researcher who travels to Svalbard, Norway, to speak at a conference on the ethics of mind enhancement. There she encounters a high-tech experimental building powered by “Dual Resolve,” a system that harvests human body heat. As the conference unfolds, the warmth of bodies and the pressure begin to blur, pulling Max into a state of growing uncertainty where thought and sensation are no longer discernible. 01.07.2026 — 20:00 OT301 Cinema Space Overtoom 301 1054 JL Amsterdam Pays-Bas Supported by mondriaanfonds

Update about tomorrows INC Exit Fest in the heatwave: we will proceed with the program. The main venue is not too hot. We have fans in place, will distribute water, and have moved parts of the program to cooler spaces. Please bring cool clothes, any water or hand fans you want, and let us know if we can help you be happy and healthy in any way. If it’s too much for you, remember that you can always join online for the livestream

INC Exit Fest live: https://theinbetween.live/

Cocomelon, Cheeto Fingers and Contagious Addiction: Why the Internet Hates iPad Kids By Ana Kubrusly & Martina Paulenová iPad Kids are considered stinky. They reek of all the deep-fried, carb-heavy foods they eat and proudly wear ketchup stains on their Fortnite and Minecraft t-shirts. They can’t be bothered with proper eating etiquette because Cocomelon is simply more deserving of their attention. Their mouth is dirty, their fingers sticky, and they like their unhealthy food with a side of boggars they diligently dug up from their noses. On the rare occasions of their cleanliness, you can tell them apart by a signature bad posture from crouching over their screen of choice, and spreading mysterious diseases with their omnipresent runny nose, crusty cough, and careless sneezing. ▷https://networkcultures.org/blog/2026/06/20/why-the-internet-hates-ipad-kids/

⚡️Mapping Antifascist Postart w/ Gregory Sholette, Hito Steyerl & Kuba Depczyński⚡️ What is to be done when authoritarianism is not simply a blast from the past, but mutates through AI slop, fossil infrastructures, culture wars, and flexible realities? What happens when time collapses and fascists wage war on truth itself? What is the role of artists and postartists facing this conundrum? Should their work become more operational, or rather radically inoperative? And do we need clear answers, or must we learn how to pose the right questions? In the second episode of Duckrabbits Talk Back, we map postartistic antifascism around the world with Gregory Sholette, Hito Steyerl, and Kuba Depczyński. 🔗 Listen to the pod via https://rss.com/podcasts/duckrabbits-talk-back, or on any major podcast platform. Cover illustration by Kacper Greń

Interview with German Media Theorist Anna-Verena Nosthoff on Cybernetics and Criticism Anna-Verena’s PhD (written in German) was published in early 2026 by Suhrkamp Verlag. Its release prompted the following email interview, in English, to introduce this majestic 660-page study that covers eight decades of theory on the “art of digital governance”. Her PhD degree at the University of Freiburg coincided with the birth of their son Bruno, and her appointment as junior professor at the Carl von Ossietzky University in Oldenburg. Time to celebrate, discuss ideas, and steer next steps. Will there be a long-awaited renaissance of cybernetics, provoked by Europe’s ‘digital sovereignty’ wake-up call? Is there a need for a meta-theory that brings together digital media, networks, platforms, and AI? And how many of these ambitions are holding up in the face of techno-fascism? ▷https://networkcultures.org/geert/2026/06/13/interview-with-anna-verena-nosthoff/