Encoding Value: What is cryptocurrency, and what does it mean for society?

Author: Stephanie Betz, PhD candidate at the Australian National University and a digital anthropologist researching the intersections between people and technology.  Her doctoral research is an ethnographic study of the relationships people develop with and through computer-controlled video game characters.  Her research interests include artificial intelligence and machine learning, art and images, and narrative-based communities. … Continue reading Encoding Value: What is cryptocurrency, and what does it mean for society?

Ep. #8 Savage Bitcoin, hamster flushing, scholars at work, and New Mandala: this month on TFS

This month, Ian (1:25) digs into Bitcoin, arguing that the cryptocurrency is no different than regular currencies, and can be analyzed along all the same lines: symbolically, materially, institutionally, relationally. “The same material problems of decay that would affect some other kind of material currency like a coin or a bill still applies to Bitcoin.” … Continue reading Ep. #8 Savage Bitcoin, hamster flushing, scholars at work, and New Mandala: this month on TFS