Transcript PDF

go back a little bit with our introduction to the agriculture as something that has existed longer than we have had all of this. So, again, computers were seen as heavily as administrative and impersonal, and it was not a part of the daily or daily usage. But then, computers started to become perso...

go back a little bit with our introduction to the agriculture as something that has existed longer than we have had all of this. So, again, computers were seen as heavily as administrative and impersonal, and it was not a part of the daily or daily usage. But then, computers started to become personal, and it kind of came across as tools for liberation. So, it's important to see how this changed. So, of course, we can just go back in time, but then back in the 80s when Apple launched Macintosh and more of Apple products started coming in, that was still a time where these machines were not a part of everyday life. So, for example, when television came in as more of a personal living room, more like a piece of furniture, right? So, it kind of became part of the living room, and it started coming into people's space, which was not the case before. But then computers, of course, they started kind of coming in with people who had knowledge of it, all of that back in the 90s. But when do you think it started becoming more of a personal one-on-one tool? More from the computers, right? So, it's, of course, moving on from when everyone has a personal mobile phone, right? A smartphone device or an iPad or tablet, that's when it started becoming more personal one-on-one, right? So, you have a computer as a part of your health tool, which was, let's say, back in the 90s or early 2000s, that was still a shared device, right? Just something that the students would go and access at their school library, or they would have, like, one computer to be shared among all the people in the family, but then it's more like 10, 15 years ago. But then maybe what you can also, of course, you will have the idea of today's lecture, I'll talk about an assignment, will you be sharing your personal experience on your digital life? That's where we can explore more of, for example, when did you have your first phone? Like, what is your earliest memory of having a personal device for yourself, right? So, of course, that takes us more into our topic for when the computers kind of were very impersonal or more like industrial things to be doing more fancier things as compared to when it became a part of your one-on-one thing, right? And, of course, you have seen that as that when you were growing up, right? So, again, these are the kind of how the first computers would look like, right? So, with this, what do you think when you hear the term hacker? And, again, just to come up with a dialogue, or whatever previous knowledge you have, of course, it's anything you would like to share here? Yes. Yeah, at the back. Yes. I mean, it's more like, okay, what do you, what are the connotations that hacker has, right? What, is it like a negative connotation when you think of a term hacker? It's more like, okay, you know, like someone who might have access to more information, then you would like to share kind of thing, right? Maybe, yes. I picture like the person in the van that's like in the movies where they're like, they have like a bunch of computers and screens and monitors and they're kind of like the man behind the desk while there's like other people gathering like physical information. Yes. And, yeah, I cannot have a perfect example of this coming up next. So, you think of, you know, like the Woudney trades and other kind of things that you've seen in maybe cinema, right? About how it's displayed, right? And generally, in my opinion, I mean, when I heard about the term hacker, it was more like a negative connotation when someone is, you know, maybe even trying to steal information or maybe use it in, in for any of the wrong purposes, right? And of course, we have a lot of, if you see documentaries on it as well, maybe in Netflix or other sources like Snowden. Have you ever seen Snowden? Or there's another one which has been trending a lot. It's called Jam Tara. It's more of when information is being stolen, like the banking information, sensitive information from maybe marginalized people or people, you know, who are not really aware and they just give it, give it out. Some people are calling them and they're like, oh, what's your passcode? I'm calling from XYZ bag and they just give out their information. And then some, some amount is stolen out of them, right? So, again, that is, those also have hacker kind of connotations there. And there's a lot of like documentaries or things out there for that, right? Another example or another kind of things that you would think about is this recent news with kind of mentioned the Toronto Public Library hit with outside cyber attack and here's what you need to know, right? So these kinds of things, right? When there are cyber attacks, what's the purpose? But then generally, this is something you would connect with maybe hacker culture, right? So what are the hackers trying to do generally? Maybe steal some sort of sensitive information out of your knowledge, out of your consent. Yeah. And anything else that you would like to add. Okay. So with this, we will move on to our one of the readings that I'll be talking about. It's an optional so you can go ahead and read in the CQ3v2. So hackers, which was the work by Arthur Warke from 2006. So hacker, again, the term, like I mentioned, is the term is much poorer than what you can think of from your current devices or how it's coming up in popular culture. So it first emerged at MIT in late 1950s. So hacker first started as a technology company like France and give it among MIT engineers. And then it evolved into social ethic, right? So it was kind of done or maybe people were more like on the bigger platforms as well. So now hacking was about more like innovation style and technical more like virtuosity in the computer programming. So we will be reading this author levy in the next week's reading as well. So it's more like their work has to be super sophisticated and super seamless for to be able to extract information out of you or whatever you're working on. And of course, so they can make it better for themselves or whatever kind of sign mission that they're running on it, right? So hackers, they generally felt that the computer should be accessible and reflect the personality of the user as well. So of course, they have to be working very seamlessly to be able to do that. And of course, many the user term hackers, we also visualize someone who's an expert at using their device, their technology to be able to extract all that information from XYZ person that they are trying to move from, right? And again, to be honest, like I will be uploading these debts on purpose as well. So if you miss all or anything, but then generally, this is more like high level information, which you need to be observing. So you won't be having a final exam or being tested on all of this terminology just as I know, right? So it's more like for information. And of course, you can access it as a later time as well. So now, another when you talk about more like hackers, another big tension here is between information as something that should be shared and developed in common, more like the common public sharing platforms versus something that should be privatized, commodified, and controlled by cooperation, right? So the two factions here in the struggle over information is first of all, hacker as information producers, corporations, and also those who are profit seekers. So let me give you an example. So you all have heard of the open source sharing, right? So let's say we have some open source sharing platform, like Linux or like open to have you heard of those Linux? Yes. So that is more like an open source, right? Versus we have Apple, right? So now in Apple, it's more like very, very close system where you have to be paying for everything. So let's say you want to use a design software. And then of course, they want you to be buying everything or purchasing everything. So now, let's say you kind of grab a code or a hack for it, and you know, you're able to get it on your, you know, your bank book or your iMac for your post, right? So now, to be able to do that, technically, that's not legal. But are you a hacker to be doing that? Like, would you be close systems and, or maybe you don't have enough money to be, you know, as a student to be able to access, be able to pay for those things, right? So would you be called a hacker to, for doing that? I mean, it's up for debate. What is your opinion on that? In terms of open source versus something which is not open source. Yes. I don't know if people have like an Indian connotation with the word, but I feel like if they're doing good or doing bad, they're still like altering, they already know that or they can't access your data that's not there. So whether it's good or bad, like, they still be labeled like that. Yes, exactly. So we are using like this one terminology, but then we don't know in what ways it's been played out, right? Anyone else on that? And I don't know if it's a thing now, but I know like maybe 15 years ago, some years ago, torrent was a thing, right? Where you would like download movies and all of that. So technically, if you are one of those people who are getting softwares or, you know, downloading like torrent movies or any of the content, that's maybe a hacker get to be doing, right? Like maybe you would be trying to as a hacker and maybe it's illegal content to be done, right? But again, now when you look deeper into it, who's making all of these rules, who's deciding what's legal, what's illegal, what's ethical, what's unethical, right? Because in some countries, those kinds of things might be allowed, right? But then in some countries it might not be allowed, right? So like just changing the policies, the information policies, or what geographical location you're in and what are the policies there, does that make you a good or bad person or like ethical or unethical person just because you are willing to pay for a choose for something, you are ethical and if you don't have that mindset or maybe you won't have an open source mindset, does that make you an unethical person or a hacker per se in that geographic area? Like how does it work? Who makes all these rules, right? So I feel like that is something we are going to be exploring this semester, this term, and of course you can take up all these kind of topics in your term papers as well. Anyone else who has any input on this as of now? Okay, otherwise I'll continue moving on. So the hacker may turn out to be a very important social category for channel labour and commodity and private property in information age, right? So again, these are some of the direct quotes that I've grabbed. But then if you see, there's something called gig labour as well, gig labour where especially when we are, for example, bringing some examples from my own PhD research and the groundwork that I've done in the global hub. Let's say there are all these platforms like Uber, right? They have different versions of that in other countries in the world. And when people are working as a part of these platforms, for example Uber, they're driving their vehicle or they are affiliated with some sort of food delivery app. They're generally, it's non-unionized work, right? It's gig work. Where, yes, they are working through the specific platforms, but who is kind of vouching for them or supporting them or, you know, if anything goes wrong, for example, we have a lot of unionized systems in North America, in the global north overall. But when it comes to South, yes, these platforms are present there. But is there anyone supervising their wellbeing or let's say they're laid out from work or let's say they are unethically, they're not paid properly, they're unethically removed from the platform just because there were like people complaining about their services. Is there more power given to the people who are the customers on the platforms? For example, if I have ordered something on a food delivery app and then there's someone who's working in the gig economy and they are like the food delivery like the person who's driving me right there. So who's vouching for their interest, right? Let's say, why give them bad news? Are they penalized for that, right? So these are all the kind of things that we speak about under the broader umbrella of this hacker culture. So when it comes to labor, when it comes to any sort of commodity, when it comes to any of the private problems, when it comes to private problems, another thing I can talk about is let's say you're speaking about a platform, let's say Airbnb or those kind of platforms, there is a person who has maybe the property owner and there's a person who's taking service. So in that scenario, who has more power? Like, do you have any personal experience dealing with any of these things, right? Maybe we can speak further about that in this course, right? And this is a course, the coding culture, where you can get to explore more on this, right? Ethics, policies, for these platforms, what do you think is right? Because another important thing to notice is that the policies and ethics, not ethics, but the policies, they keep changing. So it's not like when these platforms were first introduced, let's say I'm talking about maybe even Instagram, TikTok, or Uber, Uber Eats, and you know, when they were launched, the kind of policies that the platform started with, the kind of policies that the government had for these platforms in place, they have been evolving ever since. They have been agile based on what is on the experience of the people, based on the how society is interacting with these platforms. It's ever changing. You can even go and trace what were these platforms first launched when they came into the market, and how has those policies evolved? And again, these are all the things that you can explore further in this course, but this is just an example of how things worked out. Okay. Yes. Yeah, I just wanted to ask about who is hacker, like someone, then you see white power, could you say some single, like you're like Uber supervisors, say also co-hacker, or is there some special identifiers? I would say that these people are hackers. Of course, they are in position of power. So I would say you need in position of power, they are hackers. However, as users, we find our own subversive base of using these, right? So now, of course, I open this course up with the notions we have in media or popular culture of things that happen, right? They might be stealing information, blah, blah, but that's not the exact picture. Hackers might be people, one of us who are trying to subversively step over the rules, which are made by the policy makers, maybe the platform policy makers, maybe by the government, by the state. So all these people come and make rules for us, and those are the platform policies or information policies. However, for example, I spoke about TikTok, we've abandoned some countries. So now the platform makers have certain rules, but the government decided, okay, you know, we want to ban it. So now the government has certain power, platform makers have certain power. We, as users, don't have any power, but we try to exercise our power by subversing some of the means of using the platform, right? So now this is something to explore. Like, can anyone give me an example of when you as a user kind of use your own power, maybe in a kind of a sign way, to use platform in a way that it's not intended to? Yes. Yeah, I think that's a perfect example of what we're talking about here, right? So then, would we call this as a hack? You know, like, how we nowadays use this word, hack, as in our everyday, you know, conversation. So maybe there's some association there. I mean, I can also share examples, but then maybe you guys want to share more examples, and then I'll share where I've gone. Anyone else? Yes. Can you repeat that? Oh, yes. So are there any hacks, per se, that you use? For example, if you have a piece of platform, and it has a specific intended use, do you sometimes use it for something else, or to get something else done, or something else extracted out of it, which was not intended, but you feel it's working out for you? Yes. Yeah, that's a very good example as well. Like, I have also, like, heard about it, and seen it. So for example, when, like, let's say there's a platform in North America, like, let's say Netflix, or, I don't know, maybe another platform, and, or Amazon, I guess, and they're super expensive here, maybe, let's say. So if you change, you know, your country, use some other country, and then that country has a cheaper, you know, subscription, people are actually able to do that. But recently, I think Netflix kind of caught that thing, and they started, like, praising people with a VPN, so then people couldn't use it. So for example, even I was using it, so, for example, my, my siblings lives in the US, and they had a subscription for Netflix, they shared their email and password with me, and they had an account where they could add up to, you know, like, five user profiles. So I was using it to living in Canada. And, but later, just recently, I think, a few months ago, Netflix has a thing where they're tracking your VPN, because maybe a lot of people were doing that. So now it's only a part of single household, or even if you're using it in another household, you have to pay more, right? So they kind of, you know, like, stop this hack, but then a lot of other platforms are still doing it. So for example, YouTube, opinion, subscription, Amazon subscriptions, a lot of people are just like, even living in Canada, they're just going and changing their country, and then paying for that country is charged, and they're using those services here. So anyone has that kind of story to share? Yes, go ahead. Yeah, so sometime I want to stay on the page from a website, but the original website will allow us to do that. However, I do some extender to, like, to be taking whatever finally I'm able to do that. Yeah, I think that this is a very good example, this is a good example. So for example, they're not letting you do something, and then you find a way to do it, right? So now there can be degrees to it, right? And then of course, we will be exploring that throughout the course, there can be something as subtle as, you know, just taking a webpage, or it can be something bigger as well, but then it can have any degrees, but then again, who decides what's ethical, like, did we just do something really unethical, or where are the boundaries, right? Then again, maybe someone would say that if you're not hurting someone else, or, you know, like, it's not, like, financially, you're in some other way burden someone else, or not hurting from someone else, then it's okay, not for an individual. Maybe it's a corporation, they're making a lot of money, if I do the small thing, that's available, I'm not going to comment on it. So I'll give you a very basic example, too, like, maybe, I don't even know if you've counted as a hack. So I was trying to get the course readings for this course apparently. So this reading, which you have, you for next week, which we'll talk about, it was not available anywhere for me to download, right? Because I wanted to arrange readings for you, so it's less work, so I just print out code, because you read it, and you'll do your thing. So that book is actually a little further, and all of that, and even U of T Library doesn't have it for, like, an online link to download chapters. So then I found an HTML version, where it's available on the web. So I just saved it for printing, it was not letting me save it as well, just like you mentioned. It was not letting me save it, so just I saved it for print, where I'm trying to print it, and then I have it available for you. So when you read it, it's not going to be a very nice format, because it was apparently an HTML, but then I'm like, okay, I'm just going to do this hack or whatever I can, so I can get it, have a free access to you guys for it, right? Again, this might sound like a lame example, but there can be degrees to it, where someone has prohibited you from doing something, downloading, but then you still manage to do it, right? So again, just to answer the question in terms of how these things I'm mentioning, these are the big platforms. Another quick example I would like to mention from my new research from the Global South is, so my research is about how micro entrepreneurs use e-commerce platforms, or maybe they don't use, or maybe they should use, right? So in Global South, how do these people, who are technically not even excited, they're ill afraid, how would they reach out to a broader audience, or broader market, to be able to sell their products? And then, while I was doing research on round, and I gathered data with the people on round, I realized that they are actually using a lot of platforms, so they are not even using Amazon, even though it's available, they just feel like the policies for Amazon are very exploitative for them, because them being sellers, it's putting a lot of burden on them, and getting more, leveraging more seller, the buyers, right? So they're getting more power to the consumers than to the sellers, so what they're doing is actually they're selling on WhatsApp, so they are, you know, and people come in person to purchase anything, they are making WhatsApp groups, taking their numbers, if they like their products, and adding them on the WhatsApp, and then they are sending them their product listings, product pictures, all of those things, and then those people want to purchase anything off them, they are taking their personal, you know, home address, and sending them through a courier service. So, for example, my groundwork was in India, right? So they have very affordable courier systems there, right? So where there's someone driving, like a motorcycle, or like a bicycle, or something, and they're delivering things off of that, right? And you give them things for barely, if you convert it to Canadian dollars, it'll be barely like one dollar or a few cents, and you can actually deliver a product across the city, right? So what these people are doing is they are sending them the listings on WhatsApp, taking orders, sending them through that service, and they feel like, okay, you know, we don't have to pay the middleman charges that you're supposed to pay to Amazon on all these platforms, right? And sometimes they're even taking orders, like, you know, they're connecting with their customers on Amazon platform, but they are not doing the final orders. They are just using the chat functionality there, and they're like, yeah, let's just like chat here, and I'll send you the product separately, and you know, you just transfer money in my businesses, like this, you know, like through either transfer or something of that sort. And what would you call them? Like, would you call them if they've been unethical or XYZ? Because these people that, you know, like actually interviewed, and all of that, like, they are below the poverty line. And of course, there are a lot of disadvantages that they are, you know, going through in their personal life. And then also, these platforms are even difficult for them to use, because it's a lot of times in English, it's not in their local language. But when they use WhatsApp, they can, they're actually giving voice notes. So they're not using like a lot of reading and writing kind of bookshelves, they're using voice note feature. So it gets very, very convoluted. It gets very, very deep when you dig into all of this, like, what does mean by like hacker or hacking culture, right? I know I leveraged it a lot in order to explain, but then I hope it makes sense. And it also spans your horizons in terms of what you can explore as a part of this course as well, right? Like, what are your limits and boundaries when you are trying to, you know, write your trumpet for writing all those things. So I invite you and encourage you to be doing all those things, right? Make it as complicated as possible, because it is very complicated. And that's what, to be honest, is my PhD research as well. It just keeps getting more complicated, right? Because all of these personal devices and these technologies, it just came about, let's say, 20 years ago, 15 years ago, 10 years ago, and all these platforms appear in them as well. If you speak about Instagram, maybe like, I don't know, like 10 years, 10 years of its popularity, right? So when it was launched, whether it's the platform makers, the policymakers, no one knew how it's going to play out when it interacts with real people, when it comes out in a particular society and culture. And it's also varying based on what specific geographical region it is in, what kind of culture it is in, maybe the cultural influences or religious influences of a particular society or a particular, you know, nation state might impact how a specific platform is playing out. Why is this specific platform banned in this country and not the other? Is it just the government policies? Is it like social beliefs of people? I know I can explore all of that when you are, you know, like talking about those things. And then again, hacker term or hack is open to many interpretations. Okay, so with this, I would like to jump into the course overview. But perhaps we can take a break, or I'm going to take a break and come back and do that, right? Because it's already 4. So let's come back at 4.10 and we will jump into the course outline and make sure it's prepped. people can connect some of the ideas in terms of what we spoke about. For example, evolution of computing and politics of digital media. So evolution is similarly how I mentioned. The policies of the platform keep changing from time that they, from their inception until now, right? And then also the politics of digital media. So when we say politics, it's more about who are the beneficiaries, who are the stakeholders, who are the people being extracted either information or any of the monetary gains from, where is the data coming from, you know, who's commercializing all the data. So all of these are imprecating my new questions, kind of, feed into the politics of digital media. And when we say hackers, so how do they shape the future of entrepreneurship, free speech or surveillance. So the reason we're saying this, like, how do they shape? So now you're talking how do they shape? Okay, so the very simple answer is if they see that more than one people, like maybe multiple people, are trying to use a specific piece of platforms in a subversive manner, then a lot of times the platform operators or policymakers are kind of forced to make changes to accommodate these people because they're like, okay, you know, like a bunch of people are kind of, like, you know, doing this hack. So maybe something is not working super well for them or maybe the government then kind of like orders the platform to change things to accommodate a larger section of people who are trying to use it subversally or using some sort of hacks. So that's how it might influence. And if you see any examples of those things, it's important that you bring up here in this course while we're talking about feminism and all of that stuff, right? Have you noticed that something was being done and it actually changed things later on, Dandaral, kind of thing, right? Okay, so the course will examine the cultural, social, and the legal facets of hacking in the fields ranging from software production to political activism and the hacker underground. It will be based on social science research on hackers. So things that I've been talking about in terms of any of the secondary sources or the primary research. So those things that we see in society and culture, as well as any complete examples of data reappropriation and technology modification as well. Okay, so this version of hacker culture will be a little bit broader than the past iterations, which means in addition to the history of hacking and hacktivism, we will delve into hacking in maybe games, popular culture, or hacking in digital economy. But again, that will be something we will explore and you can explore further in your own term paper if you feel like that is something that you wish to explore further. Okay, so just a minute. I will see if I... I think I will just connect the cover of it before the session shows us out. We do have a USB cable here, but apparently it's not turning. And I don't think we need that. Okay, we're good. Again, my name is in the back. If you feel like that I'm not loud enough, then I can use a microphone. Okay, so now jumping into the course learning outcomes. So what we're doing here is essentially trying to understand the role of hackers in the history of personal computing and the development of digital economy as well. And of course, when I say personal computing, it kind of comes to a level of when computers are used by people in the private space or maybe even other ones. And also understanding the history and culture of hacking, its popularization and literature, maybe pop culture, movies, games, and its role in fundamental debates about openness of software. And hackers as a component in the development of contemporary digital capitalism. So, again, just like I mentioned, who's being benefited, looking at all those things, right? When there's a platform, who's making money out of it, and who's a part of making rules, who's making rules. And ultimately, when it comes to games, there's a lot of game culture there as well, right? And there's a lot to discuss. So you might be a gamer, and you might be a person who's playing those collaborative games. And if you have more experience there in terms of giving examples of hacking there, feel free to bring it on, right? Because I don't come from that research background, so I don't have a lot to share, but I know there's a big area to explore there, right? So my personal research is more about digital economy and digital capitalism and how we can relate that to hackism or hacking culture. But then if there are other kind of fields which you feel like you can bring examples of hacking culture, feel free to go ahead and do that. Okay, I'm sorry about that. So the next learning outcome will be we'll analyze the computer hacking in institutional, historical, and economic and cultural contexts as well. So in the past slide, we spoke about the personal computing, but now it's more like on an institutional level as well. So you know the big fancy kind of hackings that we see in the pop culture. So maybe that one, if you're talking about those big things, you know that there's a big news of some cyber-ag and all those things. Of course, they're always there as well. And you also get an opportunity to discern how the hacker, as a social category, is one that needs to be interrogated and critiqued. So just like I mentioned, in terms of interrogation and critique, we're talking about the ethics. Are those people who are using subversive means ethically wrong, or is it just about the policies of the nation and cultural state they're in? The rules are not matching with what these people are trying to do in their personal life, right? So you can go deep into that as well. The next learning outcome is to assess and interrogate how the hacker has been both an inclusionary and exclusionary category, and how it has both enabled and constrained cultural understandings of the digital as well, right? And now with that, the other course outcomes will be just with all the course assignments and all of that is to practice writing as a form of self-assessment. And this course on an outbreak, you're able to build better, build and develop better plans, write term papers, include building, of course, an authoritative geography. If you haven't done already in the past, writing very seamless abstracts and identify the relevant academic resources as well. Also, you'll accumulate a better understanding of reading and reviewing course materials to enhance the class participation, and also to prepare for the reading responses as well. Okay, so with this, we will be working on some specific limits in this course. So first, we will start off with the history of hacking. Then we will speak about hacking and popular culture. And this one, of course, you can up-pitch your term papers, explore the ideas of the talk culture representation, if you can, which is a topic we will explore. Then after this, we will be speaking about being able to talk this and giving you one kind of mentality or perspective that kind of helps you to... If you're part of any of those in the class fair, what kind of research is needed? And then after that, the course is hacking and capitalism. So how this plays out more like in the city level when there are big people involved as well with it. And then the next one is making sure that you keep an eye on Korkas all the time. So make sure you visit Korkas for readings, for course info, for updates, because we will be coming up with more updates. So whatever you have in course outline, there will be more things updated constantly on Korkas. And I will of course post an announcement there, but this is your month is to go as well. And of course, other info and recommendations as well. So if you have any questions, feel free to email me. And then I would like to reach back to you as soon as possible. You can reach out to me to schedule your one-on-one meetings as well. I don't have specific office hours, but I do meet by appointment. So if there is any assignment discussion or any other thing that you would like to meet me for, you can meet over the Zoom or maybe in Preserve, where we can see how things go or what kind of meeting you would like to have. Just drop me an email and make sure to add the course title in the email as well when you reach out to me. And again, make sure that you come to the class, prepare to participate with your readings, because I might be, you know, watching for more engagement or like call on you or an event specific just to give your insights into whatever we're trying to discuss here. And final thoughts, just keep up with your readings. You'll find that the weeks will vary from more like academic chapters to maybe articles or maybe like maybe random videos even or documentaries that you are requested to watch. So like in this class, people have a lot of back and forth dialogue, so just be open to whatever is being posted like one or two weeks prior and just be ready with it. And again, just like an announcement, we have a lot of people requesting accessibility in this class. So if you become a volunteer, don't tinker with the UTM Accessibility Service, maybe for any notes or anything that I'm saying as well or, you know, overall highlighting of the lecture. And if you are someone who takes notes, sign up with them as well. And I will jump into the course outline. And then I will come back again and talk about our first assignment. Okay, so with this, I will actually jump to our PDF that we had posted on Procause and we'll go over to Shepba's step. And then I will come back again to this deck right here. And then we will go over... Okay, so is this visible enough? Is it like legible to me? Okay, so we have a teaching assistant for this class who will be mostly grading your work. There will be the names, Sean and Ching. However, for any questions or anything, reach out to me if there's anything where I want them to be answered for you. Although I will CC them and forward them to the class. So again, we have already gone over the course description. I'll quickly go over the course goals and learning objectives. This course takes you through the history of hacker culture in the 20th century in our units from the formation of the hacker ethic to the creation of the personal computer, the internet, the global games industry, the contemporary digital economy. And by the end of the course, you will be able to understand the role of hackers in the history of personal computing and development of the digital economy. And also hackers have often been constructed as the open laws of the digital economy and have heavily implicated in the digital economy's cultural and economic processes. However, our aim is to consider the other ways of hacking here, which is not always a negative connotation. So again, understanding the history of cultural hacking, its popularization in the literature of movies, games, and its role in fundamental debates about openness of software, hackers as a component in the development of contemporary digital capitalism as well. And of course, we've already gone over some of this stuff as well, so I'll just quickly skim through the rest of the stuff. So when it comes to requirement reels for this course, there are no required textbooks that you are required to purchase, but instead there are required readings that are listed in the syllabus, and it will also be made available through QURQAS for each unit for this course. So if there's ever any trouble accessing the required reading, please reach out to me. Or if there are points when the readings which are listed in the syllabus here, but they are not posted on QURQAS, I'll always post an alternate reading. So you will always have something to read for the next week or week before, because we will have weekly reading responses which are viewed right before the class. So before the next class, we will have these reading responses, and I will jump into it. So that's why the reading and you keeping up with it is super important. So with this, just look out for the next week's reading, and I will try my best to keep posting those in advance. So you're never waiting on me to have those readings. So assessment and reading policies. So your first assignment, which is self-assessment, is My Digital Life. So of course you share more about your personal experience. And I will post more details about each assessment and assignment on QURQAS. So you will have a separate detailed section about each deliverable, each assignment, each assessment, along with a view brick posted on QURQAS. So for a short, we will start off with My Digital Life. So you will see that come up in the next couple of days, so you can start working on that one. So that one is due in two weeks from now, is it January 20th? So that's two weeks from now. And then we will, that's just 5% of the grades. So approximately around 500 words, if not so prolonged. And the first one is more like you sharing your personal story. And of course it has to meet a standard of academic writing in terms of the grammar, the sentence structure and everything, but then it's your opportunity to be, you know, just like going back and exploring. It's more like writing a diary where you are like just sharing your own experience and just like recalling, recollecting everything. And it's just the 5% of the class grades. The next one is digital footprint audit. And again, once your assignment number one is due, I will get into the detail of the digital footprint audit. So I won't be talking too much about it today, but we will talk about it in detail once you submit your assignment number one. And then after that, you work on your term projects, which will be in part. So first you will kind of give a proposal abstract and a period of bibliography for your term project, and then you will have your final one due in the last class, on the day of the last class. And then something which is ongoing is your weekly reading responses. So you see it's 30% of the total grade, which means it's 3% for each week. You will only be required to submit 10 of those, so you don't have anything this week. You don't have anything due in the last week of classes as well for the weekly responses. So we have total of 12 classes. You will only have this due from week two, which is next week, till week 11, right? So week 11 will be like prior to March 31st, which will be, I think, March 24th. So something on that show, that will be the last day you'll be turning that in. And it's due right before the class starts, right? So I will make it due on CRUCUS. Let's say next week at like 3 p.m. your class starts, so let's say 2.59, or maybe at 3 p.m., whatever that is, whatever CRUCUS lets me do. The purpose is first, you come prepared to the class with having those readings and providing a response, and you're ready to absorb all the material that which is being shared in the lecture, and also participate in the class discussions. So this is also, you can say, it'll do all of your class participation and attendance as well. And of course, a lot of things we will be discussing in class will be used towards your assignments as well. So I will also go back and check if all the lectures are going to be posted on CRUCUS or not, because if I'm seeing there is an attendance drop, then I won't be posting the lectures on CRUCUS, right? Because, and then it will only be provided to students who have, you know, express the accessibility needs, right? But generally, if you're here, you're present, then there's nothing in those slides which you will be directly, you know, copy and pasting in your assignment anyways. It's more like your personal thought sharing and all of that as enemies, right? Okay, so before I move further into details of each assessment, are there any questions at this point? Yes? It's generally APA, but if you could use anything like Himalayish, Kaggle, like any of those as well, right? So it's not like rigid, but then you are supposed to be using some sort of academic writing guidelines. It's fine, it's flexible. Like, 500 is just like a basic guidelines. I mean, it should be somewhere around there. So, you know, like, let's say I need a million, 450 to 550 as well, but the general guideline would be 500 words. And then if you are using any outside sources, make sure to cite those kind of stuff. But you are not expected to use for the first one, because again, it's very like open-ended and personal. But for all the subsequent ones, you would be expected to be using the readings which are assigned for class, actually. And any outside sources as well, if you come across something really cool and you are like influenced by it. But then generally, you'll be expected to be citing the class readings. Yes? Any other questions? Yes? It's generally just a reading response, and technically you'll be citing the reading which is assigned for that reading. But again, it's more like your personal reflection of the reading as well. And I will give you more details on the word count and everything, so you'll have all those details by tonight. And I will also open up the submission and stuff. But if you go to purpose now, the reading is up already. So I'll give you all the guidelines of how long I'm expecting it to be, but it's not going to be super long. I would say somewhere around maybe 250 to 300 words, something of that sort, right? But again, you are, you can go a little bit over it. That all is fine, but not too much under it. So if it's like minimum or 250 words, you have to stick to the minimum, and you can go a little bit here and there. But it's more like a reading reflection. Any other questions? I'll be getting into a little bit more detail on each of these as well. Yes? So which assessment is immediate teamwork? I'll see how this goes, but then as of now, we are doing mostly individual work. But then we'll see how things go in terms of it, or term before anything. But then I'll be going over all of this now. So we'll see. Okay. So self-assessment, again, it's just a little bit overview I'm giving you, and you'll get details later. So in this assignment, you will tell me the origin of your digital life. So what is your earliest memory of using a computer, a mobile phone, or an app? And what social networks or virtual worlds games are meaningful to you or platforms? Just like you guys told me about, you know, like YouTube, TikTok, or any of those platforms like you are using a lot of databases. Finally, do you feel like you have had real control over your experience of the digital world? Or do you feel it has been controlling you? Again, these are some of the preliminary guidelines, but then you'll be getting more guidelines. And I'll open up the forecast submission and re-bring and all of that for this as well. The next one will be the digital footprint audit. So this is going to be a big one. So the primary goal of this assignment is to shed light on the nature and the use of the data collected about you as you go about your daily life. So this might seem like it's pretty similar to the digital life, but that's more like a high level and this gives you an opportunity to get deeper into it. So the reason I'm giving you a summary of this is so you only share whatever is required in the first one and then keep some in depth for the second one. So together all of this information creates a digital footprint like a collection of digital data which can be used to create more like an accurate profile about you. So additionally prompts you to consider if your own mind presents, generally represents the best aspect of your character and asks you to reflect on where potential disparities might be between your real-world self and your digital persona. So if you see the first one and the second one, the first one can be a high level, but the second one gives you an opportunity to delve deeper into maybe the things that you spoke about in the first one. And then also you'll receive the feedback on your first one as well in terms of, you know, like if you're proposing something, the TTA will be marking this, Sean will be marking this, but then they can suggest you in terms of what you can explore further when you jump into the digital footprint aisle. So for the term paper, so this is the part one of your final term assessment. So this is the one where I was considering if it can be maybe a team work or maybe a pair of two, but as of now it's a personal thing that you are working on. But then this comes much later, so don't worry about that. This mostly comes after the reading week, so it's okay. You'll have guidelines for it beforehand. So in part one of your final term paper assignment, you will put together a biography using, you know, proper APA citation and providing the short critical summary of five academic sources, three sources you will find on your own while two of the sources come from this class or the reading that you have done so far. So each source will have an annotation giving a short summary of what it is about and how it fits into your paper, and academic sources should be sourced from again, highly high quality academic journals as well. So it's not like just like any website. You are giving proper journal articles or like book chapters as well. And again, overall this assignment will help you follow the more like academic skills putting together an annotated book geography. And the main purpose of this first term paper part one is to have feedback on your abstract or on your proposal in terms of what direction can you take it in and how can you expand it further into a big term paper because the term paper, and again before the things that you have jumped into it as well, but this term paper will be almost 2000 words. So when you receive the feedback from the paper, it kind of gives you guidelines on how you can build it further or if something is not working out, maybe you can change x, y, z aspect to make it expand to that level. And then now, the lastly, your weekly reading responses. So this class only works again if you're a participant. So your reading responses will kind of test your knowledge on the course concepts, themes, and your core ideas as well. And it will reflect on your readings providing you an opportunity to develop a better understanding of the course. So I also encourage you to discuss assigned readings and also adding anything related to your digital economy, computing, or hacking as well. So while you are providing your reflection to that specific reading, you're not only providing more like a review of that specific article or chapter. You also add your own angle to it. You also add your own angle in terms of whatever you feel about digital economy, computing, or hacking as well. So always keep the purpose of the course in mind and add your own input into how that reading relates to the purpose of this course as well. And again, I will provide you these guidelines on the course as well, but just keep that in mind. So be sure to share your personal anecdotes as well in your reading reflections. And just like I explained, we have 10 weeks, 3% each week, due right before the class, right? So again, you have taken some of the courses as already like CCD 901, 110, like rhetoric, ad communication, media, those kind of courses. So just some of the guidance which you can, of course, read on your own as well. Just make sure that you are using your go-to email. And then also, another note about use of AI or charging. It's not encouraged to use because there's a lot of personal reflection. I know there might be times when you are using that to just like brainstorm ideas on your own, but do not copy and paste or use it in any of those, that kind of manner where it's very obvious that it's coming from there. Because in my course in the past, it looks very obvious that you know, copy and paste it. And I do understand that a lot of times you might be using that as a tool to brainstorm things which is unavoidable and I really can't monitor all of that. However, when you are writing your own piece, that should be coming from you, right? Maybe you take an idea and then you explore it, put your own team and sources and your personal anecdotes all comes from you, right? So just make sure that that's very particular because when you submit an assignment, it will also go through and make sure that things are not crawling from the web and your submissions are your own as well. Okay, so the general stuff is something I would highly encourage you to read on your own. Right, like if there's any late work, if you are like not well or there is an extenuating circumstances which is probably going to submit work on time, make sure you reach out to me at least 72 hours prior or like being a demand, letting me know that this is a situation which I can foresee instead of like letting me know. Also, I make sure that you're not penalized because if that thing passes and you're submitting late work, then whatever penalty is applied on purpose, it's applied, right? So just try to give me a heads up. So again, generally, if something is beyond like more than 20%, you have to reach out to the U of T and D's office, but then I technically do not have any deliverables which is more than 20%. So you can just like reach out to me about all of that. And I'm just trying to jump to the weekly schedule here. Okay, so our unit one will be the history of hacking. So today, which is the first class of the two lectures, technically there is no readings which are required, but there's an optional reading which I will upload on court because if you really wish to review it because you can still use this reading for your upcoming coursework. And if you feel like, you know, it's on point, it's representing your case for a short go ahead. So I will upload that as well. The reading which you're supposed to do for next week's reading response as well is already uploaded. So you can read it on your own time. And again, it's due right before the class Monday, 3 p.m. So make sure it's turned in. Then next week we are talking about hacker ethic. The following week we are talking about the computer underground. This is all unit one, right? And then January 27th and onwards, we will be jumping into unit two which is hacking in popular culture. Week four will be cyberpunk. Week five will be game and hacking. Week six will be game modding and play more. The next week following week after that is a friendly family day. And it's also your reading week and there are no classes. So February 17th, we have no classes. However, I have a commendation for some of the movies that you can watch, like food movies, which kind of gives you some like maybe notions on hackers. The following week is we will jump into unit three which is PN Open Software. And then we continue that unit for three weeks in continuation. And then March 17th is hacking and capitalism. Then we go again to hacktivism. And the last week is the hacker post-work. And that's about it. Another disclaimer I would like to make is that although these are the buildings and the topics that are assigned in the syllabus for now, there can be times when I change things around and move things around. However, if there are any readings which are different, you'll see them on Qarkas. Or if there are topics which are different, you'll see that notified on Qarkas as well. So there is a huge possibility that some things might be moving around. So just letting you know of that aspect as well. And the last thing to drop this course is March 10th. And then before we jump into more discussion on the first assignment, on the first assignment I'll go over the new dates. So make sure that of course they'll be posted on Qarkas as well. You'll be able to see an overview. But just general big new dates are assigned to the weekly 3%. You have 5% on January 20th. Then on February 10th you have another 3% review, which is 20% of your grade. So technically, before your drop date on March 10th, you will have a significant portion of your course due. So turn paper is also 15%. So this 15%, 20%, is a 35%, and 5%, 40%. So more than 40%, including your reading responses, almost I would say more than up to 50% of your course grade will be released by March 10th. So you can make a decision on whether you want to keep this course, drop this course, whatever is going on. But just make sure that you put these due dates in a calendar, if you are using your phone's calendar or whatever you use. Keep those in. It'll also be posted on Qarkas. Yeah, I think that's about your course outline. Any questions? So if you see your last assignment, which is due on the last class, we'll see how that goes. We might have a presentation component in here as well. But again, you'll get details later on it as well. But again, there's no final exam for this course. So in past, this course used to have a final exam. But then I changed this course while I'm teaching it to make sure that there are no final exams, because me personally coming from a background of exploring the social sciences of these things, I feel like final exam is not the best way to be focusing your knowledge. And I feel like you can show it better when you have more lecture and papers, or you have more time to be exploring and jotting down your ideas and grabbing sources other than just giving out random definitions or terminology. So I have implemented the final exam component, and I actually added another assignment instead, which is the digital footprint audit. So that was not used to be there. So more like a view of the final exam, which used to be 35% of the grade, I have this one. Let's see how you guys like all of that. Yes. Did you have a question? Oh, I thought you missed your hand. Okay, so I will go back to your, this deck that we were going over. Just some things about the first assignment. Okay, so the first assignment, my digital life, right? So again, what I want you to do here is I want you to tell me, mostly in 500 words, what is your earliest memory of using a computer phone or app, and what social networks or virtual world games are being meaningful to you, or you use on a daily basis. And finally, do you feel you have your control over your experience of the digital world, or do you feel like it's been controlling you? So all of those things, and then you will build later on it in the digital audit footprint as well, right? So I know this is more like a millennial thing, but if any of the computer early games or everything, do you feel like this is how your first memories look like? Maybe for me it would look like that. So again, what we did today was we had introductions, for my personal direction, courses and direction. We did a basic overview of hacking and hacking history, or what the term hacker or hack mean, and we did a quick overview of the entire course and what we will be covering in the next couple of weeks. And we discussed our first assignment, and then for the next week, you will be reading first two chapters of Stephen Levy's Hackers, Heroes of the Computer Revolution, from 2010. And first, these chapters are a page, 3 to 38, but I have put it in more like a print format for you. And that's about you. Thank you guys.