Music & Media

King’s College London
14-15 May, 2015

In the wake of the Snowden revelations about the surveillance capabilities of intelligence agencies, this interdisciplinary symposium gathers experts to discuss the place and implications of secrecy in contemporary culture and politics.

Thursday 14th May
6.30-8.30
Opening Talk: Jamie Bartlett, Demos, Author of The Dark Net
Respondent, Zach Blas on the ‘Contra-Internet’
Edmond J. Safra Lecture Theatre, The Strand Campus, King’s College London
Free Registation at: https://secretsofdarknet.eventbrite.co.uk/

15 May: Symposium
Free registration at: https://politicsofsecrecy.eventbrite.co.uk/

9-9.15
Introduction: Secrecy’s Frame
Clare Birchall (King’s College London) & Matt Potolsky (University of Utah)

9.15-10.45
Roundtable 1: Between Opacity and Openness

Mark Fenster (College of Law, University of Florida)
(Secrecy and the Hypothetical State Archive)

Zach Blas (Artist, University of Buffalo)
(Informatic Opacity)

Mikkel Flyvverbom (Intercultural Communication and Management, Copenhagen Business School)
(Transparency and the Management of Visibilities)

Vian Bakir (Creative Studies and Media, Bangor University)
(Deceptive Organised Persuasive Communication: (a) Misdirection and (b) Secretly Altering Reality to Fit the Lie you want to Tell)

11.15-12.30
Roundtable 2: Aesthetics of the Secret

John Beck (Institute of Modern & Contemporary Culture, University of Westminster)
(Photography’s Open Secret)

Neal White (Artist, Bournemouth University)
(Secrecy and Art in Practice)

Clare Birchall (American Studies, King’s College London)
(Art “After” Snowden)

12.30-1.30
Lunch

1.30-3.00
Roundtable 3: Open Secrets

Jack Bratich (Communication and Information, Rutgers University)
(Spectacular Secrecy and the Public Secret Sphere: Rumsfeld, Anonymous, and Snowden)

Deme Kasimis (Political Science, Yale University)
(Passing as Open Secrecy: Migrants and the Performance of Citizenship in Classical Greek Thought)

Adam Piette (English, Sheffield University)
(The Open Secret of Nuclear Waste)

Matt Potolsky (English, University of Utah)
(Beyond Fiction: The NSA and Representation)

3.30-4.45
Roundtable 4: Covert Spheres

Timothy Melley (English, Miami University)
(The Democratic Security State: Operating Between Secrecy and Publicity)

Øyvind Vågnes (Visual Culture, University of Copenhagen)
(Drone Warfare and the Language of Precision)

Hugh Urban (Comparative Studies, Ohio State)
(The Silent Brotherhood: Secrecy, Violence, and Surveillance from the Brüder Schweigen to the War on Terror)

5.00-5.30
Summary: Secrecy’s Future

Drawing on the debates in the ongoing ESRC-
funded  seminar  series  (2015-2016),  ‘Debating 
and  Assessing  Transparency  Arrangements: 
Privacy,  Security,  Surveillance,  Trust’  (DATA-
PSST!),  we  identify  stances  on  transparency 
in  the  post-Snowden  leak  era  held  by  partici-
pants.  Participants  comprise  academics  from 
diverse  disciplines,  and  stakeholders  involved 
with transparency issues. We advance an origi-
nal  transparency  typology;  and  develop  the 
metaphor  of  the  Visibility  Slider  to  highlight 
the  core  aspect  of  privacy  conceived  in  terms 
of  control,  management,  norms  and  protocol. 
Together,  the  typology  and  metaphor  illumi-
nate  the  abstract,  complex  condition  of  con-
temporary  surveillance,  enabling  clarification 
and assessment of transparency arrangements.

This paper examines the 2016 US presidential election campaign to identify problems with, causes of, and solutions to, the contemporary fake news phenomenon. To do this we employ textual analysis and feedback from engagement, meetings and panels with technologists, journalists, editors, non-profits, public relations firms, analytics firms and academics during the globally-leading technology conference, South-by-South West, in March 2017. We further argue that what is most significant about the contemporary fake news furore is what it portends: the use of personally and emotionally targeted news produced by algo-journalism and what we term 'empathic media'. In assessing solutions to this democratically problematic situation, we recommend that greater attention be paid to the role of digital advertising in causing, and combating both the contemporary fake news phenomenon, and the near-horizon variant of empathically-optimised automated fake news.