Collaborative Research Centre Media of Cooperation

28/08/2026

Registration for our next annual conference “Politics of Cooperative Sensing: Techfascism, War, Geopolitics, & Resistance” is open.
Register now 👉 https://u-si.de/CeUKi

You can register until October 11th.

We look forward to bringing together scholars, activists, artists, filmmakers, and journalists to inquire into the politics of media, data, and sensory practices, and to explore the role of cooperative forms of sensing and sense-making.
Keynotes, presentations, and workshops shape the amazing program of our annual conference. The conference will take place on November 11-14 at the University of Siegen.

The conference promises critical discussions on the politics of cooperative sensing and sense-making in a time marked by geopolitical and climate catastrophes, anti-democratic backlashes, and the rise of authoritarian regimes—all phenomena closely intertwined with increasing datafication, generative AI developments, and the growing power of Big Tech.

28/08/2026

Wir laden zum Community-Workshop “Geteilte Mobilität: Wer verteilt was?”
Leihfahrräder, E-Scooter und App-basierte Mobilitätsdienste sind aus dem städtischen Leben nicht mehr wegzudenken. Doch die geteilte Mikromobilität wirft auch wichtige Fragen hinsichtlich von Raum, Infrastruktur, Daten und Teilhabe auf. Der Workshop lädt Teilnehmende ein, gemeinsam die Rolle der Geteilten Mikromobilität in der Stadt Köln zu erkunden.

🗓️ Donnerstag, 17.09.2026, 10:00 - 17:30 Uhr
📍 Bürgerzentrum Ehrenfeld (https://bueze.de/), Venloer Straße 429, 50825 Köln
🔗 Anmeldung unter https://my.liberaforms.org/workshop-geteilte-mobilitaet
📧 Kontakt unter [email protected]

Wie?
Während des Workshops am 17.09. werden wir uns gemeinsam mit verschiedenen Verkehrsmitteln durch die Stadt bewegen und unsere Erfahrungen anschließend gemeinsam mit Künstler:innen kartieren.
Interessierte sind auch herzlich eingeladen, am 18.09. an der weiteren Auswertung der Ergebnisse teilzunehmen.

26/08/2026

Registration for our next annual conference “Politics of Cooperative Sensing: Techfascism, War, Geopolitics, & Resistance” is open.
Register now 👉 https://u-si.de/CeUKi

You can register until October 11th.

We look forward to bringing together scholars, activists, artists, filmmakers, and journalists to inquire into the politics of media, data, and sensory practices, and to explore the role of cooperative forms of sensing and sense-making.

Keynotes, presentations, and workshops shape the amazing program of our annual conference. The conference will take place on November 11-14 at the University of Siegen.

The conference promises critical discussions on the politics of cooperative sensing and sense-making in a time marked by geopolitical and climate catastrophes, anti-democratic backlashes, and the rise of authoritarian regimes—all phenomena closely intertwined with increasing datafication, generative AI developments, and the growing power of Big Tech.

26/08/2026

Registration for our next annual conference “Politics of Cooperative Sensing: Techfascism, War, Geopolitics, & Resistance” is open.
Register now 👉 https://u-si.de/CeUKi

You can register until October 11th.

We look forward to bringing together scholars, activists, artists, filmmakers, and journalists to inquire into the politics of media, data, and sensory practices, and to explore the role of cooperative forms of sensing and sense-making.
Keynotes, presentations, and workshops shape the amazing program of our annual conference. The conference will take place on November 11-14 at the University of Siegen.

The conference promises critical discussions on the politics of cooperative sensing and sense-making in a time marked by geopolitical and climate catastrophes, anti-democratic backlashes, and the rise of authoritarian regimes—all phenomena closely intertwined with increasing datafication, generative AI developments, and the growing power of Big Tech.

sensemaking cooperation crisis

07/08/2026

04/08/2026

📖 new publication in our Working Paper Series Media of Cooperation is out now: No. 41 looks beyond informant consent by discussing the asymmetry between consumer data preferences and the conditions under which consumers engage with data-driven platforms.

🎤 Maximilian Becker & Catalina Goanta: Beyond Informed Consent: Consumer Data Preferences and the Case for Enforcement-Oriented Transparency
🔗 Open Access: https://doi.org/10.25819/ubsi/10978

Digital markets have fundamentally altered the conditions under which consumers engage with data-driven platforms, yet regulatory frameworks, particularly in the EU, continue to rely on consent-based models that presuppose a level of technological literacy and informed agency that most users do not possess. Drawing on existing empirical evidence from five studies across the US, UK, and EU, this paper departs from the empirical argument that consumer preferences regarding personal data are highly unstable and shaped by framing and trust rather than genuine, well-formed values.

Consumers systematically overestimate the privacy protections offered by paid services, accept personalization without understanding its commercial scope, and disregard privacy notices regardless of their clarity. This argument exposes the structural failure of transparency-as-disclosure as a regulatory strategy: informing consumers better does not fix markets distorted by asymmetric information and complex, layered business models.

Rather than doubling down on consumer-facing transparency obligations, this paper proposes a shift toward enforcement-oriented business-model transparency, under which platforms would be required to disclose aspects such as data flows, monetization strategies, but also algorithmic processes to regulatory authorities and civil society. The Digital Services Act and the General Data Protection Regulation already point somewhat in this direction. Building on this logic, the paper proposes further machine-readable transparency as a complement to existing information obligations.

20/07/2026

We are delighted to announce the programme for the forthcoming Autumn School, Synthetic Social Media: Studying Platform-Embedded AI, taking place at the Universität Siegen, 22–25 September.
👉 check out our programme: https://u-si.de/OrjWc

The programme contains updates on the event's schedule, keynotes, workshops, and presentations.

Want to join us? Register here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeiUSyl8uXiHH-oNoM-QxIiste9RDWMhT89rxXh9B9DJjDI-Q/viewform

17/07/2026

🔥Our conference programme is out now! Register now!

We are very much looking forward to bringing together scholars, activists, artists, filmmakers and journalists to inquire into the politics of media, data, and sensory practices and to explore the role of cooperative forms of sensing and sense-making.
👉 check out the programm on u-si.de/VOaj7

The 2026 annual conference of the Collaborative Research Center 1187 “Media of Cooperation” explores the politics of cooperative sensing and sense-making in a time marked by geopolitical and climate catastrophes, anti-democratic backlashes and the rise of authoritarian regimes—all of which are phenomena closely intertwined with increasing datafication, generative AI developments, and the growing power of Big Tech.

🗓️ 11-13 November
📍Universität Siegen
🔗 info®istration on u-si.de/VOaj7

15/07/2026

🗓️ Save the date! The 2026 Annual Conference of the Collaborative Research Centre 1187 Media of Cooperation will examine "Politics of Cooperative Sensing in Times of Crisis"

🗓️ 11-13 November
📍Universität Siegen
🔗 https://www.mediacoop.uni-siegen.de/en/annual-conference-2026/

Registration opens soon

Our 2026 annual conference explores the politics of cooperative sensing and sense-making in a time marked by geopolitical crises, technological transformation, and democratic uncertainty. Across the world, societies are facing overlapping challenges: wars, the climate catastrophe, democratic backsliding, and the rise of authoritarian regimes, all of which are deeply entangled with the rise of datafication. At the same time, digital infrastructures, data practices, and generative AI are transforming how people cooperate, communicate, and perceive reality. Cooperation today takes place across complex sociotechnical networks – from alliances between governments and technology companies to collaborations between civil society, research communities, and activists networks. Digitalisation is built on cooperative media and data practices. Yet today, these same cooperative structures increasingly enable digital political violence. This conference asks how these forms of cooperation shape contemporary politics and sensory experiences. How do media and data practices contribute to new forms of power, control, and digital violence? How do they shape collective perception, uncertainty, and conflict? And how can cooperative practices also enable resistance, democratic engagement, and new forms of knowledge production?

14/07/2026

We like to draw your attention to our conference on "Social Inequalities, Membership Categorization, and Interactional Asymmetries. EMCA Analyses and Ethnographic Challenges“

📆 16 July 2026
🕑 1 am - 7 pm
📍 Universität Siegen, AH-A 217/18
🔗 program: https://u-si.de/TIiwH

The highlight will be the keynote lecture:
🎤 Waverly Duck (UC Santa Barbara): “Negroes Gone Wrong”: Pauli Murray, Passing, and the Interactional Practices of Race, Gender, Sexuality, and Power in Garfinkel’s 1940 “Color Trouble”

🕑 5:15 pm 6:45 pm

The conference is preceded by a small ‚pre-conference‘ on Wednesday afternoon, 15 July, following the research forum, entitled: „Navigating an Archive".
📆 15 July 2026
🕑 4 pm - 6:30 pm
📍 Universität Siegen, AH-A 217/18
🔗 https://u-si.de/lAoBS