Increasingly, it would seem, the future is already known, determined by algorithms that analyze, predict and pre-empt actions.  Privacy is dead, and so is consent, because regardless of our own actions, we are betrayed by people “like us.”  To what extent, though, does this situation offer new possibilities for action and modes of identification?  This talk explores what it means “to be determined,” by framing users as characters in a universe of dramas putatively called Big Data.

Wendy Hui Kyong Chun is Professor of Modern Culture and Media, Professor of History of Art and Architecture, and Chair of Modern Culture and Media at Brown University. This talk is sponsored by GC Digital Initiatives.