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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · 4d

CBI is absolutely delighted to announce that thought-leading scholars University of Illinois' @anitachan.bsky.social & Indiana University's @rachelplotnick.bsky.social have just joined us as new CBI Research Fellows. Below is the link to the article. #histsci

cse.umn.edu/cbi/news/cbi...

CBI Names Anita Say Chan and Rachel Plotnick as the Institute’s New Research Fellows

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (10/09/2025)—The Charles Babbage Institute for Computing, Information and Culture (CBI) is delighted to announce the addition of University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana’s Anita...

cse.umn.edu

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · 21d

Just published in Interfaces-- tremendously insightful & timely essay by U. of Toronto's @hopelatta.bsky.social "People-in-Progress: 'Debate Escrow,' and the Language of Delay in Tech Research on Adolescent Digital Health." #histsci

cse.umn.edu/cbi/interfaces

1960 Lucky Strike ad with woman smiling as she holds a lit cigarette--Wikimedia Commons

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Aug 27

Just Code, just published!!! Open Access of full book is now freely available, see link below, made possible by @sloanfoundation.bsky.social grant to CBI! Am so honored to partner w Con & work alongside 19 stellar, fellow interdisciplinary authors on this book! #histtech

cse.umn.edu/cbi/just-cod...

Front cover of Just Code: Power, Inequality and the Political Economy of IT. Black lettering in bold with trailing pastel colors.

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Eileen Clancy 🧿 @clancyny.bsky.social · Aug 27

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Just Code
Power, Inequality, and the Political Economy of IT

Edited by
Jeffrey R. Yost and Gerardo Con Díaz

Table of Contents

9. Pushing Fintech: Testing Mobile Money, Financial Inclusion, and
“Rural Women” in Peru 212
Mariel García Llorens

10. Corporate Culture Made Material: Ephemera and In/equity at
Control Data Corporation, 1957–1975 236
Elizabeth Semler

11. Reassessing the Iconic and Unbundling the Ironic: IBM System
Engineering, Gender, and Antitrust 255
Jeffrey R. Yost

12. Y2K and the Politics of Labor 274
Dylan Mulvin

PART III. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO GRAPPLE WITH CODE?

13. From Programming to Platform Expertise: Technical Reformers
and the Reinvention of Institutions 295
Shreeharsh Kelkar

14. Computers as Colonizers: British Computing Companies and
Indian Technological Resistance, 1955–1975 325
Mar Hicks

15. The Mask of Humanity: Manipulation and Psychopathy at the
Human-Computer Interface 344
Jennifer Alexander

16. Cryptography Goes Public: Contesting the Meaning of a New
Field in the 1970s United States 372
Gili Vidan

17. Nodes and Codes: Iterating with the State in México 388
Héctor Beltrán

Epilogue: Artificial Intelligence—Braiding Irony, Paradox, and
Possibility 411
Jeffrey R. Yost and Gerardo Con Díaz

Contributors 433

Index 435

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Eileen Clancy 🧿 @clancyny.bsky.social · Aug 27

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Just Code
Power, Inequality, and the Political Economy of IT

Edited by
Jeffrey R. Yost and Gerardo Con Díaz

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vii

Introduction: Encoding an Analytic. 1
Gerardo Con Díaz and Jeffrey R. Yost

PART I. HOW DOES CODE BECOME BOTH A SUBJECT AND A MEANS OF GOVERNANCE?

1. Delivering Solidarity: Platform Architecture and Collective Contention in China’s Platform Economy 23
Ya-Wen Lei

2. Consent Code and Default Dramas 64
Meg Leta Jones

3. A Mirror, Not a Glass Door: Legal Code and Software Code in Practice 87

Justin Petelka, Megan Finn, Janaki Srinivasan, Elisa Oreglia, and A. P. Janani

4. Algorithmic Collusion, Modern Monopolies, and Their Market Power 109
Hamid R. Ekbia

5. Reopening the Politics of Openness in the Age of Cloud Computing: Reflections on Recent FOSS Relicensing 127
Shun-Ling Chen

6. The Great E-book Conspiracy 148
Gerardo Con Díaz

PART II. HOW DOES CODE BECOME INFUSED WITH SOCIAL VALUES, ASSUMPTIONS, AND BIASES?

7. The Standard Head 171
Stephanie Dick

8. Spanning Space and Time Barriers: Computerized Conferencing, Disability, and Citizenship 193
Elizabeth Petrick

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Aug 22

"One of the throughlines in the history of technology is that big, new infrastructural technologies often make more uncompensated labor. People may have to do more things to essentially shepherd those technologies along and make sure that they don’t break down..."
www.fastcompany.com/91384078/not...

Historian Mar Hicks on why nothing about AI is inevitable

The author of Programmed Inquality peers through the AI hype by recalling the rise of past technologies.

www.fastcompany.com

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Aug 21

New Interfaces Essay, Aug. 2025. A super creative & insightful essay by Eóin Phillips, a Prof. of History and Sociology of Sci/Tech/Econ at La Salle-Ramon Llull Univ.

"Computational Schemes and Technological Routines: A Wet History of the Phillips Machine." #histsci

cse.umn.edu/cbi/interfaces

Rochdale Canal Lock 91, industrial setting with lock and water flowing. David Dixon Wikimedia Commons

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Aug 13

Sharing a book review of Thomas S. Mullaney The Chinese Computer that I just published in the British Journal of the History of Science.

www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Cover of The Chinese Computer, blue and gray with a woman sitting at a keyboard/machine and QWERTY keys magnified above with smaller Chinese characters on the keys.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Aug 12

Copies of JUST CODE just arrived! Partnering w Con & teaming w 19 brilliant STS authors on the vital topic of code/codes & inequality was so special! Authors (full list ToC below) On bsky: @mysdick.bsky.social @histoftech.bsky.social @dmulvin.bsky.social & blurb from @anitachan.bsky.social #histtech

Open box of books with two out showing front and back covers propped up on the balcony railing of my Minneapolis condo. Trees and sunshine are in the background. The book's full title is JUST CODE: Power, Inequality, & the Global Political Economy of IT, and it is in bold black lettering with pastel fading trails of the letters.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Jun 18

Delighted to announce CBI Research Fellow (& close friend & collaborator) Prof. Gerardo Con Díaz's (Con's) stellar new book is out (got to read it early & blurb it).

Everyone Breaks These Laws: How Copyright Made the Online World.

Congrats Con! #histtech

yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300...

Everyone Breaks These Laws

Copyright’s profound impact on the online world as we know it This book is a captivating exploration of the profound impact of American copyright law on...

yalebooks.yale.edu

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · May 22

CBI is delighted to announce Stanford Univ. 's Tom Mullaney is co-recipient of the 2025 CBI Human Computer Interaction @benbendc.bsky.social ‬ History Award for his masterful book The Chinese Computer: A Global History of the Information Age. #histsci

cse.umn.edu/cbi/news/mul...

Cover of Thomas Mullaney's book The Chinese Computer, blue book with gray image and lettering, a woman sits at a stenography machine and in the background a QWERTY keyboard with many Chinese Characters on each key.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · May 22

CBI is delighted to announce that Carnegie Mellon U. Prof. of CS Brad A. Myers is co-recipient of the 2025 CBI Human Computer Interaction ( @benbendc.bsky.social )‬ History Award for his monumental book Pick, Click, Flick!: The Story of Interaction Techniques. #histsci

cse.umn.edu/cbi/news/mye...

Cover of Brad A. Myers' book Pick, Click, Flick! The Story of Interactive Techniques. black colored book with purple, white and gray design elements and computer keyboard keys in the background.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · May 15

Just published in Interfaces (May '25). Delighted to publish James (Jim) Cortada's new essay!

"When Tacit Knowledge Meets Artificial Intelligence" (drawn in part from his forthcoming book Beyond the Facts). #histtech

cse.umn.edu/cbi/interfaces

Cover of Beyond the Facts book by James W Cortada. In pastel blue and green and white it shows a stack of books with a ladder up to a light bulb.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Apr 11

Thrilled to announce that on April 21 at 2pm Central CBI Tomash Fellow, Harvard ABD Aaron Gluck-Thaler will be giving an online Tomash Fellow Lecture entitled "Pattern Recognition and Intelligence Reform in Cold War America." Link is below for registration. #histtech

cse.umn.edu/cbi/events/2...

2025 Tomash Virtual Lecture with Aaron Gluck-Thaler

Join CBI's 2024-2025 Tomash Fellow Aaron Gluck-Thaler, Ph.D. Candidate, History of Science at Harvard University, presenting his paper Pattern Recognition and Intelligence Reform in Cold War America.T...

cse.umn.edu

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Apr 1

Just published, April 2025 Interfaces essay, "Business History Conference 2025, & CBI's Participation." In this historiographical essay, I focus on oral history, & IT, gender, political economy, & labor history (in spotlighting many CBI fellows/grantees @BHC). #histtech

cse.umn.edu/cbi/interfaces

Business History Conf. 2025 in Atlanta. Session on IBM and Work with left to right Corinna Schlombs, Jim Cortada, and David Stebenne.

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Anita Chan @anitachan.bsky.social · Mar 26

So many thanks to @justcode.bsky.social and Christina Ewig for the fantastic visit with UMN's Charles Babbage Institute and Center on Women, Gender & Public Policy! Such engaging conversations with the archivists, students, and colleagues there - so excited for all the work underway there!

Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Mar 8

So grateful to the incredible Prof. @anitachan.bsky.social for her tremendous lecture (& wonderful conversation) in MPLS "Predatory Data: Feminist Resistance to Eugenics in Big Tech," on Thursday!!! Hosted by CBI for Computing, Info. & Culture & HHH Ctr. on Women, Gender, & Public Policy. #Histsci

Prof. Anita Say Chan delivering her talk on Predatory Data in MPLS for CBI & CWGPP at UMN.

Prof. Anita Say Chan in Q & A discussion following her lecture, she is seated and is holding a microphone.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Mar 21

CBI for Computing, Information & Culture is thrilled to announce UPenn History & Soc. of Science ABD Sam Franz is CBI's new Tomash Fellow, for his dissertation project "Calculating Knowledge: Computing, Capitalism, and the Modern University, 1945–1990." #histtech

cse.umn.edu/cbi/news/sam...

Sam Franz named as the 2025-2026 CBI Tomash Fellow

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (03/21/2025) — We are thrilled to announce that University of Pennsylvania ABD in the History and Sociology of Science Sam Franz is the incoming Erwin and Adelle Tomash Fellow f...

cse.umn.edu

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Mar 6

Join us TODAY at 5pm at Humphrey 105 for this important lecture, "Predatory Data," by @anitachan.bsky.social , hosted UMN @cwgpp.bsky.social, The Charles Babbage Institute for Computing, Information & Culture (Christina Ewig, Youngmin Chu & me). #histsci

Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Feb 19

THRILLED to announce @anitachan.bsky.social will be giving a Humphrey Forum talk "Predatory Data: Feminist Resistance to Eugenics in Big Tech" co-hosted by CBI for Computing, Information & Culture, & Humphrey School of Public Affairs' CWGPP (March 6 @ 5pm CST). #hstsci

cse.umn.edu/cbi/events/p...

Flyer with information on the talk and Anita Say Chan picture & short bio in the middle of the flyer. Coloring is U of Minnesota maroon and gold.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Feb 19

THRILLED to announce @anitachan.bsky.social will be giving a Humphrey Forum talk "Predatory Data: Feminist Resistance to Eugenics in Big Tech" co-hosted by CBI for Computing, Information & Culture, & Humphrey School of Public Affairs' CWGPP (March 6 @ 5pm CST). #hstsci

cse.umn.edu/cbi/events/p...

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Feb 27

How did television help to shape early conceptions of personal computing & computer dating? See standout media studies scholar Dr. @myrnamoretti.bsky.social 's insightful (just published) Interfaces essay "Part of Our Lives Now: The Personal Computer on "Family Ties” "!

cse.umn.edu/cbi/interfaces

Streaming shot of laptop with 1980s sitcom Family Ties playing--pictured is Alex and Mallory Keaton using an early personal computer in the family's living room.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Feb 15

Thrilled my tremendous HSTM & CBI, U. of Minnesota colleague Honghong Tinn will give a CBI lecture from her incredible new book Island Tinkerers on History of Computing in Taiwan. Feb 25th at 2pm Central. #histtech

Join us! Register at link below for Zoom link.

cse.umn.edu/cbi/events/i...

Screen shot of Island Tinkerers book lecture of Prof Honghong Tinn. Book cover and description.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Jan 21

Call for Applications--Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) History & Archiving Fellowship Program.

For projects in whole or major part advancing ACM history.
Applications due 28 Feb. 2025. #histtech

history.acm.org/wp-content/u...

history.acm.org

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Jan 17

Just released cover of our book JUST CODE, out in Fall 2025. Honored to partner with Con in working alongside an absolutely stellar team of scholars for this interdisciplinary volume from Johns Hopkins University Press!!!
#histtech

JUST CODE book cover. Black text for title and subtitle with code design in lettering and trailing pastel colors.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Jan 14

New Interfaces essay! JHU's @jacobbruggeman.bsky.social

"Phreaking the U.K."

Jacob Bruggeman shows "how the origins of what became the 'computer underground' were fashioned in a trans-Atlantic current of technological tinkering, counterculture, and radical politics."

cse.umn.edu/cbi/interfaces

Museum display of Blue Box used for phone phreaking. Keypad and small speaker/receiver.

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Jeffrey Yost @justcode.bsky.social · Jan 2

Just published essay for the new year, in my critical blockchain studies essays blog, Blockchain & Society. #histsci

blockchainandsociety.com/home-%2Fessa...

A Hard Reign’s A-Gonna Fall: Cryptocurrency Political Economy

Introduction—As we enter 2025, Russian President Putin, and the world’s wealthiest person, Elon Musk, are tugging on U.S. President-elect Trump’s strings. Trump won the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election...

blockchainandsociety.com

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