Dr. Jean-Christophe Plantin, Associate Professor in Media and Communications at the London School of Economics, explains the concept of media infrastructures.

We discuss Dr. Plantin’s research on digital platforms, infrastructures, and how tech giants like Facebook and Google increasingly blend those two concepts. We also discuss the infrastructure of WeChat, and get into Dr. Plantin’s ongoing work into the concept of programmable infrastructures – which explores how the hardware of the tech industry is becoming increasingly disagreggated and modular.

Check out Dr. Plantin’s recent talk at Sciences Po for more details on programmable infrastructures.

And the articles we discuss in the episode:

Digital Media Infrastructures: Pipes, Platforms, and Politics (2018)

Infrastructure Studies Meet Platform Studies in the Age of Google and Facebook (2018)

WeChat as Infrastructure: The Techno-Nationalist Shaping of Chinese Digital Platforms (2019)