Ethan Zuckerman 
Associate Professor of Public Policy, Communication, and Information, and Director of the UMass Institute for Digital Public Infrastructure | University of Massachusetts Amherst
Amherst, MA, UNITED STATES
Founder of the Institute for Digital Public Infrastructure, Ethan Zuckerman focuses on building alternatives to the commercial internet.
Areas of Expertise (5)
Social Media Governance
Technology and Social Change
Digital Public Infrastructure
Online Community Governance
Social Media
Biography
An international expert on designing and advocating for versions of social media are designed to have positive social and civic impacts, Ethan Zuckerman is frequently sought out to discuss idea for moving beyond existing models of funding and governance in social media and on the internet.
Video Appearances
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Education (1)
Williams College: B.A., Philosophy
Links (2)
Press Coverage (4)
Twitch Isn't Overwhelmed With Far-Right Extremists, But It Does Have A Big Misinformation Problem
Kotaku online
2021-05-31
Ethan Zuckerman comments about how Twitch has now joined older social media platforms in beginning to combat misinformation.
Misinformation Is Destroying Our Country. Can Anything Rein It In?
The Nation print
2021-05-10
Zuckerman comments about possible ways to rein in online misinformation. He says, “The Nazis right now have an incentive to build alternative distributed media, and the rest of us are behind because we don’t have the incentive to do it. My real deep fear is that we end up ceding the design of this way of building social networks to far-right extremists, because they are the ones who need these new spaces to discuss and organize."
To Thrive, Our Democracy Needs Digital Public Infrastructure
Politico online
2021-01-05
"This is why a growing group of scholars and technologists have started looking at new ways of supporting flourishing online public life by focusing on parks and libraries for the internet — what scholar Ethan Zuckerman calls “digital public infrastructure.”
Fragmented and humbled: How social media could emerge from the post-election crisis
The Boston Globe print
2021-01-24
"The events of the past few weeks “could be an ugly path that might get us toward a very different media environment,” said Ethan Zuckerman, a University of Massachusetts Amherst professor who has been working on ways to better orient social media toward civic conversation and public benefit."
Publications (4)
How Has Misinformation Evolved Over The Past Ten Years?
ForbesEthan Zuckerman
2021-01-29
Zuckerman writes about how misinformation has changed over the last decade. He says, "
Mistrust: Why Losing Faith in Institutions Provides the Tools to Transform Them (Book)
W. W. Norton & CompanyEthan Zuckerman
2021-01-19
Zuckerman says: "How can you change society if you lose faith in institutions like governments and corporations? Mistrust: How Losing Faith in Institutions Provides the Tools to Transform Them (2021) looks at democracies like the US through the lens of mistrust in institutions, a massive social trend."
The real lesson of Trump's social media silencing
CNNEthan Zuckerman
2021-01-12
Ethan Zuckerman writes that social media companies removing Donald Trump from their platforms "reflect a major shift in how large social media platforms handle extreme speech. They have long tolerated right-wing extremists and were particularly hands-off with Trump, concluding that his tweets and posts -- for all his flagrant lying and bullying -- were important dispatches from a world leader, and had to stay up for everyone in our democracy to see."
Digital Cosmopolitansz; Why We Think the Internet Connects Us, Why It Doesn't, and How to Rewire It (Book)
W. W. Norton & CompanyEthan Zuckerman
2014-11-10
In Digital Cosmopolitans, Ethan Zuckerman explains why the technological ability to communicate with someone does not guarantee human interaction or the healthy exchange of information and ideas.
Social