March 2026 - Members - lists.sigcis.org

Call for papers, American Historical Association
by Ceruzzi, Paul 08 Apr '26

08 Apr '26

I saw this call from the AHA for papers about Artificial Intelligence.. Many of the topics suggested have been well-covered by members of SIGCIS, but perhaps the AHA membership is unaware of our (your) work. https://www.historians.org/news-publications/american-historical-review/how… Paul Ceruzzi

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Annals 48(1) now available
by Troy Astarte 31 Mar '26

31 Mar '26

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details sought on Paul Werbos work on Vietnam for RAND
by Bernard Geoghegan 30 Mar '26

30 Mar '26

Dear colleagues with RAND and Vietnam War expertise! In an interview in the book *Talking Nets*, Paul Werbos, an earlier developer of backpropagation algorithms, tells a story (excerpted below) about a project he worked on for RAND that got leaked to the New York Times. I've emailed with Werbos, but he doesn't seem to have a handy citation for the NY Times report. Does anyone happen to know the report he has in mind or tips on how to locate the report or a gloss on his work for RAND? There are a few comments in Boden's two volume study of AI, but it appears her reconstruction is imprecise. Alternately, I'm not planning a RAND archives deep-dive or site visit, but maybe someone has advice for a well targeted remote search request I could file? This is just a little footnote for a larger project, so I'm trying to not get too sidetracked. Werbos reports: “I went back to Harvard to get a PhiD. in applied math. Having been fortified with humanity from London, I then descended into the bowels of the machine , stopping off at the RAND Corporation for the summer of 1968 along the way....Actually, I did learn a thing that summer that surprised me. It turned out one of their problems was coming up with a measure of success in the Vietnam War....I looked for stable invariants , and they were things like Vietcong attacks on Americans. That was the best stable invariant underlying measure. I used that as a success measure and came to the conclusion that we' should radically change our policy and do things like small unit actions instead of these large sweeps...Of course , it was all classified , and I read it on the front page of the New York Times two weeks later, which immediately made me very cynical about American security. The minute it’s useful , it’s on the front page of the New York Times. That made me very cynical- that event plus a few other things that happened at the RAND Corporation.” Best wishes, Bernard

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The Humanities
by Dag Spicer 29 Mar '26

29 Mar '26

Wonderfully done. <https://thewokesalaryman.substack.com/p/how-humanities-help> [983be836-1667-4fc4-b7e4-67bd3b245508_2160x2700.jpeg] We live in complex times. Here's how the humanities can help.<https://thewokesalaryman.substack.com/p/how-humanities-help> thewokesalaryman.substack.com<https://thewokesalaryman.substack.com/p/how-humanities-help> Dag ----- Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum Editorial Board, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing ACM History Committee 1401 N. Shoreline Blvd. Mountain View CA 94043 “History is a vast early warning system.” — Norman Cousins, American journalist (1915-1990). Join our Mailing List here: https://info.computerhistory.org/subscribe

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Thinking Machines event tomorrow, free online streaming
by thomas.haigh＠gmail.com 26 Mar '26

26 Mar '26

Hello SIGCIS, I'll be talking tomorrow (remotely) at an event at the ZKM Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe, Germany. The museum is displaying an iconic Connection Machine 2, thanks in large part to the energy of artist and former Thinking Machines designer Tamiko Thiel in getting the machines into major museums. My talk "Why Did They Say The Machines Were Thinking?" will provide some historical context for the 1980s regarding the AI brand, ARPA's history of AI funding, and the Strategic Computing Initiative. I noticed that the livestream links are right there on the event page with no signup required, so thought I would circulate a last minute notification to the list to see if anyone is interested The event runs from 2pm Central European time on Friday, with two further sessions on Saturday. Full program with streaming links at https://zkm.de/en/2026/03/envisioning-ai-legacy-and-impact-of-the-connection -machine. Other speakers include Danny Hillis, Brewster Kahle, and the MIT Museum (is that you, Debbie Douglas?). Tamiko Thiel herself has an interesting website on the Connection Machine and its legacy at https://tamikothiel.com/theory/cm_txts/ (particularly https://tamikothiel.com/cm/cm-30th.html) One of the themes of my forthcoming book The Brand That Wouldn't Die is that the technical contributions of 20th century AI-branded research centers in the 1960s and 70s were considerable but were all incidental to its supposed mission of achieving intelligence (e.g. timesharing systems, search algorithms, electronic publishing and text editing, etc.) Documenting the longer-term influence of ARPA's support for what looked at the time like a failed investment is interesting as example of this continuing in the 1980s. Best wishes, Tom Thomas Haigh Professor & Chair, UWM History Department Chair, IEEE Computer Society History Committee Director, ACM History Committee Turing Awards Project See more at www.tomandmaria.com/Tom <http://www.tomandmaria.com/Tom>

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Call for Submissions: 2026 Joel A. Tarr Envirotech Article Prize
by Ruamcharoen, Boyd 24 Mar '26

24 Mar '26

Dear all, The Envirotech Special Interest Group is inviting submissions for the 2026 Joel A. Tarr Envirotech Article Prize. Please feel free to circulate the call among your networks! In association with the Society for the History of Technology (SHOT), Envirotech has established the Joel A. Tarr Envirotech Prize to recognize the best article, published in either a journal or edited volume, on the relationship between technology and the environment in history. The prize is named in honor of the eminent U.S. historian of urban environments and technologies Joel A. Tarr. Awarded roughly every eighteen months (alternating between SHOT and ASEH conferences), the prize recognizes innovative publications that explore new ways of thinking about the interplay between technological systems and the natural environment. Early-career scholars and graduate students are especially encouraged to submit their publications. Articles may be submitted in any language; however, for articles not written in English, the applicant will need to provide a translation. To be eligible for this prize, the article must have been published in a journal or an edited volume between January 1, 2025, and June 30, 2026. Submissions can be final page proofs in lieu of the published PDF, if needed. The winner of the 2026 Joel A. Tarr Envirotech Prize will be announced around the SHOT 2026 conference (held virtually). To apply, please attach your article and a brief curriculum vitae (a one-page PDF file) to this form by July 1, 2026: https://forms.gle/vpx4bRSoiEKW71RL7 For more information and previous winners, see here<https://www.envirotechhistory.org/awards-and-prizes/the-envirotech-article-…>. Please contact co-convenors Boyd Ruamcharoen (bruamcharoen(a)fas.harvard.edu) and Ramya Swayamprakash (swayampr(a)gvsu.edu) with any submission-related issues. Best, Boyd Ruamcharoen Postdoctoral Fellow in Global American Studies Charles Warren Center for Studies in American History Harvard University Website: boydruamch.com<https://www.boydruamch.com>

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Nominations invited for the 2026 Mahoney Prize
by Morgan G. Ames 24 Mar '26

24 Mar '26

Please submit your article nominations for SIGCIS's 2026 Mahoney Prize! And please forward widely! The Mahoney Prize recognizes an outstanding article in the history of computing and information technology, broadly conceived. The Mahoney Prize commemorates the late Princeton scholar Michael S. Mahoney, whose profound contributions to the history of computing came from his many articles and book chapters. The prize consists of a $500 award and a certificate. For the 2026 prize, *articles published in the preceding three years (2025, 2024 and 2023) are eligible for nomination*. The Mahoney Prize is awarded by the Special Interest Group in Computers, Information, and Society (SIGCIS). Please email copies of articles being nominated to the 2026 Prize Committee by* April 24, 2026*. Self-nominations are welcome, as are nominations from the SIG’s membership. Committee members’ names and emails are included below. Luke Stark (Chair) Assistant Professor Faculty of Information and Media Studies University of Western Ontario cstark23(a)uwo.ca David Murphy Senior Lecturer Digital, Tech, Innovation & Business Staffordshire University david.murphy(a)staffs.ac.uk Janet Toland Adjunct Professor School of Information Management Victoria University of Wellington janet.toland(a)vuw.ac.nz Information on previous winning essays may be found on the SIGCIS website: https://www.sigcis.org/mahoneyprize

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Delete: Strategies of Negation in the Age of Data Suffocation, CFP Reminder (1 Week Left)
by Veronika Hanáková 23 Mar '26

23 Mar '26

Dear colleagues, We invite you to submit proposals for the conference: *Delete: Strategies of Negation in the Age of Data Suffocation* *Where: *BLOC Cinema, *Queen Mary University of London * *When:* 17–18 September 2026 *Apply until 31 March:* https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdIk0FttwN7BI9Q0QlLw6_rWDt_S_ZM4Cu… <https://eur01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fdocs.goog…> *Read CfP:* https://www.qmul.ac.uk/arts/research/research-events/items/delete-strategie… *Keynote speakers: *Neta Alexander (Yale University), Thomas Dekeyser (University of Southampton) Seventeen years ago, Viktor Mayer-Schönberger argued that deleting is indissolubly linked to our capacity to survive and move forward (Schönberger 2009). Yet even then, a paradox emerged: while digital technologies expanded possibilities for erasure, deletion’s critical and subversive function was already eroding. With growing storage capacities and tracking mechanisms, deletion has become reduced, contested, or even impossible. How has its status changed, as AI slop and global political turbulence render this gesture seemingly futile? In the late 2000s, deleting still carried weight: we removed media to free space and erased posts to avoid embarrassment, while glitchy images and sounds remained worth preserving. By 2026, deletion has largely lost urgency. Entertainment is accessed via subscription platforms, files are dispersed across drives and clouds, and interactions (on social media or with AI models like ChatGPT) are effectively permanent and extractable. We are surrounded by lossless media, and even failures have become pauses between updates (Alexander and Appadurai 2019). Meanwhile, disruption itself appears co-opted by Big Tech, limiting its value for cultural production (Owens 2024). This conference revisits deletion as both a tool of power and a practice of resistance, refusal, and negation. Current research shows how online regimes delete memories, histories, subjectivities, and labour (Lingel 2021; Thylstrup 2025), while creative strategies attempt to rupture the deluge of digital content (Dekeyser and Culp 2023; Klik 2026). Bringing together *scholars, artists, archivists, and activists*, the conference aims to collectively reflect on and experiment with infrastructures, methodologies, and epistemologies in which deleting can once again operate as a meaningful cultural and political act. *Possible topics include (but are not limited to): * - Aesthetics of Deletion and Absence - Media Obsolescence and Forgotten Technologies - The Politics of Digital Forgetting - Creative Erasure in Videographic Scholarship - Failures, Errors, and Digital Loss on Streaming Platforms - Events and Impact of Social Media Going Dark - Histories of Digital Deletion - Media Preservation and the Fight Against Digital Deletion - Cognitive Tools and the Deletion of Traditional Memory Functions - Algorithmic Deletion and Digital Bias - Global vs. Local Practices of Deletion and Digital Memory - AI and Deletion All the best, Veronika Hanáková, Jiří Anger, and Daniel O’Brien -- Mgr. Veronika Hanáková *. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ⟡ ݁ . ⊹ ₊ ݁.**. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ⟡ ݁ . ⊹ ₊ ݁.* *Screenworks: the peer-reviewed online publication of practice research in screen media* <https://www.screenworks.org.uk/archive> Associate Editor *. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ⟡ ݁ . ⊹ ₊ ݁.**. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ⟡ ݁ . ⊹ ₊ ݁.* *Cycles of Labour: In the Metaverse, We Will Be Housewives* <https://necsus-ejms.org/cycles-of-labour-in-the-metaverse-we-will-be-housew…> Co-authored with Jiří Anger and Martin Tremčinský BAFTSS Awards 2025: Winner, Best Videographic Criticism . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ⟡ ݁ . ⊹ ₊ ݁.. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ⟡ ݁ . ⊹ ₊ ݁. *The Red Shoes: A Desktop Fairy Tale * Recipient of the SCMS Digital Humanities & Videographic Criticism SIG Graduate Student Video Essay Award

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So.hist.Info Seminar : Anna Katharina Osterlow (CERI, Paris) - Training “The African vanguard of the computer age”
by Camille Paloque-Bergès 20 Mar '26

20 Mar '26

Dear colleagues, We are pleased to invite you to the next session of the Socio-History of Informatics Seminar 2025-2026. This sixth and penultimate session of the 2025–2026 season will host: *April 13, 3:00–5:00 pm* *Anna Katharina Osterlow (Centre for History at Sciences Po / CERI, Paris)* for a presentation entitled: *Training “The African vanguard of the computer age”: early computing and visions of modernity and independence in Senegal and Nigeria, 1963-1984* The seminar will be held in *hybrid format* at *UTC-Paris, 62 boulevard Sébastopol – 75003 Paris* (Salle Danielle Quarante [IMI/IMI-QUARAN]). A connection link and the room number will be posted on this page before the event. To attend the seminar, please *register here <https://framaforms.org/inscription-seminaire-de-socio-histoire-de-linformat…>* *.* *Training “The African vanguard of the computer age”: early computing and visions of modernity and independence in Senegal and Nigeria, 1963-1984* In March 1982, an ambitious, transnational group of teachers, scientists, and computer experts from Senegal, France, and the United States launched the project “Computers in education” at the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Dakar, Senegal, to explore the usage of micro-computers in teaching and learning. The exchanges within the transnational network of experts around this project raised questions about the “Westernness” of technology, the appropriate ways to spread computing knowledge adapted to Senegalese culture, and the conditions of exporting computer hardware from the Global North to the Global South. Similar questions were raised in a much earlier computer project in 1964 in Nigeria, where International Business Machines (IBM) established the “African Education Centre”, in cooperation with the University of Ibadan, to train students from different African countries on an IBM punch card computer. While evoking similar questions on modernity and computing, this project brought forward Nigerian aspirations of linking computing with the efforts of nation-building and decolonisation, and it was announced as a symbol for the path that the African continent would take. Considering the changing practices of computing over the years, my research investigates the entanglements between French and US American state and private actors with African academics, functionaries, teachers, and computer scientists, from the 1960s to the late 1980s, in their ambitions to spread computing. Thereby, my research intends to shed light on the “silence” surrounding African computing history and its embeddedness in the global dynamics of decolonisation and the Cold War. My research is based on archival materials from archives in France, Senegal, Nigeria, and the US The *So.Hist-Info seminar* is coordinated by* Mathilde Fichen, Camille Paloque-Bergès & Adrien Tournier (HT2S lab Cnam, Paris) and Léandre Bécard (COSTECH, UTC, Compiègne). *Please note that this will be the first session organized with our new co-coordinator, L. Bécard. More info on the seminar : https://sohistinfo.github.io/ https://technique-societe.cnam.fr/seminaire-socio-histoire-de-l-informatiqu… Link to the online announcement : https://technique-societe.cnam.fr/anna-katharina-osterlow-training-the-afri…

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Turing Conference -- On Computable numbers...
by Dag Spicer 16 Mar '26

16 Mar '26

On the 90th anniversary of Turing's classic paper. <https://www.tnmoc.org/computable90-conference> [computable90-logo.jpg] Computable90 Conference — The National Museum of Computing<https://www.tnmoc.org/computable90-conference> tnmoc.org<https://www.tnmoc.org/computable90-conference> Dag ----- Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum Editorial Board, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing ACM History Committee 1401 N. Shoreline Blvd. Mountain View CA 94043 “History is a vast early warning system.” — Norman Cousins, American journalist (1915-1990). Join our Mailing List here: https://info.computerhistory.org/subscribe

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