The speaker explores three protocols—cosmopolis, metropolis, and nation-state—for articulating civilizational memory, with a focus on reconsidering what cosmopolitanism means in a changed geopolitical landscape. Drawing on over a decade of blogging, work with the Summer of Protocols program, and AI consulting, the speaker presents a book-length investigation into how these three units function as frameworks for understanding belonging, identity, and memory beyond familiar nationalist or globalist categories.
Nadia Asparouhova discusses anti-mimetics—ideas that resist spreading or being remembered—drawing from SCP Foundation fiction and connecting the concept to Venkatesh Rao's 'cozy web' theory. She explores how certain ideas fade from memory despite documentation, and examines the tension between isolated intellectual communities and information spread.
Nadia Asparouhova
Nathan Schneider, professor of media studies at the University of Colorado Boulder, presents his research on protocol studies and shares a glossary project documenting the intellectual history of protocols across disciplines. He traces how the term 'protocol' appears across online economies, blockchains, crypto, and social networks, and discusses his oral history initiative interviewing protocol practitioners worldwide.
Nathan Schneider
The speaker introduces the Spannungsfeld (field of tensions) Special Interest Group, a research initiative exploring trade-offs and conflicts in protocol design and technological development. Drawing from tension games conducted at conferences, the group proposes a framework combining engineering trade-offs with social conflict to understand how tensions shape protocol design and societal outcomes.
Speaker (SIG Lead)