Engineering and Policy Development

Build, support, and strengthen tangible ideas and prototypes that could be implemented or show new possibilities for future implementation to improve the state of the digital social sphere. (e.g. code, draft policy, tools)

Posts

January 24, 2024

RSM Spring Speaker Series

This spring, we're welcoming an exciting group of social scientists, industry practitioners, and legal academics for a speaker series on social media topics.

December 15, 2023

Data Sovereignty: From the Digital Silk Road to the Return of the State

Visiting Scholar Anupam Chander has co-edited the newly released Data Sovereignty: From the Digital Silk Road to the Return of the State, which is available through open access.

November 15, 2023

Safe Digital Intimacy

Alum Elissa Redmiles and her team have launched safedigitalintimacy.org, a resource for tech platforms and policy makers to prevent image-based sexual abuse online.

November 13, 2023

RSM Hosts Oversight Board Members for Discussion on Content Governance

The event included a day of closed-door working sessions with experts from across the tech field as well as a day of public-facing programming.

November 7, 2023

When AI Systems Fail: The Toll on the Vulnerable Amidst Global Crisis

Employee Fellow Nadah Feteih outlines some of the ways AI models perpetuate stereotypes, and how those mistakes can lead to real-life harm to marginalized communities.

October 11, 2023

Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society and Non-Profit Project Liberty Announce Launch of New BKC Lab

Project Liberty and The Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University announced today that Frank McCourt and the 501(c)(3) non-profit Project Liberty will support the launch of BKC’s Applied Social Media Lab (ASML) – a first-of-its-kind program to assess and build social media technology in the public interest.

October 5, 2023

Centering Community Voices: How Tech Companies Can Better Engage with Civil Society Organizations

Employee Fellow Nadah Feteih and alum Elodie Vialle co-author this article on Tech Policy Press urging platforms to collaborate more closely with marginalized communities in order to effectively address online harms.

September 27, 2023

RSM Fall Speaker Series

This fall, we're welcoming an exciting group of authors, social scientists, industry practitioners, legal academics, and computer scientists for a weekly speaker series on social media topics.

August 8, 2023

Not Just Semantics:
Learning from Definitions in Technology Policy Proposals

Assembly Fellow Marissa Gerchick explains the state of affairs that motivated term tabs, her Assembly Fellowship project that aggregates and makes searchable important terms in proposed and enacted federal tech legislation.

August 2, 2023

Platform Accountability: Developing Systems to More Meaningfully Assess and Mitigate Platform Harms

Assembly Fellow Nate Lubin recaps his fellowship project, a white paper which argues for a series of platform accountability mechanisms informed by the field of public health.

Events

June 6, 2024

Designing Safe(r) Digital Intimacy Workshop

The Institute for Rebooting Social Media invites students, scholars, and designers to apply for this hybrid workshop exploring new ways to build a safer internet, organized by RSM alum Elissa Redmiles, along with Allison McDonald and Lucy Qin, and featuring a slate of experts.

May 8, 2024

POSTPONED: Information Foraging in a Social Media World (RSM Speaker Series)

The Institute for Rebooting Social Media welcomes Carl T. Bergstrom for a talk exploring social media's impact on the scale of human communication and our mechanisms for creating collective understanding.

May 2, 2024

Platforms and the Right to Information

Join us for a one-day workshop examining what the right to information should look like in relation to platforms and how it can be implemented in a manner that protects user privacy.

April 24, 2024

Harvard x Creators: Making Evidence-Based Public Health Information Viral (RSM Speaker Series)

The Institute for Rebooting Social Media welcomes Amanda Yarnell and Kate Speer for a conversation with Visiting Scholar Jeff Hall about the Center for Health Communication's efforts to improve the quality of public health information circulating online.

April 3, 2024

Trust & Safety in the Majority World Workshop  

This workshop will bring together professionals within the field of Trust & Safety (T&S) to discuss socio-technical issues that disproportionately affect the Majority World.

April 2, 2024

A Conversation with Anne Neuberger, U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor

The Institute for Rebooting Social Media welcomes Anne Neuberger, U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor for Cyber and Emerging Technologies, for a conversation on cybersecurity, AI, and other emerging technologies with Faculty Director Jonathan Zittrain.

March 28, 2024

Social Media and Well-Being in Context

Join us for a series of conversations organized by Visiting Scholar Jeff Hall and featuring:

Nancy Baym
Linda Charmaraman
Diane B. Francis
Connie Hadley
Lee Humphreys
Carrie James

March 27, 2024

A Contractual Approach to Social Media Governance (RSM Speaker Series)

The Institute for Rebooting Social Media welcomes Gilad Mills for a discussion with Martha Minow regarding his work on contractual approaches to social media governance.

March 20, 2024

Moderating AI and Moderating with AI (RSM Speaker Series)

The Institute for Rebooting Social Media welcomes Dave Willner for a talk on the promises and perils that foundation models present for the field of content moderation.

March 6, 2024

Moderating Model Marketplaces: Platform Governance Puzzles for AI Intermediaries (RSM Speaker Series)

The Institute for Rebooting Social Media welcomes Robert Gorwa and Michael Veale for a discussion of their research into the governance questions raised by the moderation of model marketplaces.