I am interested in the ways institutions are reconfiguring themselves to the constraints and potentials of the digital age. In particular, following the work of Thomas Malaby, I research how the institutional sponsorship of games or gameful processes are changing the terms by which individuals participate within society. My Masters Thesis examined Niantic’s Pokemon Go (2016) as a contingent product of their previous game Ingress (2014), and critiqued the ways that data is produced, recycled and deployed algorithmically in the placement of augmented reality objects. My PhD research will continue to work with data, algorithms, games and institutions, using ethnographic methodology amongst actors and actants involved in using, designing, and programming algorithmic or gameful processes. I am also working to problematise the lack of computer programming language literacy in ethnography of these networks and the ‘black-boxing’ of the digital that happens as a result.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthew-keracher/

Academia.edu: https://uwm.academia.edu/MatthewKeracher

Twitter: https://twitter.com/matthewkeracher