headlines – Josh Cowls

I’m joining Google

September 23, 2024 Josh Cowls

Today marks my first day at Google in London, where I’ll work as a Product Policy Lead for Multimodal Generative AI. To say the least, it’s an exciting and timely opportunity to help shape effective policy for GenAI products in a trust and safety context.

Naturally it’s bittersweet to be leaving academia after spending over a decade (!) researching the societal implications of digital technology, and watching the intellectual interest in and institutional capacity of this field blossom. I’m proud of my track record in academia and am constantly inspired by colleagues’ incredible and important work. I’m also grateful for a recent rewarding stint in public policy. But since finishing my PhD last year I’ve been on the lookout for a new challenge, and I’m thrilled to now be embarking on just that.

Consulting at Ofcom

October 16, 2023April 23, 2024 Josh Cowls

I’m pleased to say that I’ve joined Ofcom to undertake a six-month research assignment into generative AI in the context of the UK’s new online safety regime. It’s great to return to the world of policy, and an exciting time to be asking important questions about AI and its social and political impact.

New publication The Internet’s Town Square? A Critical Discourse Analysis of Parler’s “Past Imaginary”

June 20, 2023July 11, 2023 Josh Cowls

With Cindy Ma, we have a new paper published in Social Media + Society. In it we explore efforts to publicly portray the fringe social media platform Parler as “the internet’s town square”, in stark contrast to the reality of the platform.

Successful PhD defence

June 1, 2023July 11, 2023 Josh Cowls

I’m delighted to say that earlier today I successfully defended my PhD (DPhil) thesis at the Oxford Internet Institute.

The thesis is titled “The responsible governance of hate speech in app stores: The case of Parler” and my examiners were Professors Vicki Nash and Matthias Kettemann.

I’m extremely grateful to the enormous number of people who helped me get this far, including my supervisors Luciano Floridi and Mariarosaria Taddeo, my funder the Alan Turing Institute, colleagues, friends, and family.

New publication App store governance: implications, limitations, and regulatory responses

October 17, 2022July 11, 2023 Josh Cowls

In this article, we analyse two case studies: the removals from app stores in 2021 of the fringe American social media app Parler and of the Russian opposition app Smart Voting. On the basis of this analysis, we identify three critical limitations for app store governance at present: Apple’s and Google’s dominance, the substantive opacity of their respective app store guidelines, and the procedural arbitrariness with which these guidelines are applied to specific cases. We then assess the potential efficacy of legislative proposals in the EU and US to intervene in this domain and conclude by offering some recommendations supporting more efficacious and socially responsible app store governance.

I have a new article with Jessica Morley and Luciano Floridi now published in Telecommunications Policy, which looks at the issues for app store governance raised by the removals of Parler and Smart Voting from app stores.

New publication Constitutional metaphors: Facebook’s “Supreme Court” and the Legitimation of Platform Governance

April 6, 2022July 11, 2023 Josh Cowls

A range of rhetorical devices have been used to simplify the complexities associated with the governance of online platforms. This includes “constitutional metaphors”: metaphorical allusions to traditional political concepts such as statehood, democracy, and constitutionalism. Here, we empirically trace the ascent of a powerful constitutional metaphor currently employed in the news media discourse on platform governance: characterizations of Facebook’s Oversight Board (OB) as a “supreme court.”

I have a new paper published open access in New Media and Society with Philipp Darius, Dominiquo Santistevan and Moritz Schramm, about Facebook’s “Oversight Board” and the depiction of it as a “Supreme Court”.

New article in Monocle Magazine’s anniversary issue

March 2, 2022December 27, 2022 Josh Cowls

While social media’s incredible growth has fostered extraordinary new possibilities for human connection and creativity, it has also enabled – and at times even incentivised – a 21st century resurgence of extremism, disinformation, surveillance, and many other ills.

For the 15th anniversary issue of Monocle, I was commissioned to write a piece about the many changes to social media, and society, since 2007. The piece is now available in print and online.

Trump Central? App stores as a new front in the platform governance of Donald Trump

February 21, 2022December 27, 2022 Josh Cowls

Trump’s transition from mainstream platform user to putative platform operator marks a watershed moment in the politics of platform governance. The launch of “Truth Social” brings to light a frequently underrated aspect of platform governance: how platform operators govern not only their own users, but also other platforms.

I have a new blog post at the OII discussing what the launch of Donald Trump’s “Truth Social” app may mean for platform governance going forward.

The 2020 Yearbook of the Digital Ethics Lab

November 22, 2021December 27, 2022 Josh Cowls

In the midst of lockdowns and social distancing, the role of digital technology in society has become made ever more integral. For many of us, the lived experience of the pandemic would have been strikingly different even a decade ago without the affordances of the latest information and communication technology—even as digital divides persist within, and between, societies. Yet as digital technology “fades into the foreground” of everyday life, for both scholars and civil society at large it is necessary to engage even more robustly with the implications of such shifts.

I am pleased to say that the latest edition of the Digital Ethics Lab Yearbook, which Jessica Morley and I co-edited, is now in print. In our Introduction, we provide an overview of this year’s contributions.

Achieving a ‘Good AI Society’: Comparing the Aims and Progress of the EU and the US

November 12, 2021December 27, 2022 Josh Cowls

Over the past few years, there has been a proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI) strategies, released by governments around the world, that seek to maximise the benefits of AI and minimise potential harms. This article provides a comparative analysis of the European Union (EU) and the United States’ (US) AI strategies and considers (i) the visions of a ‘Good AI Society’ that are forwarded in key policy documents and their opportunity costs, (ii) the extent to which the implementation of each vision is living up to stated aims and (iii) the consequences that these differing visions of a ‘Good AI Society’ have for transatlantic cooperation.

A new article by Huw Roberts, myself and colleagues, on conceptions of a “good AI society” for the EU and US, has been published in Science and Engineering Ethics.