Skip to content

Nathan Schneider: Contributions to a Glossary of Protocol

TalkNathan Schneider, Venkatesh Rao
researcherpractitioner
Nathan Schneider: Contributions to a Glossary of Protocol
Open resource →

Nathan Schneider, a media studies professor writing a book on protocols for MIT Press, argues that Alexander Galloway's influential 2004 'Protocol' framed protocols purely as top-down control and is historically inaccurate, proposing instead a broad definition of protocols as 'patterns of interaction' that includes vernacular, non-elite protocol-making (developed with Avery Edenfield) and protocol sovereignty/capture dynamics (developed with Johannes Bunke). He also discusses his Protocol Oral History Project interviewing quilters, choreographers, and diplomats, his concept of 'implicit feudalism' in online governance, and a closing debate with Venkatesh Rao over whether centering indigenous/diasporic knowledge in protocol theory is legitimate pluralism or ideological social constructionism.

Topics

governanceimplicit-feudalismprotocol-oral-history-governance-archaeologyprotocol-sovereignty-and-captureprotocolsprotocols-as-patterns-of-interaction-vs-galloways-control-based-definitionresearchtown-hallvernacular-protocols

Related resources

Talk

The State of Climate Protocols

Cory Levenson (Corey Levenson), an engineer and climate tech consultant previously with Regen Network, surveys the state of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) protocols, distinguishing 'closed system' pathways like direct air capture and biochar (easy MRV, high cost) from 'open system' pathways like enhanced rock weathering and ocean alkalinity enhancement (cheaper but harder to quantify due to attribution challenges). He details emerging data protocols—including the Carbon Data Open Protocol, Cascade's ERW Data Query, and Carbon to Sea's Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement Data Protocol—and argues the field should adopt community-governed standards bodies (like OBO Foundry or schema.org's science working group) rather than letting registries like Isometric capture scientific protocol development.

Cory Levenson

Talk

Protocols in Electronic Design

Engineer Vikram Shaker (Qualcomm RF front-end) surveys protocols across electronic design, from hard standards like NIST's cesium-clock definition of the second and the 50-ohm coaxial impedance convention, to communication standards (USB, chiplet interconnects like UCIe and CXL), validation failures (Intel's Pentium FDIV bug and the resulting birth of formal verification), and documentation disasters (NASA's Mars Climate Orbiter unit mismatch). He frames these through Protocol Institute concepts like 'tension' versus 'trade-off' and the efficiency-thoroughness (ETO) frontier, and closes by examining unwritten cultural, ethical, and geopolitical protocols governing chip industry work.

Vikram Shaker

Talk

Inventing Psychohistory: Discussion

Open discussion session following the 'Inventing Psychohistory' symposium talks, with participants including Andre, Florian, Shawn, Venkatesh Rao, Sachin, and Mike Travers debating pace-layer time theory, fashion as an interface layer, and Shawn's concept of 'new nature' as technological systems with no one to appeal to. Venkatesh Rao connects this to Paul Ford's 'why wasn't I consulted' essay and Dan Davies' unaccountability machine thesis, arguing complex systems becoming unaccountable makes them paradoxically more predictable as autonomous machines; Mike Travers questions how this relates to historical disenchantment and Descola's animism framework.

Aneesh Sathe, Andre, Florian, Shawn, Venkatesh Rao, Sachin, Mike Travers