Sommersemester 2021

The STS Workbench focusses on current topics in Science & Technology Studies. Alternating more or less weekly, we discuss guest presentations by international experts and young scholars as well as current (pre)publications at the interface of science, technology and society. The term “workbench” is synonymous with the program: we are looking at rough and unpolished work, data and analysis from ongoing projects and conceptual and theoretical experiments – and we screw apart and reassemble issues, concepts and methods of current STS research.

The specific focus of this course will be on the tensions between setting incentives to innovation on the one hand and permitting access to knowledge on the other. Against this background, the course will provide an introduction to intellectual property law, including the basics of copyright, patent and trademark law. It will place a specific emphasis on how to engage with these areas of law in the context of a digital startup, and how they apply to artificial intelligence. Other relevant areas include trade secrets, upload filters, and specific IP protection for software and databases.

Emerging technologies, like social media, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Everything (IoE), have changed the way we communicate, interact, and live. These technologies, however, not only create novel opportunities. As is becoming increasingly apparent, they raise specific challenges for many legal fields. This seminar puts a spotlight on data protection issues generated by the rise of the IoE and the advent of AI. Throughout, we will not only analyze the GDPR and comment on recent jurisprudence by the CJEU, but also discuss novel policy strategies to square such technologies with data protection and human autonomy.

This course offers ENS students the possibility to present and discuss their individual course projects for the MoDE. More specifically, in the first part of the course, feedback will be given by peers and by the course instructor in an informal, interactive format. The comments of the course instructor will particularly highlight potential legal challenges that may arise in the realization of the project. The first part of the course will probe these legal challenges and seek to develop solutions. The second part of the course will be dedicated to individual student presentations, which will form the basis of the award of three ECTS credits (see below). The course is supposed to provide a platform for peer exchange and the continuous development of individual projects in a legally compliant way.

Students gain knowledge in the field of visual communication on the web and the principles of creating the visual sphere of websites (proximity, alignment, repetition, contrast, hierarchy). During the course, they learn the web design process from the perspective of a professional web designer. Throughout the course students are introduced to planning and designing effective web pages, according to their own projects, ideas and needs. Students are able to implement their own websites (no coding skills are required).