Ethan Zuckerman

Zuckerman is a graduate of Williams College, where he received a B.A. in Philosophy in 1993.{{cite web |url= http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/ezuckerman |title= Ethan Zuckerman |publisher= Berkman Center for Internet & Society, Harvard University |access-date= October 10, 2014}} He then spent a year on a Fulbright scholarship at the University of Legon, Ghana and the National Theatre of Ghana in Accra, where he studied ethnomusicology and percussion.

Zuckerman was one of the first staff members of Tripod.com, one of the first successful "dot com" enterprises, where he worked from 1994 to 1999. There, he was in charge of the design and the implementation of the website, which at that time marketed content and services to recent college graduates. The business model of this website was exclusively based on advertising. After one of the website's major advertisers complained that one of their banner advertisements had appeared on a page that celebrated anal sex, Zuckerman imagined a way to associate an ad with a user's page without putting it directly on the page. His solution was to open a new dedicated window with only the ad in it. While Zuckerman claims having only written the code to open a new window, he is credited as the inventor of the pop-up ad.{{cite magazine |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/08/advertising-is-the-internets-original-sin/376041/?single_page=true |title=The Internet's Original Sin: It's not too late to ditch the ad-based business model and build a better web. |last=Zuckerman |first=Ethan |date=August 14, 2014 |magazine=The Atlantic |access-date=August 20, 2014}}

In 2000, he founded Geekcorps and 2004, Global Voices{{cite web |url=http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/home/ethan_zuckerman |title=Ethan Zuckerman | Berkman Center |last=Zuckerman |first=Ethan |website=Berkman Center for Internet & Society |access-date=April 22, 2006}} where he sits on its board.{{Cite web |title=Board · Global Voices |url=https://globalvoices.org/our-people/board-of-directors/ |access-date=2022-04-09 |website=Global Voices |language=en}}

He won the MIT Technology Review "Technology in the Service of Humanity" award in 2002 for his work on Geekcorps.{{Cite web|title=2002 TR100|url=https://www.technologyreview.com/2002/06/01/235078/2002-tr100/|access-date=2020-07-30|website=MIT Technology Review|language=en}} Zuckerman has been a senior researcher at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, where he is also a long-time fellow. His work at the Berkman Center has included research into global media attention,{{Cite journal |last=Zuckerman |first=Ethan |doi=10.2139/ssrn.487943 |title=Global Attention Profiles - A Working Paper: First Steps Towards a Quantitative Approach to the Study of Media Attention |year=2004 |journal=Social Science Research Network |s2cid=34696767 }}{{Cite journal | last1 = Zuckerman | first1 = E. | doi = 10.1007/s11127-007-9200-y | title = Meet the bridgebloggers | journal = Public Choice | volume = 134 | pages = 47–65 | year = 2007 | issue = 1–2 | s2cid = 55806852 }} as well as the co-founding of Global Voices in collaboration with Rebecca MacKinnon. For some years he was also a contributing writer for Worldchanging.com, where he served as president of the board of directors.

In January 2007, he joined the inaugural Wikimedia Foundation Advisory Board.

In 2008, he coined the cute cat theory of digital activism.{{citation needed|date=August 2014}}

In 2011, he was named by Foreign Policy magazine to its list of top global thinkers, in which he stated the Best idea is "The world isn't flat and globalization is only beginning, which means we have time to change what we're doing and get it right".{{cite magazine |url=https://foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/11/28/the_fp_top_100_global_thinkers?page=0,44#thinker73 |title=The FP Top 100 Global Thinkers |magazine=Foreign Policy |date=November 28, 2011 |access-date=April 14, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120416082704/http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/11/28/the_fp_top_100_global_thinkers?page=0,44#thinker73 |archive-date=April 16, 2012 }} Also in September of that year, he became the director of the MIT Center for Civic Media.{{cite web |url=http://newsoffice.mit.edu/2011/zuckerman-civic-media |title=Ethan Zuckerman, cyberscholar and activist, to lead MIT Center for Civic Media |publisher=MIT News |date=June 30, 2011 |access-date=August 20, 2014}}

Zuckerman was an Open Society Global Board member, and also sits on the board of directors of Ushahidi,{{cite web |url=http://ushahidi.com/about-us/team/board-of-directors |title=Board of Directors |website=ushahidi.com |access-date=April 16, 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120419215146/http://ushahidi.com/about-us/team/board-of-directors |archive-date=April 19, 2012 }} Global Voices,{{cite web |url=http://globalvoices.org/about/board-of-directors/ |title=Board of Directors |website=globalvoices.org |access-date=April 16, 2012}} and the Ghanaian journalism training nonprofit, PenPlusBytes.{{cite web |url=http://www.penplusbytes.org/detail.cfm?prodcatID=1&tblNewsCatID=23&tblNewsID=143 |title=About Penplusbytes: Board of Directors |website=penplusbytes.org |access-date=April 16, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130727222124/http://www.penplusbytes.org/detail.cfm?prodcatID=1&tblNewsCatID=23&tblNewsID=143 |archive-date=July 27, 2013 |url-status=dead }}

He was interviewed in the 2015 web documentary about internet privacy, Do Not Track.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/apr/14/brett-gaylor-do-not-track-interactive-documentary-privacy|title=Do Not Track: an online, interactive documentary about who's watching you|last=Davis|first=Nicola|date=April 14, 2015|work=The Guardian|access-date=April 15, 2015}}

On July 1, 2016, Zuckerman was appointed Associate Professor of the Practice in Media Arts and Sciences at MIT.

In 2019, revelations of Media Lab director Joi Ito's connections with Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender, shed light on the extent of monetary gifts from Epstein to the Media Lab and Ito's startups outside of MIT. Zuckerman resigned from his position{{Cite web|url=https://medium.com/@EthanZ/on-me-and-the-media-lab-715bfc707f6f|title=On me, and the Media Lab|first=Ethan|last=Zuckerman|date=August 21, 2019|website=Medium}} as director of the MIT Center for Civic Media, in protest of the Media Lab's involvement with Epstein.{{Cite web|url=https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/08/23/mit/MmMvichvMG1bpIMq7HLGdL/story.html|title=Head of MIT Media Lab faces crisis that tears at lab he helped elevate - The Boston Globe|website=BostonGlobe.com}} He joined the faculty of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in April 2020.{{Cite web|title=Next steps {{!}} … My heart's in Accra|date=April 28, 2020 |url=http://www.ethanzuckerman.com/blog/2020/04/28/next-steps/|access-date=2020-07-30|language=en-US}}

In 2024, Zuckerman, in his academic role, brought a suit, represented by lawyers from Knight First Amendment Institute, for declaratory relief under section 230 of the US Communications Decency Act. He proposed to use a piece of software similar to Unfollow Everything to evaluate user response to having control of their social media feeds.{{Cite web |last=Zuckerman |first=Ethan |title=Why I'm suing Facebook in US federal court |url=https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/ideas/technology/66018/why-im-suing-facebook-in-us-federal-court |access-date=2025-03-05 |website=www.prospectmagazine.co.uk |language=en}} The motion was dismissed without prejudice in Novmber 2024, due to the tool not yet existing, and federal law prohibiting federal courts from issuing advisory opinions.{{Cite web |first1=Sophia| last1=Cope |first2=David |last2=Greene |first3=Aaron|last3=Mackey |date=2024-09-24 |title=EFF to Federal Trial Court: Section 230's Little-Known Third Immunity for User-Empowerment Tools Covers Unfollow Everything 2.0 |url=https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/09/eff-federal-trial-court-section-230s-little-known-third-immunity-user-empowerment |access-date=2025-03-05 |website=Electronic Frontier Foundation |language=en}}{{Cite court|litigants=Zuckerman v. Meta Platforms, Inc., 3:24-cv-02596|opinion=ECF No. 43|court=N.D. Cal.|date=22 November 2024|url=https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.428857/gov.uscourts.cand.428857.43.0.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250305134052/https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.428857/gov.uscourts.cand.428857.43.0.pdf|archive-date=5 March 2025|url-status=live|litigants-force-plain=yes|pinpoint=page 1|quote=Professor Zuckerman’s request for declaratory relief is not ripe for adjudication and seeks an unconstitutional advisory opinion.}}

Zuckerman resides{{When|date=January 2022}} in Lanesborough, Massachusetts, and has a son with Rachel Barenblat.{{Cite news |last=Clatworthy |first=Ben |title=Meet the man who invented pop-up ads |newspaper=The Times |language=en |url=https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ethan-zuckerman-the-man-who-invented-pop-up-ads-jbjd2qw7r |access-date=2022-04-09 |issn=0140-0460}} On October 7, 2022, Zuckerman married Amy Price.{{Cite web |last=Zuckerman |first=Ethan |date=October 22, 2022 |title=Our wedding, October 7-9, 2022 |url=https://ethanzuckerman.com/2022/10/22/our-wedding-october-7-9-2022/ |access-date=November 16, 2022}}

• "[http://niemanreports.org/articles/using-the-internet-to-examine-patterns-of-foreign-coverage/ Using the Internet to Examine Patterns of Foreign Coverage]." Neiman Reports, Fall 2004.
• Hal Roberts, Ethan Zuckerman, and John Palfrey. [http://dash.harvard.edu/handle/1/2794933 2007 Circumvention Landscape Report: Methods, Uses, and Tools]. Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, 2009-03
• "[http://blogs.hbr.org/now-new-next/2009/01/innovating-from-constraint-in.html Innovating From Constraint in the Developing World]." Harvard Business Review, 2009-01-23
• [http://pubs.iied.org/G02845.html "Web 2.0 tools for development: simple tools for smart people."] Participatory Learning and Action, Volume 59, Number 1, Change at hand: Web 2.0 for development, 2009–06, IIED and CTA.
• "Citizen Media and the Kenyan Electoral Crisis." In: Stuart Allan. Citizen journalism: global perspectives. Peter Lang, 2009
• "[http://itidjournal.org/itid/article/viewFile/631/271 Decentralizing the Mobile Phone:A Second ICT4D Revolution?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180926170925/http://itidjournal.org/itid/article/viewFile/631/271 |date=September 26, 2018 }}" Information Technologies & International Development, Volume 6, SE, Special Edition 2010
• "International reporting in the age of participatory media." Daedalus, Spring 2010, Vol. 139, No. 2.
• "Internet Freedom: Beyond Circumvention." In: The next digital decade : essays on the future of the internet. Washington D.C. : TechFreedom, 2010.
• "[https://foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/01/14/the_first_twitter_revolution The First Twitter Revolution?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141017184548/http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/01/14/the_first_twitter_revolution |date=October 17, 2014 }}" Foreign Policy, 2011-01-14
• Hal Roberts, Ethan Zuckerman and John Palfrey. [http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/sites/cyber.law.harvard.edu/files/2011_Circumvention_Tool_Evaluation_1.pdf 2011 Circumvention Tool Evaluation]. Berkman Center, 2011
• {{cite book |title=Rewire: Digital Cosmopolitans in the Age of Connection |publisher= W. W. Norton & Company |location=New York |date=June 17, 2013 |isbn=978-0-393-08283-8 }}
• "[https://www.cjr.org/special_report/building-honest-internet-public-interest.php Building a More Honest Internet]" Columbia Journalism Review, Fall 2019.

• Media Cloud, co-developed by Zuckerman

{{Reflist}}

• {{cite journal |author=Gregory T. Huang |url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19325871.700-interview-over-the-internet-border.html |title=Interview: Over the Border. |journal=New Scientist |volume=193 |issue=2587 |date=January 20, 2007}}

{{Commons category}}

• [http://ethanzuckerman.com/blog/ My Heart's in Accra (Ethan Zuckerman's blog)]
• [http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/home/ethan_zuckerman Bio - Berkman Center for Internet & Society]
• {{TED speaker}}
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20060713010929/http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/001098.html Interview with Zuckerman on Worldchanging.com]
• [http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/21140 Video (with mp3 available) of discussion about cyber-war and social media with Zuckerman] and Evgeny Morozov on Bloggingheads.tv

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