Subversive affordances as a form of digital transnational activism: The case of Telegram’s native proxy

Abstract

Internet, social media, and app shutdowns have become frequent, not only in authoritarian states but also in emerging and fragile democracies. As Russian authorities enforced a legal blockage to Instant Messenger Telegram during the past 2 years, many users kept using the app seamlessly thanks to what we call a subversive affordance: a built-in proxy functionality that allows users to seamlessly circumvent the blockage. We claim it is subversive because it allows users to overcome the blockage as the consequence of the app’s development, with a significant fraction of users who did not have to take action to bypass the blockage. By conducting an online survey and performing a meta-cluster analysis, we found a group we labeled the undeprived: people that, despite presenting traits frequently associated with digital divides—such as gender, age, and low levels of digital skills—were able to keep using the app.

Cooperative affordances: How instant messaging apps afford learning, resistance and solidarity among food delivery workers

“…The integration of the online groups into the daily routines of food delivery workers represents a form of subversion, from below , of the values encoded by companies in their technology. Following Santos et al (2021), we could call this set of affordances ‘subversive affordances’, or ‘oppositional’ affordances (Milioni and Papa, 2022). However, while in the case analysed by Santos et al (2021) the designers of Telegram have inserted in the app – by default – a ‘subversive’ affordance 7 , in our case, the couriers enact the affordances of the instant messaging apps in ‘subversive’ ways, with the aim of expanding the set of actions made possible by the affordances provided by food delivery apps by default.…”

“…Following Santos et al (2021), we could call this set of affordances ‘subversive affordances’, or ‘oppositional’ affordances (Milioni and Papa, 2022). However, while in the case analysed by Santos et al (2021) the designers of Telegram have inserted in the app – by default – a ‘subversive’ affordance 7 , in our case, the couriers enact the affordances of the instant messaging apps in ‘subversive’ ways, with the aim of expanding the set of actions made possible by the affordances provided by food delivery apps by default. Unbeknownst to the platforms, workers have thus developed new affordances that complement those of food delivery apps.…”

“…7.According to Santos et al (2021) Telegram designers inserted a functionality that allows users to seamlessly circumvent the blockage of Telegram imposed by the Russian government.…”

WhatsApp and transparency: an analysis on the effects of digital platforms’ opacity in political communication research agendas in Brazil

“…In the last half-decade, mobile instant messaging services (MIMS) have become a matter of concern for governments, civil society, and academic researchers, due to their opacity and the difficulty of monitoring the circulation of content harmful to democracy, such as mis/disinformation and hate speech, which particularly flood the discussion groups they host (Rossini; Stromer-Galley; De-Oliveira, 2020; Banaji; Bhat, 2019). There is a recent but vast literature that has sought to discuss these platforms, with an emphasis on specific services, such as WhatsApp (Bursztyn;Birnbaum, 2019), Telegram (Willaert et al, 2022;Santos;Saldaña;Tsyganova, 2021), and WeChat (Wu;Wall, 2019), among others. And although, among these three examples, Russian and Chinese private messaging services equally pose challenges for their respective contexts, it is WhatsApp, due to its enormous popularity, especially in non-Western countries such as Brazil and India, that has boosted public debate around issues such as the spread of fake news (Resende et al, 2019;Sacramento;Paiva, 2020), and increased distrust in democratic institutions (Piaia;Alves, 2020), political radicalization (Evangelista;Bruno, 2019), and dangerous speech (Saha et al, 2021;Matamoros-Fernández, 2020).…”

Telegram Channels and Bots: A Ranking of Spanish Media Oulets

“…In 2013, Telegram was created outside the Silicon Valley ecosystem by the Russian brothers Nikolai and Pável Dúrov-the latter already famous as the creator of Vkontakte (currently known simply as VK), which is often called the "Russian Facebook." In 2014, Pável was forced to leave the hugely successful VK-and Russia-because of problems with the Putin administration, which even blocked the messaging application in 2018 (Wijermars 2021); however, its clandestine and nonconformist use continued (Santos et al 2021). Currently, Telegram is registered in the British Virgin Islands, and its operations center is in Dubai.…”