Luis Felipe Murillo, an Assistant Professor of Anthropology, explores the innovative world of hackerspaces as alternatives to corporate tech domination. He reveals how hacker collectives foster privacy networks and community-created monitoring devices to combat mass surveillance. Through his research in San Francisco, Tokyo, and Shenzhen, Murillo discusses the political nuances of hacking and the importance of inclusivity. He argues that these spaces not only challenge the status quo but also envision a more just technological future.
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insights INSIGHT
Common Circuits Enable Alternative Tech Futures
Common circuits are transnational networks where people, projects, and symbols circulate to enable local tech alternatives.
These circuits connect sites like hackerspaces, privacy software, and open hardware to prefigure different technological futures.
question_answer ANECDOTE
What A Hackerspace Looks Like
Hackerspaces are community labs where people teach themselves and others about information technology through workshops and shared projects.
Luis Felipe Murillo observed art, political, privacy, and open-hardware projects happening in these spaces.
insights INSIGHT
Hacking Is Context Dependent
Hacking means different things across contexts, shaped by local political histories and infrastructures.
The same networked identity can produce divergent projects and practices in different countries.
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A digital world in relentless movement—from artificial intelligence to ubiquitous computing—has been captured and reinvented as a monoculture by Silicon Valley "big tech" and venture capital firms. Yet very little is discussed in the public sphere about existing alternatives. Based on long-term field research across San Francisco, Tokyo, and Shenzhen, Common Circuits: Hacking Alternative Technological Futures (Stanford UP, 2025) explores a transnational network of hacker spaces that stand as potent, but often invisible, alternatives to the dominant technology industry. In what ways have hackers challenged corporate projects of digital development? How do hacker collectives prefigure more just technological futures through community projects? Luis Felipe R. Murillo responds to these urgent questions with an analysis of the hard challenges of collaborative, autonomous community-making through technical objects conceived by hackers as convivial, shared technologies.
Through rich explorations of hacker space histories and biographical sketches of hackers who participate in them, Murillo describes the social and technical conditions that allowed for the creation of community projects such as anonymity and privacy networks to counter mass surveillance; community-made monitoring devices to measure radioactive contamination; and small-scale open hardware fabrication for the purposes of technological autonomy. Murillo shows how hacker collectives point us toward brighter technological futures—a renewal of the "digital commons"—where computing projects are constantly being repurposed for the common good.
Mentioned in this episode:
"Political Software: Mapping Digital Worlds from Below" Project Website here
Luis Felipe R. Murillo is Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Faculty Fellow at the Notre Dame Technology Ethics Center at the University of Notre Dame. His work is dedicated to the study of computing from an anthropological perspective.
Liliana Gil is Assistant Professor of Comparative Studies (STS) at The Ohio State University.
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