Introduction
Richard Barbrook is an academic in the School of Social Sciences, Humanities and Languages at the University of Westminster.
Education
Barbrook studied for a BA in Social & Political Science at Downing College, University of Cambridge, a MA in Political Behaviour at University of Essex and a doctorate in Politics & Government at University of Kent.
Career
In the early 1980s, he was involved with pirate and community radio broadcasting. Helping to set up the multi-lingual Spectrum Radio station in London, he published extensively on radio issues during this period.
Having worked on media regulation within the EU for some years at a research institute at the University of Westminster, much of his material was published in his 1995 book Media Freedom. In the same year, he became the coordinator of the Hypermedia Research Centre at Westminster's Media School and was the first course leader of its MA in Hypermedia Studies.
Working with Andy Cameron, he wrote the essay "The Californian Ideology" a pioneering critique of the neo-liberal politics of Wired magazine. His other important writings about the Net include "The Hi-Tech Gift Economy", "Cyber-communism", "The Regulation of Liberty", and "The Class of the New".
In 2007, Barbook moved to the Social Sciences School of the University of Westminsterand published his study of the political and ideological role of the prophecies of artificial intelligence and the information society Imaginary Futures.
The Media Ecology Association selected Imaginary Futures as the winner of the 2008 Marshall McLuhan Award for Outstanding Book of the Year in the Field of Media Ecology.
Richard Barbrook is a founding member of Class Wargames and co-wrote the script to the group's film: Ilze Black (director), Class Wargames Presents Guy Debord's The Game of War.
Selected works
- Barbrook, Richard (2007). Imaginary Futures: from thinking machines to the global village (paperback ed.). London: Pluto Press. ISBN 978-0-7453-2660-3..
- Barbrook, Richard (2006). The Class of the New (paperback ed.). London: OpenMute. ISBN 0-9550664-7-6..
- Barbrook, Richard (2000) [1999]. "Cyber-Communism: How The Americans Are Superseding Capitalism In Cyberspace". Science as Culture. 9 (1), 5–40.
- Barbrook, Richard. (15 May 1996). "Global Algorithm 1.5: Hypermedia Freedom". Ctheory. 19 (1–2).
- Barbrook, Richard (1995). Media Freedom: the contradictions of communications in the age of modernity (paperback ed.). London: Pluto Press. ISBN 978-0-7453-0943-9.
- Barbrook, Richard. Andy Cameron. (1996) [1995] "The Californian Ideology". Science as Culture. 26, 44–72.