My full name is “Joan Pla Vivoles”. “Joan” is a Catalan name, pronouced (/d͡ʒuˈan/), although different pronunciations are welcome. My first surname is “Pla”, and my second surname is “Vivoles”. In international contexts I prefer using “Joan Pla” to prevent confusion and ensure simplicity.
Born in 1980, I have a firsthand memory of the world before the Internet—not that I particularly miss it. This is simply a statement to position myself within a specific generation and era.
My academic and research interests include:
- Journalism and the Digital Public Sphere
- Political Economy of Communication
- Public Service Media in Europe
- Decentralised Social Networks
- FLOSS
- Philosophy of Technology
- AI Ethics and AI in research
This is all I wish to disclose publicly about myself. If you need anything else, you can contact me at pla@proton.me, @joanpla:matrix.org or see you around the Fediverse: @joanpla@mastodon.social (since August 2018) or @joan@pixelfed.pla.cat (since January 2025).
I was on Twitter from February 2008 until sometime in 2023. I still have the account on X for professional reasons, but I set it to private and don’t use it anymore for obvious reasons.
This is a picture of me taken by Google’s Street View car in 2022:
And this is the picture I took to Google’s Street View car:
