Efficiency in Multi-objective Games

In a multi-objective game, each agent individually evaluates each overall action-profile on multiple objectives. I generalize the price of anarchy to multi-objective games and provide a polynomial-time algorithm to assess it. This work asserts that policies on tobacco promote a higher economic efficiency

Digital prosumption labour on social media in the context of the capitalist regime of time

So-called social media such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Weibo and LinkedIn are an expression of changing regimes of time in capitalist society. This paper discusses how corporate social media are related to the capitalist organization of time and the changes this organization is undergoing. It uses social theory for conceptualizing changes of society and its time regime and how these changes shape social media. These changes have been described with notions such as prosumption, consumption labour, play labour (playbour) and digital labour. The paper contextualizes digital labour on social media with the help of a model of society that distinguishes three subsystems (the economy, politics, culture) and three forms of power (economic, political, culture). In modern society, these systems are based on the logic of the accumulation of power and the acceleration of accumulation. The paper discusses the role of various dimensions of time in capitalism with the help of a model that is grounded in Karl Marx’s works. It points out the importance of the category of time for a labour theory of value and a digital labour theory of value. Social media are expressions of the changing time regimes that modern society has been undergoing, especially in relation to the blurring of leisure and labour time (play labour), production and consumption time (prosumption), new forms of absolute and relative surplus value production, the acceleration of consumption with the help of targeted online advertising and the creation of speculative, future-oriented forms of fictitious capital

Early specific cognitive-behavioural psychotherapy in subjects at high risk for bipolar disorders: study protocol for a randomised controlled trial

Background: Bipolar disorders (BD) are among the most severe mental disorders with first clinical signs and symptoms frequently appearing in adolescence and early adulthood. The long latency in clinical diagnosis (and subsequent adequate treatment) adversely affects the course of disease, effectiveness of interventions and health-related quality of life, and increases the economic burden of BD. Despite uncertainties about risk constellations and symptomatology in the early stages of potentially developing BD, many adolescents and young adults seek help, and most of them suffer substantially from symptoms already leading to impairments in psychosocial functioning in school, training, at work and in their social relationships. We aimed to identify subjects at risk of developing BD and investigate the efficacy and safety of early specific cognitive-behavioural psychotherapy (CBT) in this subpopulation. Methods/Design: EarlyCBT is a randomised controlled multi-centre clinical trial to evaluate the efficacy and safety of early specific CBT, including stress management and problem solving strategies, with elements of mindfulness-based therapy (MBT) versus unstructured group meetings for 14 weeks each and follow-up until week 78. Participants are recruited at seven university hospitals throughout Germany, which provide in-and outpatient care (including early recognition centres) for psychiatric patients. Subjects at high risk must be 15 to 30 years old and meet the combination of specified affective symptomatology, reduction of psychosocial functioning, and family history for (schizo) affective disorders. Primary efficacy endpoints are differences in psychosocial functioning and defined affective symptomatology at 14 weeks between groups. Secondary endpoints include the above mentioned endpoints at 7, 24, 52 and 78 weeks and the change within groups compared to baseline; perception of, reaction to and coping with stress; and conversion to full BD. Discussion: To our knowledge, this is the first study to evaluate early specific CBT in subjects at high risk for BD. Structured diagnostic interviews are used to map the risk status and development of disease. With our study, the level of evidence for the treatment of those young patients will be significantly raised

Marx’s "Capital"in the Information Age

This article argues that a media and communication studies perspective on reading Marx’s Capital has thus far been missing, but is needed in the age of information capitalism and digital capitalism. Two of the most popular contemporary companions to Marx’s Capital, the ones by David Harvey and Michael Heinrich, present themselves as general guidebooks on how to read Marx, but are actually biased towards particular schools of Marxist thought. A contemporary reading of Marx needs to be mediated with contemporary capitalism’s structures and the political issues of the day. Media, communications and the Internet are important issues for such a reading today. It is time to see Marx not just as a critic of capitalism but also as a critic of capitalist communications

Comfort radicalism and NEETs: a conservative praxis

Young people who are not in education, employment or training (NEET) are construed by policy makers as a pressing problem about which something should be done. Such young people's lack of employment is thought to pose difficulties for wider society in relation to social cohesion and inclusion and it is feared that they will become a 'lost generation'. This paper(1) draws upon English research, seeking to historicise the debate whilst acknowledging that these issues have a much wider purchase. The notion of NEETs rests alongside longstanding concerns of the English state and middle classes, addressing unruly male working class youth as well as the moral turpitude of working class girls. Waged labour and domesticity are seen as a means to integrate such groups into society thereby generating social cohesion. The paper places the debate within it socio-economic context and draws on theorisations of cognitive capitalism, Italian workerism, as well as emerging theories of antiwork to analyse these. It concludes by arguing that ‘radical’ approaches to NEETs that point towards inequities embedded in the social structure and call for social democratic solutions veer towards a form of comfort radicalism. Such approaches leave in place the dominance of capitalist relations as well as productivist orientations that celebrate waged labour