event

Content Moderation Beyond Social Media

November 18th, 2021 - 9:00 am to 10:30 am PST

This private workshop on Content Moderation Beyond Social Media proposes to shift the attention from large social media companies, and explore responses and innovative approaches to mitigating harmful content online, by other companies. The workshop will bring together representatives of different content platforms and industry experts, to discuss the diversity in practices of content moderation, focusing on issues related to scalability, decision-making processes, and enforcement. The conversation will also bridge methods and practices of responsible innovation and content moderation, exploring the benefits of adopting an intersectional lens.

This is an invite-only, private session that is part of a workshop series organized and moderated by fellows Julie Owono and Niousha Roshani for the Content Policy and Society Lab (CPSL), a project of the Program on Democracy and the Internet.



Speakers:

Abby Vollmer

Abby Vollmer is Director of Platform Policy and Counsel at GitHub, building and guiding implementation of GitHub’s approach to content moderation. Abby’s work focuses on developing GitHub’s policy positions, providing legal support on content policy development and enforcement, and engaging with policymakers to support policy outcomes that empower developers and shape the future of software.



Vivek Narayanadas

Vivek Narayanadas serves as Shopify’s Vice President of Legal and Data Protection Officer, where he leads the company’s privacy, data protection, and intellectual property teams. In this role, he is responsible for ensuring that Shopify complies with, and that its merchants are able to comply with, the complex set of global privacy and data protection laws that may apply to their business.  Before joining Shopify, he served as Senior Counsel and Data Protection Officer at Rubicon Project, a technology platform in the advertising space. Before moving in-house, Vivek was a litigator in private practice for many years, where he focused on appellate and complex class action matters relating to issues of privacy and constitutional law.





Aerica Shimizu Banks

Aerica Shimizu Banks is a tech policy expert and inclusion innovator. She is the founder of Shiso, a consultancy that applies an intersectional equity lens to business development, tech, and policy challenges. After experiencing the triumphs and trials of tech – building successful DEI programs at Google and then holding Pinterest accountable for its racism and sexism – she now creates systems and frameworks to elevate and restore equity in our institutions at her firm.

A 2018 Forbes 30 Under 30 Social Entrepreneur and a 2017 Washingtonian Magazine Tech Titan, Aerica’s career is a testament to the values she lives in her personal and professional life. She has served on President Biden’s innovation policy committee; founded Pinterest’s DC office and led federal affairs; led diversity and equity initiatives on Google’s legal team and served as the Black small business liaison for the DC area; co-founded BEACON: The DC Women Founders Initiative; was a political appointee in the Obama Administration; and advanced environmental justice policies in Washington state. She holds an MSc in Environmental Policy from Oxford University and a BA in Environmental Studies and Public Affairs from Seattle University. To learn more about Aerica, visit aerica.co.





Angela Hooks

Angela Hooks is a Public Policy Manager at Dropbox, where she focuses on intermediary liability and privacy. Prior to this, she worked at Yelp on consumer speech, antitrust, and small business issues. She’s an avid supporter of increasing diversity in tech and serves as a DC lead for Black Girls Code. Angela received her bachelor’s degree in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from the University of Pennsylvania, and will soon be pursuing a master’s degree in data science from UC Berkeley.