18.3. REPAIR Dialogues with Kévin Carillon

Doctoral Researcher Kévin Carillon (UCLouvain) will deliver an online presentation titled Closing the Algorithmic Black Box: Breakdowns and Patching Strategies in a Public Service Media on March 18, from 9:00 to 10:00 (EET).

Attend the session via Zoom: https://helsinki.zoom.us/j/69923863901

REPAIR Dialogues is a venue for scholars and collaborators of the REPAIR project to present their ongoing work and findings in a less formal manner. Each event includes an introduction by a researcher or expert, followed by a joint discussion. The events are held online (via Zoom) in English.

Closing the Algorithmic Black Box: Breakdowns and Patching Strategies in a Public Service Media

This presentation builds on my recent article published in Science & Technology Studies, which analyzes the development of a news article recommender system at RTBF (the Belgian public service broadcaster) through a 13-month ethnographic study of the organization. I argue that the algorithmic system should not be viewed as a pre-existing “black box,” but rather as a “black box in the making.” To support this argument, I examine the concrete processes through which the algorithmic system is stabilized in everyday practice.

The analysis focuses primarily on cycles of breakdown and repair. Two major breakdowns serve as revealing moments: one related to outdated recommendations (due to the system’s inability to account for the temporal nature of news articles), and another related to inappropriate recommendations in a sensitive editorial context. These episodes reveal deeper tensions, particularly among editorial, support/data, and management teams, regarding the definition of priorities, quality criteria, and the role of the algorithm in editorial processes.

From these cases, I introduce the notion of patching strategies, which address immediate problems without challenging the system’s overall architecture or authority. These repairs also serve an organizational and political function: they help re-engage reluctant actors, contain criticism, and reinforce the project’s legitimacy. This talk thus highlights the central argument that breakdowns and repairs may contribute to the system’s closure by transforming a contested innovation into a routinized one.

Kévin Carillon is a PhD candidate in Information and Communication Sciences at UCLouvain (Belgium), affiliated with LASCO (the Laboratory for the Analysis of Organizational Communication Systems). His doctoral research focuses on datafication and algorithmization processes in public service media, with a particular emphasis on their organizational implications.