The Charles was certainly looking lovely today, and was able to enjoy the view while listening to talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was a great talk by Joe Ploog on balancing openness and curation in platform ecosystems at PLAMADISO https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snTmmxbIM_w

Next was an interesting talk by Bart Hobijn on understanding labor market indicators at the Brookings Institution https://www.youtube.com/live/HrTIj5h1N5I?si=dVxRKOP-ht4bDw1s&t=5613

Last was "Labour, Mobility and Informal Practices in Russia, Central Asia and Eastern Europe," edited by Rano Turaeva and Rustamjon Urinboyen. This is a eclectic mix of academic essays on a variety of topics, with the most compelling ones focusing on aspects of informal migrant labor in a region that receives little attention in the English literature. I especially liked the chapters on Central Asian labor migrants in Russia (John Round and Irina Kuznetsova), taxi drivers in Tashkent (Nikolaos Olma), infrastructure of posting (Alexandra Voivozeanu), and Uzbek migrant workers in Russia (Urinboyev). It should also be noted that one of the authors of the painful chapter on Russian deportation regimes (Turaeva and Izzat Amon) is currently in prison, demonstrating the peril of this important research https://www.routledge.com/Labour-Mobility-and-Informal-Practices-in-Russia-Central-Asia-and-Eastern-Europe-Power-Institutions-and-Mobile-Actors-in-Transnational-Space/Turaeva-Urinboyev/p/book/9781032010144