Digital Infrastructures: Summer 2025 Courses

To enroll, visit Berkeley Summer Sessions!

This summer, we are offering the following classes:

Digital Infrastructure 101 | Session A

This course offers an in-depth exploration of the foundational elements of digital infrastructure. It examines the critical role of these physical infrastructures in emergent internet technologies such as cloud computing and edge computing. Students will investigate how data centers and cables underpin modern digital services such as video streaming, online gaming, and e-commerce. The course will cover the historical development of data centers and cables, their impact on the evolving landscape of internet technology, and the core components of these facilities and networks. By understanding these critical components, students will gain a comprehensive view of how digital infrastructure supports and transforms the modern world.

NWMEDIA 131-001: Digital Infrastructure - asynchronous

NWMEDIA 131-002: Digital Infrastructure - synchronous

Approved for: Historical Studies L&S Breadth; History of the Built Environment Minor, Geography major & minor (non-Geography requirement), STS Minor in Human Contexts of Data and Computing and Environmental Change and Society.

How to Build a Global Internet: Digital Infrastructure Projects from Subsea Cables to Data Centers | Session D

You are tasked with constructing subsea cables that stretch across oceans and data centers that store and compute digital content. Without these foundational infrastructures, a global internet could not exist. Yet these mega-projects can cost hundreds of millions of dollars and take years to execute. What is required to build such massive systems and facilities? What kinds of political, environmental, and technological challenges will you face? In this class, as you consider developing the internet’s backbone in different parts of the world, you will learn to answer these questions.

NWMEDIA 132-001: How to Build a Global Internet - asynchronous

NWMEDIA 132-002: How to Build a Global Internet - synchronous

Approved for: Philosophy and Values L&S Breadth, Political Economy minor in the Science, Technology, and Economic Development, History of the Built Environment minor, Certificate in New Media electives, Sustainable Design minor, Media Studies Digital Studies

Tech Wars: Security, Geopolitics, and Resilience of Digital Infrastructures | Session D

The internet is not only a place for sharing and interconnection, it is also a site of conflict, competition, and geopolitics. This course takes the students deep into the importance of security and protection to the digital infrastructures that support all internet traffic, especially the subsea cables and data centers that form the network’s backbone.

NWMEDIA 133-001: Tech Wars - asynchronous

NWMEDIA 133-002: Tech Wars - synchronous

Approved for: Political Economy minor in Science, Technology, and Economic Development, Certificate in New Media, Public Policy Minor, Media Studies Media, Law, and Policy, STS Minor in Human Contexts of Data and Computing and Environmental Change and Society