Samenvatting
One of the biggest concerns about social media is the vast amount of personal data they gather. This causes users and media to think about their privacy. But this is no longer the only thing we should worry about.
Once we dive deeper into the rabbit hole, we enter into a whole new world filled with personalised recommendations, search results, friend requests etc. This is part of a possible future described by Eric Schmidt (CEO of Google): "I actually think most people don't want Google to answer their questions," he elaborates. "They want Google to tell them what they should be doing next."
But, what do Google and social media platforms need to suggest relevant in-formation? They are using a form of unpaid labour, called Immaterial Labour 2.0 (Cote and Pybus 2009). The input is made of User Generated Content that is either willingly provided or involuntary, through the use of tracking tech-nologies such as cookies. A squirrel dying in front of your house may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa.
Recent critics and scholars are afraid of the future scenario, often referred to as The filter bubble (Eli Pariser 2011). This bubble surrounds every Internet user and it defines what is relevant to you: "A squirrel dying in front of your house may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa." (Mark Zuckerberg in The filter bubble)
If Foucault were still around, he would call this one of the clearest manifesta-tions of biopolitics. Users are willingly participating because it is free, but they are also segregated in a bubble of likeminded people, which is one of the sub-tlest ways of power to influence users.
Once we dive deeper into the rabbit hole, we enter into a whole new world filled with personalised recommendations, search results, friend requests etc. This is part of a possible future described by Eric Schmidt (CEO of Google): "I actually think most people don't want Google to answer their questions," he elaborates. "They want Google to tell them what they should be doing next."
But, what do Google and social media platforms need to suggest relevant in-formation? They are using a form of unpaid labour, called Immaterial Labour 2.0 (Cote and Pybus 2009). The input is made of User Generated Content that is either willingly provided or involuntary, through the use of tracking tech-nologies such as cookies. A squirrel dying in front of your house may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa.
Recent critics and scholars are afraid of the future scenario, often referred to as The filter bubble (Eli Pariser 2011). This bubble surrounds every Internet user and it defines what is relevant to you: "A squirrel dying in front of your house may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa." (Mark Zuckerberg in The filter bubble)
If Foucault were still around, he would call this one of the clearest manifesta-tions of biopolitics. Users are willingly participating because it is free, but they are also segregated in a bubble of likeminded people, which is one of the sub-tlest ways of power to influence users.
| Originele taal-2 | English |
|---|---|
| Specialist publicatie | Invited lecture in the context of the class Technologie de l'information, ULB |
| Status | Published - 1 dec 2011 |