Internet Oligopoly: The Corporate Takeover of Our Digital World (Digital Activism and Society: Politics, Economy and Culture in Network Communication)

"Over the last decade, the digital technologies in everyday life have multiplied. Our lives have been gradually taken over by digital devices, networks, and services. Although useful, they have also become invasive additions to our personal, professional and public lives. This process has occurred in a globalized and deregulated economy and a few US-based start-ups transformed into an oligopoly of multinationals that today govern the informational infrastructure of our societies. This book offers an analytical framework of the contemporary internet studied through the lens of history and political economy. Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft are examined as emblematic products of a new capitalist order that is resolutely opposed to the original project of the internet. The author retraces the process of commodification that resulted in financial rationales taking over from collective and individual emancipation and uncovers how this internet oligopoly uses its exorbitant market power to eliminate competition; take advantage of global financialization to exploit human labour on a global scale and to avoid taxation; and how it implements strategies to control our communication methods for accessing information and content online, thus increasingly controlling the digital public sphere. The book reveals how the reshaping of society via private company business models impact on the place of work in future societies, social and economic inequalities, and, ultimately, democracy."--Page 4 of cover Front Cover......Page 1 Internet Oligopoly: The Corporate Takeover of Our Digital World......Page 4 Copyright Page......Page 5 Contents......Page 6 About the Author......Page 10 Foreword......Page 12 Notes......Page 16 Introduction......Page 18 The Internet as a Political Issue......Page 20 The Necessary Critique of the Digital Political Economy......Page 23 Notes......Page 28 Chapter 1 The Commodification of the Internet......Page 32 A Progressive Project......Page 33 Convergence of Design and Use......Page 34 ARPANET – A Public Good......Page 35 Free Circulation of Information......Page 36 The Information Society and the Post-industrial Economy......Page 37 The Convergence of Neoliberalism and Technological Determinism......Page 38 Technology to Overcome the Critiques of Capitalism......Page 39 The Deregulation of Telecom and the Neoliberal Turn......Page 40 The Pioneers: Thatcher and Reagan......Page 41 European Dogma......Page 42 From Counterculture to the Commodification of Cyberculture......Page 43 A New Audience for the Networked, Personal Computer......Page 44 The WELL, the First Digital Social Network......Page 45 A Platform for Freelance Knowledge Workers......Page 47 The Digerati, Heralds of the Market......Page 48 Notes......Page 49 Information Highways Leading to Internet Privatisation......Page 54 From Keynesian Stimulus to Deregulation......Page 55 The Limits of Closed Networks......Page 56 Internet Privatisation: An Issue that was Never Questioned......Page 57 Internet Start-up Culture Meets Venture Capital......Page 58 The Birth of Silicon Valley......Page 59 How to Finance Innovative Companies......Page 60 From Advising to Speculating......Page 61 Start-ups: Experiments in Deregulated Labour......Page 62 The ‘Irrational Exuberance’ of the New Economy and of Convergence......Page 63 The Emergence of the ‘New Economy’......Page 64 From Convergence to Concentration......Page 65 Failed Mergers with Big Impact......Page 66 Notes......Page 67 The Internet’s Effect on the Information Economy......Page 72 Non-rivalry of Digital Goods......Page 73 Distribution Advantages......Page 75 Reducing Transaction Costs......Page 76 Winner-take-all Economics......Page 78 Regulators Avoid Challenging the Oligopoly......Page 80 Exceptional Financial Power......Page 82 Globalised Companies and Strategies......Page 84 Matrix Management......Page 85 Avoiding Taxes......Page 86 Exploiting Labour: a Pillar of the Oligopoly’s Profitability......Page 88 Subcontracting Content Moderators......Page 89 Flexibility, Precariousness and Wage-fixing......Page 90 Notes......Page 92 Chapter 4 The Oligopoly’s Strategies for Integration and Infomediation......Page 100 Infomediation: A key function of the internet......Page 101 Information Brokerage and Coopetition......Page 104 Google and Facebook: Emblematic Infomediaries......Page 106 The Vertical Integration of the Oligopoly......Page 107 Computers and Consumer Electronics......Page 108 The Cloud......Page 110 Networks......Page 111 The Horizontal Concentration of the Internet......Page 113 Communication and Networking Services......Page 114 Access to Information and Online Content......Page 115 Paid Downloads and Streaming......Page 116 Notes......Page 117 Chapter 5 The Advertising Dominance of the Internet......Page 124 The Critique of Advertising......Page 125 A Two-Sided Market......Page 126 The Audience as a Product......Page 128 Advertising Heteronomy......Page 129 Mass Culture and Advertising......Page 130 The Critique of Advertising Discounted......Page 131 Advertising on the Internet......Page 133 The Internet’s ‘Original Sin’......Page 134 Advertising 2.0......Page 135 Tracking Methods: Beyond Cookies......Page 136 The Personal Data Market......Page 138 Programmatic Trading......Page 139 Google Advertising......Page 140 Facebook Advertising......Page 143 Resisting and Regulating Online Advertising (or lack thereof)......Page 146 Personal Data: A Political Issue......Page 147 The Impossibility of Democratic Regulation......Page 148 Market Regulation......Page 150 The Blind Spots of the Online Advertising Market......Page 151 Notes......Page 153 Conclusion......Page 162 Notes......Page 165 References......Page 166 Index......Page 182 Over the last decade, the digital technologies in everyday life have multiplied. Our lives have been gradually taken over by digital devices, networks, and services. Although useful, they have also become invasive additions to our personal, professional and public lives. This process has occurred in a globalized and deregulated economy and a few US-based start-ups transformed into an oligopoly of multinationals that today govern the informational infrastructure of our societies. 0This book offers an analytical framework of the contemporary internet studied through the lens of history and political economy. Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft are examined as emblematic products of a new capitalist order that is resolutely opposed to the original project of the internet. 0The author retraces the process of commodification that resulted in financial rationales taking over from collective and individual emancipation and uncovers how this internet oligopoly uses its exorbitant market power to eliminate competition; take advantage of global financialization to exploit human labour on a global scale and to avoid taxation; and how it implements strategies to control our communication methods for accessing information and content online, thus increasingly controlling the digital public sphere Drawing on a historical and political economy analysis, this book provides insight on how, under neoliberal hegemony, the internet was transformed from an emancipatory project for humanity to the final frontier of unrestrained capitalism.