platform capitalism

A book

A : [[book]]

Written by : [[Nick Srnicek]]

Found at : https://www.politybooks.com/bookdetail?book_slug=platform-capitalism--9781509504862

Analyses platform capitalism.

It has a good historical overview of where platforms came from and how they came to dominate.

It has a useful typology of platforms.

Platforms primarily gain their advantages from data.

Trying to force platform capitalists to respect privacy is impossible - it's part of their DNA.

Over time platforms try to control the whole stack.

Over time, platforms slowly converge to offering the same services.

Typology of platforms

• [[advertising platforms]]
• [[cloud platforms]]
• [[industrial platforms]]
• [[product platforms]]
• [[lean platforms]]

What is to be done?

The small section on 'Futures' at the end of the book discusses very briefly possible alternatives.

It does not think [[platform coops]] will be the answer.

Some have argued that we might fight these monopolistic trends by building up cooperative platforms.62 Yet all the traditional problems of coops (e.g. the necessity of self-exploitation under capitalist social relations) are made even worse by the monopolistic nature of platforms, the dominance of network effects, and the vast resources behind these companies. Even if all its software were made open-source, a platform like Facebook would still have the weight of its existing data, network effects, and financial resources to fight off any coop rival.

It thinks the state might have more power to control platforms. Through thinks like antitrust, local regulations against lean platforms (like Uber), and action on tax avoidance. But notes that they are insufficient. And ignore structural conditions.

The state, by contrast, has the power to control platforms. Antitrust cases can break up monopolies, local regulations can impede or even ban exploitative lean platforms, government agencies can impose new privacy controls, and coordinated action on tax avoidance can draw capital back into public hands. These actions are perhaps all necessary, but we must admit that they remain rather unimaginative and minimal. They also neglect the structural conditions at play in the rise of platforms. In the midst of a long downturn in manufacturing, platforms have emerged as a way to siphon off capital into a relatively dynamic sector oriented towards the mining of data.

It suggests that public platforms might be a way forwards. Supported by the state. And democratically operated. It also suggests that [[collectivisation]] might be a route to public platforms. (I take that to mean the appropriation and takeover of existing private platforms?) See: [[Reclaim the stacks]]. See: [[Technology appropriation in a de-growing economy]].

Rather than just regulating corporate platforms, efforts could be made to create public platforms – platforms owned and controlled by the people. (And, importantly, independent of the surveillance state apparatus.) This would mean investing the state’s vast resources into the technology necessary to support these platforms and offering them as public utilities. More radically, we can push for postcapitalist platforms that make use of the data collected by these platforms in order to distribute resources, enable democratic participation, and generate further technological development. Perhaps today we must collectivise the platforms.

A concept

By creating the digital infrastructure that facilitates online communities, platform companies have inserted value capture mechanisms between people seeking to interact and exchange online

– [[Platform socialism]]

Platform Capitalism, referring to the market power that these technology companies have by controlling key platforms we use for our basic internet services.

– [[Digital Capitalism online course]]

it involves a number of very wealthy corporations accumulating vast quantities of capital by virtue of their control of platforms enjoying a near monopoly position in their respective domains, and exercising a particular capacity both to accumulate capital and to influence the behaviour of users through their deployment of data-gathering algorithmic technologies (Srnicek,)

– [[Techno-feudalism or Platform Capitalism? Conceptualising the Digital Society]]

• [[book]]
  • [[author]] [[nick srnicek]]