Many Marxist class concepts are wage labor-centric (see, e.g., Wright 1997). Marxist feminism has argued that unpaid reproductive labor can be considered as an inner colony and milieu of primitive accumulation of capitalism (Mies 1986; Mies, Bennholdt-Thomsen, and von Werlhof 1988; Werlhof 1991) and is a class in itself. Antonio Negri uses the term social worker to argue that there is a broadening of the proletariat that is “now extended throughout the entire span of production and reproduction" (Negri 1982: 209). Later, Hardt and Negri (2000, 2004) transformed the notion of the social worker into the concept of the multitude. These approaches remind us that, given the complexity of capitalism, we need a multifaceted and dynamic class concept that,in addition to wage labor, also includes groups such as the unemployed, house workers, migrants, people in developing countries, precarious workers, students, public servants, and precarious self-employees in the concept of class. All of them create the commons of society, and users of corporate social media are part of this expanded notion of the proletarian class.
DallasSmythe suggests that, in the case of media advertisement models, the audience is sold as à commodity to advertisers: “Because audience power is produced, sold, purchased and consumed, it commands a price and is a commodity... .You audience members contribute your unpaid work time and in exchange you receive the program material and the explicit advertisements" (Smythe 1981/2006: 233, 238). With the rise of user-generated content, freely accessible social networking platforms that yield profit through online advertisement, the web seems to come close to accumulation strategies employed by capital on traditional mass media such as television or radio. Individuals who upload images, write wall posts or comments, send messages to their contacts, accumulate friends, or browse profiles constitute an audience commodity that is sold. The difference between the audience commodity on traditional mass media and on the Internet is that, in the latter case, the users are also content producers; they engage in constant, often creative, activity, communication, community building, and content production. Alvin Toffler introduced the notion of the prosumer in the early 1980s, which refers to the “progressive blurring of the line that separates producer from consumer" (Toffler 1980: 267). Due to the permanent activity of the recipients and their status as prosumers, we can say that, in the case of corporate social media, the audience commodity is an Internet prosumer commodity. The conflict between cultural studies and critical political economy of the media about the question of the activity and creativity of the prosumer has been resolved in relation to web 2.0: On Facebook, Twitter, and blogs, users are fairly active and creative, which reflects cultural studies insights about recipients, but this active character is the very source of exploitation, which reflects the emphasis of critical political economy on class and exploitation.
That people are more active on the Internet than they are in their reception of TV or radio content is due to the decentralized structure of the Internet, which allows many-to-many communication. Due to the permanent activity of the recipients and their status as prosumers, we can say that, in the case of corporate social media, the audience commodity is an Internet prosumer commodity. The conflict between cultural studies and critical political economy of the media about the question of the activity and creativity of the audience has been resolved in relation to web 2.0: on Facebook, Twitter, and blogs, users are active, which confirms insights of cultural studies about recipients, but this engaged and dynamic behavior of the audience is the very source of exploitation, which reflects critical political economy's stresson class and exploitation.
Class and Exploitation on the Internet
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