{"resolved":true,"match_type":"uuid","source_type":"original_book","book_id":"a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7","title":"DIGITAL LABOR THE INTERNET AS PLAYGROUND AND FACTORY","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":"9780415896948","requested_by":"printed_page","book":{"source_type":"original_book","book_id":"a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7","id":"a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7","uuid":"a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7","title":"DIGITAL LABOR THE INTERNET AS PLAYGROUND AND FACTORY","normalized_title":"digitallabortheinternetasplaygroundandfactory","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":"9780415896948","isbns":["9780415896948","9780415896955","9780203145791"],"parsed":true,"ai_readable":true,"document_type":"book","page_count":267,"navigation_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7","title_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/title/DIGITAL%20LABOR%20THE%20INTERNET%20AS%20PLAYGROUND%20AND%20FACTORY","fixed_page_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7/page/{printed_page}","path_api_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/book/a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7/page/{printed_page}","read_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/read/a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7","page_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7/page","search_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/a31b1606-7526-4f42-a12d-1edcb41ff0e7/search"},"page":{"printed_page":151,"pdf_page":158,"physical_index":158,"physical_index_base":0,"printed_page_status":"recognized","page_sha256":"a70768cf03473203e9a9b71892641ef1e9bfeb8f9f71012c34cd15ee342edb82"},"chapter":"DIGITAL LABOR","content":"Because of the potential shortcomings of privacy as a means of addressing monitoring concerns, this chapter proposes an approach to the commercial use of personal information that draws on a notion more conducive to collective action and the recognition of the role played by social relations: that of exploitation. The notion of exploitation has long been used in Marxist-inflected critiques of capitalism to destabilize the very notion of free choice that underwrites the type of exchange described by USA Today: the process whereby, as individual consumers, we freely give up something of our own (our privacy—in the form of personal information) in exchange for something we desire or need. The “or\" in this formulation is admittedly a vexed one—it might be argued that it makes all the difference in the world whether we are talking about need or desire, about livelihood or convenience. Perhaps—although the notion of what constitutes an acceptable standard of living (beyond some baseline notion of physical survival) is, as Marx, among others, has noted, a historically and culturally conditioned one.4 While it is possible to mark the difference that separates sustenance from starvation, it is less easy to mark that which clearly delineates the boundary between need and desire.\n\nThis is not to dismiss the distinction outright, but rather to assert its socially conditioned character as a way of considering a similar issue that arises with the notion of exploitation. It is possible, as I will arguein the following pages, to make the case that the commercial appropriation of commercial information meets an abstract definition of exploitation, but to do so risks lumping together under the same name forms of brutal workplace exploitation with something that looks a lot more benign: people shopping or networking online. It is crucial to recognize the difference between types and levels of exploitation and to prioritize critical response accordingly—just as one might distinguish between different types of material deprivation. However, mobilizing the notion of exploitation raises questions about the social relations that characterize the online economy and their role in reproducing the privatization ofproductive resources, social and economic inequality, and resulting forms of alienation.\n\nExploitation and Free Labor\n\nAlthough forms of online activity that take place beyond the workplace proper do not fall within the realm of wage labor, they can nevertheless generate value. Because the capture of personal information is used to create targeted marketing campaigns, the online marketing model has created a market in feedback commodities. In some cases, this information is used directly by interactive companies to customize advertising; in others, it is bought and sold to marketers. As the Wall Street Journal's investigative report on data mining put it in a description of a company that profiles Internet users, “tastes can be sold wholesale (a batch of movie lovers is \\$1 per thousand) or customized (26-year-old Southern fans of 50\n\nEstranged Free Labor\n\n151","previous_page":150,"next_page":null}