Something we learnt about this week was Feudalism and its modern-day version. Feudalism was a medieval concept, a set of legal, economic, and military customs in medieval Europe. But in modern day society we are not limited to such a medieval concept, but we are still technically bound to new universe of governing and customs (much like we see in feudalism). We now answer to the technological gods at play.
We can give these technological gods a few names, some being, Facebook, Apple, Google, and Netflix. These ‘gods’ monetize all our moves and actions whilst we use their platforms, and they save our data. Our actions on these platforms can be seen as a commodity, and can even be sold without our knowledge, and sometimes this information can be then used to influence things that pop up on the platforms such as ads.
An example of this is the Cambridge Analytica scandal, where Cambridge Analytica sought to sell the data and information of American voters’ online data to provide analytics in assistance to the Donald Trump Presidency campaign.
This is just an example, but it shows that we are a commodity when online, and we provide an unequal exchange of information as we scroll through our Facebook feed for the night and let them know what party we plan to vote for in an upcoming election.
We are in no comparison realistically to the times where feudalism was as prevalent, but in our modern day society that is constantly developing in technological ways, we are still answering to social levels and still living under this ‘governing’ rules for those that hold a greater power.
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