Digital Intermediaries: Platforms are digital intermediaries that acquire monopolistic power through positive network effects, and they cross-subsidise free services with ones that cost (e.g. Amazon Web Services subsidises Amazon Prime; Google AdSense subsidises Gmail)

Data-driven accumulation: Value creation depends on the collection, processing and monetisation of data rather than traditional industrial capitalism that relies on manufacturing or financial capital accumulation.

New firm model: Platforms are a new kind of firm and the dominant business model of contemporary capitalism, and platform capitalism is a new kind of capitalism (Srnicek, 2017, p.43)

Nick Srnicek

Shoshana Zuboff

Evgeny Morozov

Other Thinkers (Lina Khan, Nick Couldry, Ulises Mejias ➡️anti-monopoly & data colonialism)

Business Logic

Platform Types (Flew, 2025)

Social Impact

Economic Impact

Critique

Challenges

Solutions

Ahmad, R. (2025). ARIN1001 The Past and Futures of Digital Cultures, Week 3 Tutorial Slides: Critical imaginariesand ‘The Techlash’ (powerpoint slides). School of digital culture, University of Sydney Canvas: https://canvas.sydney.edu.au/courses/65559/pages/week-3-critical-imaginaries-and-the-techlash?module_item_id=2714829

Couldry, N. & Mejias, U. (2019). The Costs of Connection: How Data Is Colonizing Human Life and Appropriating It for Capitalism. Redwood City: Stanford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781503609754

Flew, T. (2019). Guarding the gatekeepers: Trust, truth and digital platforms. GriffithReview. https://doi.org/10.3316/ielapa.341846195519524

Flew, T. (2025). ARIN1001 The Past and Futures of Digital Cultures, Week 3 Lecture Slides: Critical Imaginaries, the ‘Techlash’ and AI Futures (powerpoint slides). School of digital culture, University of Sydney Canvas: https://canvas.sydney.edu.au/courses/65559/pages/week-3-critical-imaginaries-and-the-techlash?module_item_id=2714829

Flew, T., & Su, C. (2022). Mapping International Enquiries into the Power of Digital Platforms. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5913069

Kleinman, Z. (2018). Cambridge Analytica: The story so far. BBC News. https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-43465968

Khan, L. M. (2017). Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox. https://www.yalelawjournal.org/note/amazons-antitrust-paradox

Morozov, E. (2011) The net delusion : how not to liberate the world (pp. ix–xvii). Allen Lane. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444812444415b

Srnicek, N. (2017). Platform capitalism. John Wiley & Sons. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/usyd/detail.action?docID=4773843

Wolford, B. (n.d). What is GDPR, the eu’s new data protection law? GDPR.EU. https://gdpr.eu/what-is-gdpr/‌

Zuboff, S. (2020). The age of surveillance capitalism : the fight for a human future at the new frontier of power (First Trade Paperback Edition.). PublicAffairs. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-020-01100-0

It is a data privacy regulation of the European Union which aims to grant EU citizens more control over their own data. This regulation requires enterprises to handle personal data in a transparent, legal and secure method and imposes severe fines on violations (Wolford, n.d).

In 2014, the company illegally obtained millions of Facebook users' personal data through a third-party application. During the 2016 US presidential election, it used this data for targeted advertising activities to influence voter behavior. It revealed the bugs in the platform's data privacy protection and the serious consequences brought about through data abusion.