Facebook Algorithmic Factory sheds light on the invisible processes that take place inside the world’s largest social network. Inside this black box, non-transparent algorithms are deciding what kind of content will become a part of our reality, what will be censored or deleted, which ideas will spread and what news gain most visibility. They are also defining new forms of labor and exploitation. Users are no longer clients. We only provide data, which serves as raw material for the production of digital profiles – a key commodity on internet stock markets.
Facebook Algorithmic Factory generates an enormous amount of wealth and power by creating a deep economic gap between those who own and control the means of production and their users, who often live below the poverty line. The layers of algorithmic data processing may conceal new forms of human rights violation, novel mechanisms for exploitation and manipulation that we no longer control. Our first step in fighting them back is to make them visible.
Project Credits
- Vladan Joler and SHARE Lab / SHARE Foundation
Biography:
Vladan Joler is the director of the SHARE Foundation and a professor at the New Media Department of the University of Novi Sad. SHARE Lab is a research and data investigation lab for exploring different technical and social aspects of algorithmic transparency, digital labor exploitation, invisible infrastructures, black boxes, and other contemporary phenomena at the intersection of technology and society.
https://labs.rs
