User:Makibakahuwagmatakot/Platform capitalism

Platform capitalism refers to the way platform-based companies, such as Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, Uber and Airbnb, have redefined data as capital and changed how relationships between owners, workers, and consumers look. Both hardware and software are used as a foundation (platform) for other actors to conduct their own business.

While companies that have furthered the development of platform capitalism are overwhelmingly located in America, platform capitalism is a global phenomenon because data as capital can be transmitted across borders. Money itself, too, is passed through platform-based companies through PayPal, which operates worldwide.

Platform capitalism has been contrasted with platform cooperativism. Companies that try to focus on fairness and sharing, instead of just profit motive, are described as cooperatives, whereas more traditional and common companies that focus solely on profit, like Airbnb and Uber, are described as platform capitalists (or cooperativist platforms vs capitalist platforms). In turn, projects like Wikipedia, which rely on unpaid volunteer labor, can be classified as commons-based peer-production initiatives.

Development and perception
Platform capitalism is either heralded as beneficial or denounced as detrimental by various authors.

This ambivalence toward platform capitalism is part of a long-standing tension around the relationship between technology and progress, which can be seen in diverging views of progress between Enlightenment thinkers and thinkers in the Industrial Revolution.

Those who see platform capitalism as beneficial overlap with those who believe in the technocratic idea of progress: technological development is equivalent to progress. Those who see it as detrimental take the opposing position: technological development is just a means used to accomplish progress.

The trends identified in platform capitalism also have similarities with those described under the heading of surveillance capitalism.

Uber and legal contests
Platform capitalism is also defined by governments acting reactively toward the introduction of platform-based companies, which has helped Uber avoid regulation that undercuts its business model. The position of Uber driver, a job with few barriers for entry, has challenged the traditional characterization of "worker", since drivers are considered independent contractors and are valued as such.

Because Uber introduced itself as a technology company, not a taxi company, it was able to evade taxi industry regulations and has not faced serious judicial challenges from drivers, whose status as disconnected gig workers has afforded them less power in litigation. When drivers have sued the company, wins have been monetary, not regulatory, highlighting Uber's hold on both the legislative and judicial realms. In one 2017 case, the Federal Trade Commission acted as the plaintiff to represent Uber drivers, indicating how platforms like Uber have redefined the term "consumer." Uber has also mobilized against efforts to regulate the gig economy, most recently in the 2020 California election.

Potential impacts
The possible effect of platform capitalism on open science has been discussed.