Privacy and Capitalism in the Age of Social Media [Paperback]

Grounded in qualitative empirical research about social media users' attitudes towards privacy and surveillance issues, this book contributes to a critical theory of information capitalism by exploring the commodification of privacy and personal data, providing a critical framing of the ongoing debate over privacy in the internet age.

Introduction  1. The Empirical Study: How to Critically Research Surveillance and Privacy Issues on Social Media?  2. Privacy in Informational Capitalism  3. Privacy Theories  4. Privacy and Ideology  5. Alternatives

Grounded in qualitative empirical research about social media users' attitudes towards privacy and surveillance issues, this book contributes to a critical theory of information capitalism by exploring the commodification of privacy and personal data, providing a critical framing of the ongoing debate over privacy in the internet age.Sebastian Sevignani is a member of the Unified Theory of Information Research Group, Austria, and Assistant Professor at the Friedrich-Schiller-University Jenas Department of Sociology, Germany.

Private sphere, private property, private data, private investors, private concerns, private initiative, private schools and education - capitalism is obsessed with the private and with possessive individualism. Sebastian Sevignani shows in Privacy and Capitalism in the Age of Social Media how digital capitalism has transformed aspects of privacy in the context of social media. This book is an outstanding rigorous study of social media privacy and an essential guide and must-read for anyone who wants to understand why the privacy critique of social media is too one-dimensional and needs to be complemented with a critique of the exploitation of digital labour, a critique of the commodification of data, and a critique of the alienation caused by targeted advertising and commerce. Sevignani eloquentll£,