Data extraction annexes life processes beyond productive labor

Evidence

We are concerned here with the annexation to capital of life processes whether or not they are labor, evidenced when many of the life streams from which data is extracted for value are not seen by those involved as part of any productive activity. — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, 143

Categorization

• DEFINE: Precisely scopes data colonialism as capital’s annexation of life processes beyond labor — distinguishing the frame from orthodox Marxism.
• XREF: This is the core definitional move for the reader’s stated goal of precisely scoping ‘data colonialism’ as a contested construct. — connects to: Platforms reconfigure human life to continuously produce extractable data streams. — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection: How Data Is…, 45; Data analytics progressed from describing internal data to prescribing every process and behavior — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection: How Data Is…, 79; Sharing-economy platforms fuse data extraction with labor at unprecedented scale (+9 more)
• ADDENDUM: Extends the infrastructure-as-exploitation logic of the trees piece into the extraction economy: life processes made invisible becoming input.

Broader Connections

• Behavioral surplus extraction extends from virtual spaces into physical life #expands (0.90) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 623
• Data extraction extends capitalism’s exploitation to all human life, echoing colonial raw-material logic #expands (0.85) — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, 42
• Abstracting value from life processes enables new commodified social relations #expands (0.85)
• Data extraction functions like colonial resource appropriation despite different modes #expands (0.80) — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, 27
• Data extraction infrastructures deform the self that autonomy and freedom depend on #expands (0.80) — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, 148