Digital speculation obscures inequality through hidden code just as nations hid exploitation

Evidence

In Imagined Communities, the iniquitous aspect of spectrality, beyond forming collective identity and “shared fatality,” lay in obscuring the “actual inequality and exploitation that may prevail” within the nation (Anderson 1991, 7). Speculative communities draw their own veil over power asymmetries in the vast networks of computational code, sensors, and backend analytics. — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 138

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels the reader’s prior material on how communication technology shapes culture and how press freedom obscures the public sphere. — connects to: Social software can promote inequality rather than counter it. — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 19; User interfaces hide the material code that structures digital capitalism. — Anna Kornbluh, Immediacy, or The Style of Too Late…, 74; Enslaving interests generated slave codes, not the other way around — Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning: The…, 463 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• User interfaces hide the material code that structures digital capitalism. #corroborates (0.85) — Anna Kornbluh, Immediacy, or The Style of Too Late…, 74
• Privately controlled data extraction produces social classifications that entrench inequality #expands (0.80) — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, 443
• Tech culture’s self-image conceals a closed system of privilege centered on profit #corroborates (0.80) — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 647
• Enslaving interests generated slave codes, not the other way around #qualifies (0.75) — Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning, 463