Take the example of what we call “self-service.” You have all had the opportunity to work implicitly on the production of a service or product, and for free. This is the case when you go through the self-checkout at your supermarket. The cashier is replaced by a scanner and a rather basic automaton: you scan the product, place it on a scale, you pay, and the deal is done.

This consumer labor is called “free.” You are in no way compensated for this effort. Worse, prices haven’t dropped, and the cashier who used to do this work simply no longer has a job. Fortunately, the free labor of consumers has its own limits.

From Consumer Labor to Free Labor

At the other end of the problem lies crowdsourcing or participatory production. Wikipedia is a very virtuous example. People participate voluntarily, and the platform’s value is created under this single condition.

The inverse effect is called “perverted crowdsourcing” or “speculative work.”

To put it simply, when used for questionable purposes, crowdsourcing can enable the creation of a nearly dishonest system that generates money based on unpaid work. Yes, put like that, one could also assume that a quote is also “perverted crowdsourcing,” except that the effort required is not on par with what a creative may endure (see the video example above).

Note that digital pushes toward task-ifying work, and the emergence of crowdsourcing platforms multiplied by the number of available players creates a perverse effect on service prices and therefore, the decline of labor compensation. And where does all the generated value go? To the platforms, of course.

The Craft of Big Data

Data is the black gold of our century. Do you doubt it? The GAFAs generated $433 billion in revenue for $73 billion in profits in 2015.

Take Google, undoubtedly the first player to implement Big Data on a global scale. The mass of information it holds combined with its powerful algorithms enables its business model, namely displaying targeted ads on its search engine. Targeting is based on profiling: who you are, your browsing habits, your interests, your ratings, your purchases, your location, etc. Data is exchanged, sold, and is the foundation of their business model.

Now consider free labor and consumer labor in perspective. Well, we ourselves are actors in the success of Google and its peers. By using the free products that Google offers (Gmail, YouTube, etc.), we generate data, traces of who we are, and all for free. This is the so-called counterpart of the service (that terms of service agreement we never read but always accept).

At the same time, the GAFAs cross-reference their data and exploit it to better sell services to us as the primary targets: the advertising paid for by their “real customers,” namely businesses. The goal of the maneuver is obviously to get us to click, to consume the service or product behind this advertisement, and thus create a virtuous (?) circle.

An Authorized Systematic Pillage

But behind all this, we produce the material and even the labor necessary for the existence of such a business model. The problem of Big Data is therefore relatively close to consumer labor and free labor.

This raises questions about the nature of surrendering one’s data and its transfer. Because while there are laws governing transfers of money or material goods, through the establishment of taxes and customs, there are none for data.

This void creates a situation where we are today being plundered by non-European players of the material that feeds digital—the black gold of this century.

Two possibilities now present themselves to Europe: play on the GAFAs’ turf or invent a legal and technical framework specific to our territory. It seems we are venturing into the first hypothesis, which, with all the accumulated delay in this area, seems very perilous or even lost in advance. The second option appears to be the only solution, but Europe remains mired in a seemingly unsolvable politico-economic-social imbroglio.