디지털 대전환 시대의 사회적 불평등과 정치신화

Abstract

In the current era, major global technology companies are engaged in a fierce competition to attract new users and extract personal data to fuel their behavior prediction products. This competition extends to the next-generation platform wars, which are focused on dominating nascent domains, including the metaverse. This article explores the emerging power dynamics in the digital society, which are transforming human nature by decomposing individuals into organic materials of data. The traces of personal data we leave online are mined covertly and utilized to develop customized advertising services and create profit models without our explicit consent. This paper critically analyzes the defining characteristics of the surveillance capitalist system in order to elucidate the zeitgeist of the digital transition period. Our investigation focuses on how platform companies use human life experiences as raw materials to anticipate behavioral patterns and consumption preferences. Additionally, we address the issue of social inequality in the digital age, with a particular emphasis on the digital divide and the socially-produced code of automated algorithms. Finally, we investigate the problem of navigating political collective myths, which are often entrenched in volatile partisan interests and can obscure or distort the truth in the digital age. In the current era of pervasive surveillance capitalism, the dimension of seeking a more desirable society through reflective deliberation and critical thinking, rather than succumbing to the logic of factions and the demonization of others, represents a vital task of our time.