Abstract
Abstract Drawing from experience of platform labor in one of the largest labor supplying countries, the Philippines, the paper demonstrates the role of an emerging labor category – that of digital labor influencers – who promote the viability of platform labor locally amid its precarious and ambiguous conditions. Through participant observation in Facebook groups, analysis of YouTube channels and videos, and interviews with digital labor influencers and workers, we present insights into the interventions that these influencers use, anchoring their strategies on what we call performing “digital labor bayanihan”: (a)coachingworkers on the “possibilities” of the platform economy and on how to navigate its structural ambiguities, (b) by acting as “agencies”, they aid workers tospan boundariesand fluidly move across platforms and job types to mitigate labor arbitrage and labor seasonality; and (c)bridging geographically dispersed workers, which allow them to form a supportive space where opportunities for labor are exchanged and debated. We argue that these affective strategies attend to Filipino workers’ labor aspirations through a community-oriented strategy encapsulated in a distinct Filipino cultural value bayanihan, which then shapes the collective “anchoring” of platform workers to navigate a precarious market. We explore the transactional nature underlying this “producer-audience” relationship, the activation of trust and influence through personalized practices and mediated encounters, and the power dynamic underlying these engagements. The paper shows that these strategies also set norms and standards in this largely unregulated sector, playing a role in how labor mobility or precarity are organized locally amid “planetary labor markets”.
Highlights
The increasing networked connectivity and relative affordability of technology facilitated the rise of labor platforms and cloudworking across the world
As we will show in the succeeding sections, emerging digital labor influencers, as if facilitating digital labor bayanihan, create opportunities for workers to recognize a sense of “community” among them, and to come together where support and strategies for survival in the platform economy are actively exchanged and visibilized, thereby sustaining itself
We argue that digital labor influencers, through coaching, boundary-spanning and bridging strategies, play a symbolic role in mediating the relationship between the local digital labor workforce and digital labor platforms
Summary
The increasing networked connectivity and relative affordability of technology facilitated the rise of labor platforms and cloudworking across the world. These points of inquiry allow us to develop and coin the term, “digital labor bayanihan” This conception encapsulates a distinct Filipino cultural value that showcases the collective “anchoring” of digital platform workers in navigating and coping with a precarious digital market through a continuous production of discursive content, networking strategies, and multiple platform engagements. Emerging digital labor influencers appropriate microcelebrity strategies enacted through the facilitation of a distinct cultural value, which we refer to as bayanihan (helping each other in a time of crisis) We utilize this conception as we examine the branding strategies of Filipino digital workers who are embedded in a digital and neoliberal economy. As we will show in the succeeding sections, its application in this paper characterizes the dynamic and mutually reinforcing influences of the global and the local in the platform economy
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
