Abstract
PurposeThis paper aims to examine the recommendation system of the video-sharing website YouTube to study how control of users is effected on online platforms.Design/methodology/approachThis paper conceptualises algorithmic systems as protocols – technological and social infrastructures that both facilitate and govern interactions between autonomous actors (Galloway and Thacker, 2004, 2007). It adopts a netnographic approach (Kozinets, 2002) to study not only the formal, technological systems of the platform but also the systems as they were made sense of, understood and enacted upon by actors. It relies both on information as revealed by the organisation itself, as well as discussions between lay users in online forums and press coverage.FindingsThe results of this study indicate that the ways in which platforms selectively facilitate interactions between users constitute a form of control. While maintaining the appearance of an open and neutral marketplace, interactions on the platform are in fact highly structured. The system relies on the surveillance of user interactions to rapidly identify and propagate marketable contents, so as to maximise user “engagement” and ad revenue. The systems place few demands or restrictions on individual users, instead control is effected in a probabilistic fashion, over the population of users as a whole, so as to, in aggregate, accomplish organisational goal.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the literature on accounting and control practices in online spaces, by extending the notion of control beyond overt rankings and evaluations, to the underlying technical and social infrastructures that facilitate and shape interactions.
Highlights
Some of the largest and most profitable corporations in the world today have platforms at the core of their businesses, that is to say they own and operate technical and social infrastructures upon which actors may interact (Srnicek, 2017)
Users may “like” and “dislike” videos, leave comments, subscribe to channels, create playlists, share videos on social media platforms and report videos for inappropriate or abusive content. It can be analysed as a system of protocols because fundamentally it facilitates interactions between users-as-content-creators, users-as-viewers, as well as advertisers, and it does so in a highly structured manner, through two systems of automated algorithms, officially referred to as “Search and Discovery” [6] and “Monetisation” [7]
Search and Discovery is the general term used by YouTube to refer to all facets of the platform relating to its search and recommendations functions
Summary
Some of the largest and most profitable corporations in the world today have platforms at the core of their businesses, that is to say they own and operate technical and social infrastructures upon which actors may interact (Srnicek, 2017) Whether they are social media services such as Facebook, marketplaces such as eBay, or companies in the “sharing economy”, they share a common characteristic – they all rely in their value creation process on the media contents, products, services and the information and data, generated by external actors who may or may not have any direct economic relationship to the owners of the platform (Srnicek, 2017). The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode
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