{"id":11962,"date":"2022-02-25T18:33:00","date_gmt":"2022-02-26T01:33:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/BigJimIndustries.com\/wordpress\/?p=11962"},"modified":"2022-03-05T18:36:44","modified_gmt":"2022-03-06T01:36:44","slug":"cloudocracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/2022\/02\/25\/cloudocracy\/","title":{"rendered":"Cloudocracy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

from Project Syndicate <\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our New Cloud-Based Ruling Class<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

by YANIS VAROUFAKIS<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"varoufakis88_FABRICE<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Capital is everywhere, yet capitalism is on the wane. In an era when the owners of a new form of “command capital” have gained exorbitant power over everyone else, including traditional capitalists, this is no contradiction.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

ATHENS \u2013 Once upon a time, capital goods were just the manufactured means of production. Robinson Crusoe\u2019s salvaged fishing gear, a farmer\u2019s plough, and a smith\u2019s furnace were goods that helped produce a larger catch, more food, and shiny steel tools. Then, capitalism came along and vested owners of capital with two new powers: The power to compel those without capital to work for a wage, and agenda-setting power in policymaking institutions. Today, however, a new form of capital is emerging and is forging a new ruling class, perhaps even a\u00a0new mode of production<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the beginning of this change was free-to-air commercial television. The programming itself could not be commodified, so it was used to attract viewers\u2019 attention before selling it to advertisers. Programs\u2019 sponsors used their access to people\u2019s attention to do something audacious: harness emotions (which had escaped commodification) to the task of deepening\u2026 commodification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The essence of the advertiser\u2019s job was captured in a line spoken by Don Draper, the fictional protagonist in the television serial Mad Men<\/em>, set in the advertising industry of the 1960s. Coaching his prot\u00e9g\u00e9, Peggy, on how to think about the Hershey chocolate bar their firm was peddling, Draper caught the spirit of the times:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t buy a Hershey bar for a couple of ounces of chocolate. You buy it to recapture the feeling of being loved that you knew when your dad bought you one for mowing the lawn.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[ click to continue reading at Project Syndicate<\/a> ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from Project Syndicate Our New Cloud-Based Ruling Class by YANIS VAROUFAKIS Capital is everywhere, yet capitalism is on the wane. In an era when the owners of a new form of “command capital” have gained exorbitant power over everyone else, including traditional capitalists, this is no contradiction. ATHENS \u2013 Once upon a time, capital goods […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-weirdness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11962","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11962"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11962\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11962"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11962"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11962"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}