Big Tech and the Digital Overlords - Digital Capitalism course: Session 2

In session two of our Digital Capitalism course, we asked how did a few digital companies become so powerful? How do they differ to other non-digital corporations? What is the source of their power, finance and influence? How successful have regulatory attempts been to limit their power? How can we effectively rein them in?
The masterclass was held with Margarida Silva, researcher on Big Tech at the Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO), Cecilia Rikap, Associate professor in Economics at Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (IIPP) UCL and author of ‘Capitalism, Power and Innovation: Intellectual Monopoly Capitalism uncovered’ (Routledge 2021), and James Schneider, co-convenor with Uni Global Union of the Make Amazon Pay coalition.
00:00 Introduction
02:05 Introducing the Course Organisers: Nick Buxton, Sofia Scasserra, Pia Garavaglia, Jess Graham
03:21 Open-source policy of the TNI
03:58 Introduction to the Module for Week 2: Big Tech and the Digital Overlords
04:40 Introduction of experts: Margarida Silva, James Scheider and Cecilia Rikap
05:15 Digital capitalism is based on monopolization
06:37 Introduction of Margarida Silva
07:16 Introduction of Cecilia Rikap
08:56 Introduction of James Scheider
10:32 Why do we pay a lot of attention to the Big Tech?
11:50 Top companies by market capitalisation
13:25 Big Tech’s monopolization strategy
18:20 Big Tech’s global market shares
19:40 How are the Big Tech companies being able to control who has access to the market and what are the rules guiding the market?
20:32 Data rents, or surveillance capitalism
23:20 Surveillance ads create above average profits
23:50 Financial rents
25:50 Amazon’s European income sources
27:14 Big Tech EU lobbying
30:43 Intellectual monopolies in the making and shaping of AI and the Cloud
33:16 What is an intellectual monopoly?
37:00 Co-creation of new knowledge by the Big Tech does not lead to monetization
39:40 Corporate innovation systems
41:40 The role of AI in monopolization
43:35 The cloud is an environment of AI development
44:50 Research on AI by the Big Tech
47:25 Control of Open Source
51:20 Control of AI start-ups
51:35 Cloud is expanding the Big Tech control
54:10 Introduction to the Make Amazon Pay campaign
56:00 Why should Amazon be targeted?
57:10 Labour issues in Amazon
58:20 Greenwashing in Amazon
01:00:10 Tax evasion of Amazon
01:00:56 Neocolonial questions to Amazon
01:04:10 Use the size of Amazon against itself
01:11:00 Big Tech Companies do everything as long as they can get away with
01:14:00 Opening the Q&A
01:16:22 Threats from the Big Tech
01:19:44 Network concentration by the Big Tech
01:23:23 Solidarity to fight the Big Tech monopoly
01:26:30 Wrap-Up