Research On The Source Of Surplus Value Of Social Media Platform

The information and communication technology revolution,a great productivity change,has profoundly changed the production and life style of human society,and a new economic and social form has been produced.Nowadays,information plays a very important role in society.The important carrier of information is data.The demand for data collection,processing and transmission has led to a new form of enterprise organization,Internet platform.Internet platform has become an important field for people to carry out various social practices.Most Internet platform enterprises are capitalist enterprises,with the pursuit of surplus value as the basic purpose.This paper will study the source of the residual value of the most basic platform in the Internet platform,social media platform.The research on the surplus value of social media platform mainly follows two different theoretical paths: the theoretical path of "immaterial labor" of the autonomy Marxist School and the theoretical path of "audience commodity" of the political economics school.The "immaterial labor" theory path of the Marxist School of autonomy denies the applicability of Marx's labor theory and labor value theory in the Internet platform,and develops new labor theory,value theory and surplus value theory.The theoretical path of "audience goods" of the school of political economics of communication studies the source of surplus value in social media platform from the exploration of what kind of goods social media platform produces.Although the two paths are different,they regard the user's activities in social media platform as a kind of labor that creates value and surplus value for the platform.The Marxist scholars of autonomy represented by Hart and Nigerian denied the applicability of Marx's labor theory and labor value theory in the information age,and established the theory of "immaterial labor",as well as the value theory and surplus value theory based on "commonality".The author points out that:(1)the negation of Marxist labor theory and labor value theory by the Marxist scholars of autonomy is not true,which reflects their misreading of the basic theory of MarxMarx's labor theory is not only limited to the labor that can produce materialproducts,but also the measurement of labor time is not the foundation condition ofMarx's labor value theory.(2)In Hart and Negri's theory,the value created by "immaterial labor" is more directed at political value than commodity value.Thepossession of capital to this value is the possession in the political sense of life,noin the economic sense.(3)Whether it is the theory of "immaterial labor",or thevalue theory and surplus value theory based on "commonality",they are all overcatering to the political construction needs of the main body of its overall theoreticathinking,thus breaking away from the analysis of historical materialism,whichleads to the lack of historical objectivity in its theory.(4)Therefore,the research onthe source of surplus value of social media platform should not follow thistheoretical path,but should be based on Marx's labor theory,labor value theory andsurplus value theory.The political economists of communication affirmed the applicability of Marx's labor theory and labor value theory,but they have misused Marx's basic theory.Schmitz,founder of the school of communication political economics,put forward the theory of "audience goods",which holds that mass media produces a kind of "audience commodity" and sells it to advertisers to gain profits.Then,the communication political economists followed the theory of "audience goods" proposed by Smiths to study the source of mass media surplus value.Different scholars define the "audience goods" produced by mass media,which leads to their different judgment on the source of mass media surplus value.As an important new media form,social media platform has been widely concerned by the political and economic scholars of communication.Fox developed the theory of "audience goods" proposed by Smiths into "Internet producer commodity" or "data commodity" in social media platform.It is pointed out that users in social media platform produce "data goods",which are freely occupied by the platform and sold to advertisers to obtain the surplus value.This part of the surplus value comes from the unpaid labor of platform users.The author points out that:(1)"data commodity" is produced by data engineers engaged by the platform to collect,process and analyze data,rather than platform users.Fox doesn't think it's right that the social media platform's residual value comes from its users.(2)The theory of "audience goods" of the school of political economics has a logical cycle of "audience goods-audience labor",which makes the theory lack of historical objectivity.(3)Therefore,the political and economic scholars of communication have not correctly understood the real source of the residual value of social media platform.From the perspective of Marx's political economics,taking the tiktok platform as an example,the paper studies the source of surplus value of social media platform.The author concludes that:(1)users in social media platform can be divided into two categories: ordinary users and Darren users.The activities of ordinary users for leisure and entertainment are not labor,but those of the reach users in order to obtain benefits are labor that creates surplus value for the platform.(2)The profit or surplus value of social media platform is mainly obtained in the form of advertising revenue.The essence of this part of surplus value is the transfer of the surplus value of some industrial capital,which comes from the outside of the platform.Here,it is the platform that hires workers to help the platform achieve this part of the residual value during unpaid labor time.Generally,the platform will take the methods of prolonging labor time and increasing labor intensity to produce absolute surplus value.(3)Social media platform also obtains the surplus value by extracting the realization income of the Darren,including the advertising revenue,the goods income and the live reward income.Among them,the surplus value obtained by the withdrawal of advertising income and goods taking income of the Da people comes from the outside of the platform,and is the transfer of the residual value of some industrial capital;the draw of the reward income from the live broadcasting of the Darren is created by the unpaid labor of the Da people in the platform,which comes from the inside of the platform.The platform usually adopts the way of extending the working time of the Darren users and attracting more and more Darren to realize the activities,so as to produce the absolute residual value.In addition,as artificial intelligence algorithm becomes a tool of platform capital,the users of the platform will be regulated and oppressed by the algorithm.Finally,according to the research of this paper,the author puts forward three suggestions for the healthy and sustainable development of platform economy in China:(1)protect the legitimate rights and interests of workers in the platform.The work system of Internet platform enterprise "996" is regulated,which provides basic guarantee for the workers in the platform.(2)We should protect the legitimate rights and interests of the workers in the platform and the legal rights and interests of the platform capital.To create a fair competition market environment for platform enterprises and stimulate innovation vitality of platform enterprises.(3)Protect the legitimate rights and interests of consumers in the platform.Establish a sound and smooth channel of consumer complaints and efficient platform governance mechanism,and strictly punish the platform for violating user privacy and killing big data.