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Antiwork

Why do we generate free data (basically work for free) for giant social media companies and the oligarchs who own them, and what do you think about boycotting them unless they start paying us as compensation for our contributions to their profits?

Social media companies make tons of money with our activity and adversely impact our mental health, but the profits only go to them. We basically work free for those oligarchs and end up getting hurt. The more people abstaining from the use, the exponentially more collective bargaining power we would have. I know this would be relatively difficult to achieve, but in theory, we would have a database of names and account ids of the abstainers. Then we would be able to show the social media giants how much free data they are missing, and how that is predicted to impact their revenues. If we are big enough, it would start hurting these companies and give them a good incentive to negotiate our compensation. It would be like creating the biggest anticorporate union in the world.


Social media companies make tons of money with our activity and adversely impact our mental health, but the profits only go to them. We basically work free for those oligarchs and end up getting hurt.

The more people abstaining from the use, the exponentially more collective bargaining power we would have. I know this would be relatively difficult to achieve, but in theory, we would have a database of names and account ids of the abstainers. Then we would be able to show the social media giants how much free data they are missing, and how that is predicted to impact their revenues. If we are big enough, it would start hurting these companies and give them a good incentive to negotiate our compensation. It would be like creating the biggest anticorporate union in the world.

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