Data Colonialism in the Creative Industries

Let’s Start at the Very Beginning

Data colonialism, by definition, is “the process by which governments, non-governmental organisations + corporations claim ownership of and privatise the data that is produced by their users and citizens.”

It may be somewhat easy to pretend like colonialism is a thing of the past — after all, we know all we know from history books — but it has simply taken on a new shape, slightly more subtle yet just as harmful. Instead of natural resources, those responsible for “processing” data appropriate and misuse it for the sake of profit.

How It Affects the Creative Industry

Data colonialism within creativity raises many issues, beginning with ownership, authorship and profit, extending to the ignored labour of not only artists, but underpaid labourers working to train AI programs as the data centres decimate the underprivileged environments they are very strategically placed in.

It broadens into surveillance and policing verbal and artistic expression to a damaging extent. The art created by AI, derived from the work of genuine artists, loses not only its integrity, but its innocence in the process of being generated.

AI may have started with personal data, but it has now made its way into every facet of creative expression. And whilst it might be framed as a tool of democratisation for access to art, what kind of democracy does theft and unauthorised use of others’ work truly offer?

credits

words — sara fares zovko

video — karina so.

design — karina so.