The Platform Question: Power, Accountability and Global South Osama Manzar Founder & Director, Digital Empowerment Foundation The Platform Question: Power, Accountability and Global South INTRODUCTION Digital systems and platforms, designed by the current technology regime, are heavily reliant on data, and are increasingly becoming unaccountable, extractive, and exploitative in nature. While the personal, social, cultural, behaviorial, and community data are being collected without informed consent, incentive or guarantee of ownership rights, the platforms and corporations that are conducting drives for data mining, are growing through the concentration of capital and power. This model of ‘digital development’ has normalised labour commodification through digital-labour based platforms, especially in the Global South where the works of data labeling and data categorisation are advertised as ‘creation of jobs’. Moreover, when the criteria or framework for data annotation is not rooted in one’s socio-cultural and demographic realities, it resonates with a factory-based model of production run by corporation-led platforms, which entails complete alienation of labour for citizens and communities. Platformisation mandates a ‘digital-only’ system, which further hinders the communities affected by the digital divide, from accessing and availing their due entitlements and services. However, we see it as a growing trend that CSOs are increasingly been seen as mere means to extract community data at a large scale, and are being approached mostly for seeking endorsement of platforms, models and frameworks that are outsourced, not ethical and community-centered. Aligned with the Global Digital Compact (GDC), this book is a testament to this glocal (global informed by local) dialogue, When we address the platform question, it is also crucial to account for the adverse socio-environmental implications of the rising digital infrastructures and data centers that are ‘essential’ for platforms to thrive - on land, water, power consumption, environment and communities, especially in the global majority countries. For instance, a single Large Language Model (LLM) guzzles as much energy and carbon footprint as one flight, taking 365 rounds around the earth. When we address the platform question, it is also crucial to account for the adverse socio-environmental implications of the rising digital infrastructures and data centers that are ‘essential’ for platforms to thrive - on land, water, power consumption, environment and communities, especially in the global majority countries. For instance, a single Large Language Model (LLM) guzzles as much energy and carbon footprint as one flight, taking 365 rounds around the earth. As we drift towards living in an increasingly platform-driven world, it is our collective responsibility to center human and social intelligence at the heart of these digital systems. In this global digital ecosystem driven largely by the governments and the Big Tech, the Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) must be treated as equal, rightful stakeholders in policymaking as we are best positioned to bring community-informed groundup perspectives to the table. 8 Introduction Introduction 9