Sarah Lamdan – Data Cartels (2022)
De bedrijven die onze academische, juridische, en financiële informatiestromen beheren, zijn verworden tot data (analyse) bedrijven. Deze megabedrijven herschikken deze informatie op niet inzichtelijke wijze, waarna deze data vervolgens wordt verkocht; zonder enige garantie ten aanzien van de kwaliteit, noch verantwoordelijkheid. De auteur legt – met haar juridische achtergrond – uit hoe dit zo is gekomen, wat de implicaties zijn, en waar dit waarschijnlijk toe zal leiden. Een kwalijke zaak.
According to the law, monopoly power is problematic when companies dominate markets and use their power to bar competitors from entering the market, and when they use their power to exploit consumers
Information quality is declining. In striving for ingress, the companies are sacrificing quality for quantity. They have become so focused on building the biggest information warehouses that their own content stockpiles are becoming diluted with information of varying quality.
The lack of quality control hurts consumers. The companies’ citators (reports that tell lawyers whether cases and statutes are still good law) are inaccurate, leading lawyers, and even judges, astray. Elsevier puts out reports that are later retracted. Personal data dossiers come with disclaimers warning for erroneous information.
Data analytics companies have become ingrained in our government systems, and the two are codependent. Which is also demonstrated by the revolving doors between both; government agencies are hungry for tech talent in their ranks, and data companies want an insiders’ scoop in which products their government clients want.
Infusing academic impact scores into predictive and prescriptive data analytics products doesn’t just lift certain journals, it also tilts academic funding in favor of for-profit work being done at elite institutions.
Library experts consider inaccessible academic research to be a market failure that prevents doctors, scientists, and technologists from getting critical information that they need, thus seeing piracy as a necessary evil instead of a deplorable act
The financial information products aren’t powerful because they’re right, they’re powerful because they tell the financial sector what to do, and the financial sector listens. They’re not just predictive, they’re self-fulfilling financial prophesies.
The problem with data companies is data companies – their business model is based on hoarding, paywalling, and crunching as much information and data as possible. Their very existence is based in data exploitation, surveillance, and informational inequality.