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TEORIJA IN PRAKSA let. 51, 6/2014 1222  Jernej AMON PRODNIK*  THE BRAVE NEW SOCIAL MEDIA: CONTR ADICTORY INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION  TECHNOLOGIES AND THE STATE- CAPITALIST SURVEILLANCE COMPLEX**  Abst ract . The paper looks at the wider role of informa- tion and communication technologies (ICTs) in the context of their use in global political struggles, but also on the back of their sweeping abuse for surveillance by  global capitalist corporations and state instituti ons. A  general question is raised: can the Internet and social media be perceived as a means of social progress or as mechanisms of oppression? The author proceeds from a critical perspective and emphasises that ICTs must be analysed as parts of the social totality. They cannot be understood in a dichotomous way, but only as being full of contradictions. Yet, contradictions do not entail rela- tivism – class inequalities, exploitation and domination are filtered through ICTs together with the manifold antagonisms emerging from capitalist societies. Keywords: political economy of communication, criti- cal theory, the Internet, online social media, surveil- lance society. Introduction The Internet and other new information and communication technolo- gies (ICTs) have, at least in most developed capitalist countries, been part and parcel of people’s lives for well over a decade now. Due to their social normalisation, questions about the overall impact of new ICTs are slowly but surely disappearing. Generations lacking a historical memory of the pre-Internet era rarely even reflect on the changes these technologies have brought to our everyday-life practices or how life would be without being constantly connected . ICTs and the Internet, together with all the platforms running on them, thus simply are. It seems as if general debates about the motives, purpose, and their social desirability are superfluous. Even with * Jernej Amon Prodnik, PhD, researcher, Institute of Communication Studies and Journalism (PolCoRe Research Group), Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University in Prague; Social Communication  Research Cen tre, Faculty of S ocial Scien ces, University of Ljubljana.

Amon Prodnik, Jernej - The Brave New Social Media: Contradictory Information and Communication Technologies and the State-Capitalist Surveillance Complex

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