Event

What Interests do Algorithms Serve? Is Algorithmic Colonisation Inevitable?

Speaker: Dr Tony Roberts, Institute of Development Studies

Big Tech companies have replaced oil and finance firms as the most powerful on earth. Apple, Amazon, and Alphabet (Google), Meta and Microsoft run online platforms using algorithms and AI manufactured to capture our attention. They effectively control the public information diet, manipulate beliefs and behaviours worldwide, and extract data and dollars for billionaires in Silicon Valley. In the face of this algorithmic colonisation what options exist for individual agency and national governance? Is another technology possible? 

Dr Tony Roberts is a Research Fellow in the Digital cluster at the Institute of Development Studies. He has worked on the use of digital technologies in international development and social justice since 1988 as a volunteer, lecturer, practitioner, trustee and researcher. He co-convenes the African Digital Rights Network and is the series editor of the Zed Books “Digital Africa” collected editions.