Page 37 - Issue-30-En

ELITE Vol.1, Issue 30, April 2021 Happy

Ramadan
The fact is concealed from the view that the Because digital companies are only obliged to pay
overwhelming success and riches of these internet taxes on their income to the countries in which they
sites are largely focused on the free labor generated are headquartered. That is why these companies turn
by prosumers. Prosumers are far more oppressed than to countries like Ireland, due to their relatively low
the employees in conventional capitalist firms. These taxes, to establish their headquarters. And evade the
employees have usually been paid as little as tax by doing this.
possible, but those prosumers who "work" on these However, some would argue that prosumption is not
websites earn no pay at all. This in turn creates an a bad concept, as digital labor is an extremely
assumption that profit-making businesses have unique form of labor, as any effort that we put in is
implemented prosumption in order to maximize the by choice. That people are not forced to spend hours
profit. Prosumption can be seen as one of many on Facebook or YouTube, but they consciously do

elements to minimize labor costs. After all, thanks to so for entertainment. And that people enjoy sharing
this free labor, those at the top of these digital and producing just as much as we enjoy consuming
companies are billionaires. These entrepreneurs, of content. Most of the time they are not being paid for
course, deserve to be rewarded for their innovations it, but they are also not paying for any of the
and the platform they create for online prosumers to services. Moreover, others would argue that
consume and produce. A much more consequential prosumption is in fact a benefit to individuals, as it
reform will mean actually paying prosumers for the empowers consumers. As prosumers have been
data they now produce, knowingly and turned into "product and brand advocates" in today's
unconsciously, free of charge. Consider how much it digitally enabled, always-on world. These
would cost these digital companies to employ individuals, with the help of social media, use a
conventional market analysts to gather and collect all variety of platforms to share their thoughts on a
these data then thinking about paying prosumers. In company's product, service, or policies with a global
reality, it would be difficult for them to do it at any audience.
price, given the large and exponentially increasing Is it true that Web 2.0 users are being exploited, or
amount of data. that users and owners are exploiting one another?
And if we look at the profits that these companies
generate, for example, digital advertising revenue for

Facebook in 2020 according to STATA data
amounted to nearly 86 billion US dollars, and it is
worth noting that 97.9 percent of Facebook's global
revenues are from ads, while only about 2 percent
were generated by payments and other fees revenue.
This is a new record for the company and a
significant increase compared to previous years.
Facebook's average revenue per user also increased
dramatically in the same time period, going from $
6.81 in 2013 to $ 32.03 in 2020. That is why the idea
of digital taxes has begun to loom large in digital
companies. Facebook and other huge digital
companies, including Amazon and Google, are under
pressure from countries around the world to pay their

real tax share.
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