Introduction
This article analyzes the transformation of capitalism into a new formation: technofeudalism. This thesis is based on the premise that markets and profits have been displaced by digital fiefdoms and rent. Instead of transparent rules, coordination is determined by closed algorithmic environments. Drawing on the concepts of Yanis Varoufakis, the text argues that the privatization of the internet and the response to the 2008 crisis led to the emergence of a new class structure. Readers will learn how cloud capital is changing the foundations of our economy and why traditional market mechanisms have ceased to function.
Technofeudalism: The Primacy of Rent over Profit
The primary difference between classical capitalism and technofeudalism lies in the mechanism of accumulation. In capitalism, the engine was profit generated in the market; in the new system, rent collected by platform owners dominates. The three pillars of cloud capital are: an integrated hardware-software package, an algorithmic procedure for allocating visibility, and real-time data monetization.
This system does not meet the definition of a free market because platforms have become private fiefdoms. The infrastructure owner (the gatekeeper) unilaterally sets the rules of the game, prices, and the visibility of offers. The foundation of this shift was the 2008 crisis—massive liquidity from central banks, instead of going into real investments, was pumped into developing the power of the cloud, creating the infrastructure for a new form of dominance.
Cloudalists and Vassals: A New Class Hierarchy
The social structure of technofeudalism is divided into three groups. At the top are the cloudalists—owners of software and computing power. Below them are the vassal capitalists, who produce goods but must pay rent for access to customers. The base of the pyramid consists of cloud serfs: billions of users whose free labor (data, attention, content) constantly feeds the system.
The geopolitics of this arrangement is based on dualism. The American model relies on a union of interfaces and API standards, steering demand through central network nodes. The Chinese model is integrated with the state apparatus and a central bank digital currency. Europe responds with attempts at regulation and data protection, while the Global South experiences the colonization of interfaces—a new form of value extraction without investment in local infrastructure.
Techno-democracy and Data Sovereignty
This system introduces a "velvet-gloved" technical terror—dominance based on controlling access to the interfaces of our consciousness. The liberal order becomes a fiction when the rules of visibility are secretly modified by private entities. Varoufakis’s answer is techno-democracy: a model in which every worker has one vote and one share in the company, and capital markets are replaced by public digital wallets.
To regain sovereignty, legal changes are necessary: the right to port identity between platforms and the recognition of data as the user's property. Traditional labor unions must fight for institutional foundations, such as public media centers and citizen councils deciding on the distribution of digital rent. The democratization of money through a basic dividend could effectively weaken the cloudalists' monopoly, restoring agency to the individual.
Summary
Living in a system of digital fiefdoms carries immense existential costs: our attention and time become raw materials, and identity is formatted at the whim of algorithms. This leads to alienation and a loss of autonomy. Are we destined for the role of digital serfs? The alternative requires political courage to transform the infrastructure of dominance into a tool for emancipation. The true revolution will begin when, instead of consuming, we start co-creating the rules of the digital game, building a space free from the arbitrary decisions of algorithms.
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