Varoufakis: Cloud Rent is Replacing Market Profit
Yanis Varoufakis, in his provocative diagnosis, announces the end of capitalism. The traditional system based on production and market competition has been replaced by technofeudalism. This is not just another phase of development, but a systemic mutation in which the logic of profit has been supplanted by cloud rent. Instead of a free market where companies compete for customers, we are dealing with digital fiefdoms controlled by algorithms. In this article, you will learn how tech giants have taken over the role of former feudal lords, why nation-states have become powerless, and whether there is still a chance to regain autonomy in a world of total surveillance.
Cloudalists: The New Class Ruling Infrastructure
The foundation of this new power is the cloudalists—owners of digital infrastructure who have dethroned traditional capitalists. The difference is fundamental: a capitalist profits from the production of goods, while a cloudalist derives passive income from the mere fact of owning a platform. Cloud rent is a modern tribute paid by anyone who wants to exist in the digital ecosystem. Even former industrial giants have become vassals of Big Tech, surrendering a portion of their revenue for access to the cloud and data.
The birth of this system was made possible by post-2008 monetary policy. Massive money printing, instead of reviving the real economy, fueled cloud capital. This "poisoned money" from central banks allowed tech giants to expand for years without the need to generate real profits. As a result, the cloud ceased to be a market tool—it became the market itself, where rules are set not by supply and demand, but by the owner's opaque algorithm.
Digital Enclosures and Cloud Serfs: Free Labor Online
The privatization of the internet resembles the historical enclosures of peasant commons in England. What was meant to be a democratic common space has been fenced off and parceled out by corporations. In this new order, each of us plays the role of a cloud serf. Our daily activity—posts, reviews, and even our physical movement with a phone—is unpaid labor that generates capital for cloudalists. This system abolishes the distinction between leisure and work; every second of our attention is monetized.
The key tools of control are 控制 algorithms, which not only monitor but actively modify human behavior. This leads to a loss of self-ownership. Our identity is broken down into data packets and commodified. In technofeudalism, we are not customers, but raw material. This is a radical anthropological transformation: the human being becomes a resource for algorithmic exploitation, and their emotions and fears serve as fuel for rent-generating mechanisms.
Polycrisis and the Helplessness of States Against Digital Fiefdoms
Technofeudalism is a structurally unstable system that generates permanent polycrisis. Because cloud rents are not reinvested in production but accumulated in the hands of a few, the global economy suffers from a chronic shortage of purchasing power. Nation-states and traditional social democracy are helpless, as cloud capital is intangible and evades taxation. Even cryptocurrencies, which were intended to be tools of freedom, have been absorbed by cloud finance, becoming another field for speculation and accumulation.
This new order also blocks the fight against climate change. The green transition has become a hostage to the new Cold War between the digital fiefdoms of the US and China. Competition for control over data and energy means that instead of global cooperation, we get a geopolitical technological arms race. The Global South must once again choose its "feudal lord"—Washington or Beijing—perpetuating structures of dependency and preventing a just solution to the ecological crisis.
Digital Democracy: A Chance to Reclaim Technology
Are we doomed to the role of digital subjects? Varoufakis points out that cloud technology is not inherently bad—it is the mode of ownership that creates oppression. There is a chance to transform technology into a tool for digital democracy by building digital commons. However, this requires wresting infrastructure from the hands of cloudalists and subjecting it to social control. The question remains: can we regain sovereignty over our own minds and data before technofeudalism finally closes the borders of its digital fiefdoms?
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