Browsing by Author "Tharani, Alim"
Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item ‘Googleplex Cultures’: a Marxist analysis of Silicon Valley workplace cultures(2020) Tharani, AlimThis paper takes a Marxist approach to analyze Silicon Valley workplace cultures and how they exploit and alienate their workers. Unlike traditional corporate offices, Silicon Valley workplace cultures offer a range of perks and benefits that attract every office worker; however, it makes them feel a sense of appreciation, known throughout the paper as ‘Googleplex culture’. This culture presents a “decentralized workforce explicitly with integrated units working together to find solutions to problems or failure” (Tran, 2017) while providing employees with a range of unconventional, yet useful amenities. Throughout this paper, it is clear Googleplex culture’s onsite benefits, such as kitchens, free meals, snacks, cafés, private rooms, designated sleep areas, workout facilities, and many more perks the average workers could only wish for, obscure both the absolute and relative surplus labour which lead to exploitation. Googleplex cultures claim to be centred around the worker; however, the concept of crunch depicted in these companies is mainly focused on profits rather than employee health, further providing evidence that these workplace cultures initiate Marx's four forms of alienation.Item The Instagram effect: Instagram and loss of agency(2021) Tharani, AlimThroughout this paper, I analyze the deterministic aspects of Instagram and how those aspects affect agency. The meaning of Instagram is dependent on the creators of the app themselves. By placing Instagram on a spectrum, on the one hand, the reader can see that this app is a tool that can stratify the human need for social communication; on the other hand, it can see how its deterministic abilities affect both our mental and physical health. This shows through the relationships users build through the screen which are in-genuine relationships, ones that can lead to a loss of individual agency and freedom. The deterministic aspects of Instagram are further reinforced through the idea of techno-social engineering where it can be shown how social media applications can change the behaviour and feelings of their users simply through the posts they are exposed to. Lastly, the device paradigm in relation to Instagram as a deterministic tool showcases how the backgrounds and contexts of devices are becoming increasingly concealed and separated from our daily life. This results in a deterioration of genuine interactions within the physical environment and further reinforces the existence of the app that is constructed based on the creators and what they would like to accomplices. As a result, Instagram is a deterministic tool that is detrimental to our individual agency.