Musik eller støj

Spotifys æstetiske hegemoni

Forfattere

Nøgleord:

platform, platformsmagt, Spotify, musik, orden, hegemoni

Resumé

In our global contemporary moment beset with economic and political crises, the digital platform has emerged as a prevailing economic and cultural form that strongly impacts the current direction and order of digitally mediated society. Siphoning money and data from their position in medias res of global digital networks, the most powerful platforms approach monopoly power and gain the capacity to impose their own logics to a multitude of sectors that rely on digital infrastructure to distribute goods, services and interactions. More radically, as globally distributed infrastructures, platforms gain the capacity to decide what qualifies as a valid existence to be mediated at all. The power of platforms therefore implies power over being, ontological power. In this contribution, we conceptualize the power to shape interactions and to decide over digital being as platform power. We will explore what platform power consists in, how it was gained and what consequences it has for cultural production in contemporary society. We do this specifically by analyzing the platform power of Spotify which is a key node for the digital distribution of music. We show how Spotify’s platform power manifests itself as an aesthetic hegemony that influences music production in the 21st century. As a guarantor of sonic and cultural order, Spotify intervenes in the very being of music by imposing a logic that differentiates and decides between what is music and what is noise.

Forfatterbiografier

Johan Lau Munkholm, Syddansk Universitet

Postdoc ved Institut for Kultur– og Sprogvidenskaber, Syddansk Universitet (Odense). Forsvarede ph.d. afhandlingen What’s the Matter With Privacy: Power and Politics in the Age of Platforms ved Københavns Universitet i 2023. Den trykte artikel er formet af en overordnet forskningsinteresse, der berører forholdet mellem digital teknologi, magt, politik og æstetik.

Anders Bach Pedersen, Københavns Universitet

Ph.D.-studerende ved Institut for Kunst- og Kulturvidenskab, Københavns Universitet. Har senest bidraget til antologien The Bloomsbury Handbook of the Anthropology of Sound (2020). Den trykte artikel er del af en gennemgående forskningsinteresse i krydsfeltet mellem musik, æstetik, politik og økonomi, hvilke emner den forestående Ph.D.-afhandling ligeledes berør.

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Publiceret

2024-12-18

Citation/Eksport

Munkholm, J. L., & Bach Pedersen, A. (2024). Musik eller støj: Spotifys æstetiske hegemoni. K&K - Kultur Og Klasse, 52(138), 39–64. Hentet fra https://tidsskrift.dk/kok/article/view/152265