Global Supply Chains and Digital Production

Description

The devices and platforms tied to the digital economy are also intrinsically connected to global supply chains and physical infrastructures. For instance, iPhones are produced by workers in large factories in Shenzhen, China as well as through the cognitive labor of Apple engineers. Meanwhile, the planned obsolescence of the latest gadgets has environmental effects, resulting in the massive buildup of electronics debris in the Global South. US Maker culture is also influenced by practices of open design and sharing within manufacturing circles in Shenzhen, showing how global supply chains do not flow in one direction.

In this Learning Club, we will discuss types of work that are usually discounted by innovation-focused origin stories as well as the material and infrastructural consequences of digital production. We will also address the ways that Silicon Valley values are embedded in and informed by transnational flow of goods, services, and people.

Readings

• Lisa Nakamura, “Economies of Digital Production in East Asia iPhone Girls and the Transnational Circuits of Cool,” Media Fields Journal, no.2 (2011)
• “The poetry and brief life of a Foxconn worker: Xu Lizhi (1990-2014),” Nào (闹) Blog (2014)
• Jonathan Sterne, "Out with the Trash: On the Future of New Media," (2007)
• Silvia Lindtner, Anna Greenspan, and David Li, "Designs in Shenzhen: Shanzhai Manufacturing and Maker Entrepreneurs," Arhaus Series on Human Centered Computing (2015)

Discussion Questions

1. How are local tech cultures related to global processes and logics of production?
2. What are the connections between different levels of labor and creation in the digital economy?
3. How do stereotypes about the value of different kinds of work and workers, especially those related to gender, sexuality, race, and citizenship, influence the digital supply chain?
4. Why did "iPhone Girl" fascinate the Western media?
5. What are the consequences of planned obsolescence on workers and the environment?

Additional Resources

• Bunnie Huang and Wired, “Shenzhen: The Silicon Valley of Hardware” Wired, Future Cities
• Nicole Scott and Mobilegeeks, “Shenzhen Smartphone Market (Walking through the Yuanwang Digital Mall),” Mobilegeeks
• Marx Pays a Visit to Foxconn Chuǎng