The algorithms is not my boss anymore: technological appropriation and (new) media strategies in Riders x Derechos and Mensakas

Abstract

This paper studies how a group of delivery workers in Barcelona were able to organize a successful traditional and a social media strategy in order to claim for their rights as waged workers. They created a union, RidersxDerechos, and they also decided to create a worker’s cooperative, Mensakas, with their own application and algorithm. We will study how they were able to re–appropriate technology and to use digital communities to spread alternative discourses. We have used different methodologies: traditional content analysis in Media, debate analysis in Social Media, qualitative ethnography. We noticed that RidersxDerechos access to media was very successful (300 piece of news analyzed) thanks to strikes and court trials, facilitating a change of perspective in the treatment of platform economy in Media. [...]