Technology

We’re at a moment where we are facing a radical change in social life, which will “become enforced until there is no way out of it”, argues Professor Nick Couldry, sociologist of media and culture at the London School of Economics and a Faculty Associate at Harvard University's Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society.

And we become ever more reliant on these services.

“We are increasingly going to be locked into a completely curated universe which is governed by corporations rather than ourselves,” he warns. We are already starting to see something like this in China, for example, where the platform WeChat – which started off as an app to chat with your friends – is now being used for all aspects of life", Gouldry says.

"You can buy goods on WeChat, get credit, submit your tax returns and deal with the government. “It has now become a complete platform for life and, as we know, Elon Musk has a similar vision for the platform X,” explains Couldry.