First printed publication in the "Collège de France Lectures" series: Big Data and digital traceability.

Pierre-Michel Menger and Simon Paye (dir.), Paris, Collège de France, "Conférences" series, October 2017.

Big data and digital traceability

The "Conférences" collection, created by the Collège de France, is natively digital, and published as a freemium open-access series on OpenEdition Book to disseminate lectures given at the Collège. It is now also available in printed form.

Book presentation

Is Big Data at our service, or are we becoming the willing cogs of informational and relational capitalism?

The digital traces of the activities of individuals, companies, government agencies and social networks have become a huge resource. How is this data collected, stored, valued and sold? And what are we to make of the algorithms that convert information on behavior, work actions and exchanges into tools for control and persuasion?

Is Big Data at our service, or are we becoming the willing cogs of informational and relational capitalism?

The social sciences are investigating the social, ethical, political and economic implications of these transformations. But they are also increasingly consumers of mass digital data. This collective work explores the expansion of digital traceability in both its commercial and scientific dimensions.

The "Collège de France Lectures" collection

The scientific and intellectual life of the Collège de France extends beyond its lectures. Numerous international colloquia, research seminars and lectures by foreign professors are organized every year. And several hundred researchers are engaged in ground-breaking work in our chairs and laboratories. The "Conferences" collection is intended to reflect this activity.