Social impact business in an era of Big Data: researching the 'social' as if it was more important than the 'economic'

Paper for the course Transformations in Digital Cultures at Maastricht University

Introduction

Inequality is a defining word to describe Brazilian’s reality. According to the GINI index (2018), Brazil is the eighth country with more disparity in income distribution. Consequently, this disproportion is reflected in education. In the last demographic census in the country, it was shown that only 36% of students from public schools entered college against 79.2% from the private ones (IBGE, 2017). Thus, political and ideological actions are needed in order to contest this monopoly of knowledge. One of them can be the use of communication technologies (ICTs). This paper examines how an online social impact corporation can use the business's data-driven model to give the next generations a more inclusive future regardless of their economic background.

To enter higher education in Brazil, students need to take Enem, an annual exam to assess the quality of high school across the country. The exam is the main gateway to undergraduate programmes at public and private universities. In addition, the test can guarantee low-income students access to government scholarships and financing programs. Therefore, the results of students in this exam can be extremely important for them to achieve better opportunities in the future. This paper discusses the possibilities of creating a more inclusive landscape in Brazilian educational space using resources from Web 2.0. To do that, it presents and uses as a case study the company Curso Enem Gratuito (CEG), a free and online course that provides the content material demanded for Enem.

CEG is divided between four different online platforms: website, YouTube channel, Facebook page and Instagram account. The company presents itself as a social impact business which provides free educational content to help underprivileged students to enter universities. Nevertheless, CEG follows the business model of biggest corporations such as Facebook and Amazon: "it is data-driven, thus using their customer’s personal information to gain a market advantage" (Greenwald, 2014, as cited in Verweij, 2019, p. 4).

As Couldry and Van Dijck sharply stated, "calling an algorithmically defined online configuration "social" has been one of the smartest semantic moves in the history of media institutions" (2015, p. 3). Thus, it is also relevant to study what the companies which claim to produce ‘social impact' are really delivering to society when using this model of business. This paper debates this enterprise model and its moral implications, in an attempt to answer

the following research question: how does a social impact company which uses a data-driven business model stimulate technomoral changes?

Below, it first presents the methodology of the ethnography research, followed by concepts from relevant work in media and pedagogy theory. The analysis considers prior work from Freire (1968), Couldry and Van Dijck (2015), Swierstra (2015), Marres (2017) and Jordan (2020). Based in this literature review, it discusses findings concerning the relationship the user's built within CEG and the results they achieved. This discussion is divided in three categories: YouTube's Educational Potential and Sense of Community, Personal Data and Economic Value, and Technomoral Change. The paper concludes by considering CEG's potential and its social and political implications that need to be taken into consideration to walk towards a democratization of knowledge.

Methodology

The methodology chosen for this paper is digital ethnography. The ethnographic method of research consists in investigating users in their usual space to understand how they relate to their natural environment. Thus, this methodology makes it possible to analyse a specific target market or audience. Moreover, digital ethnography is an ethnographic study in a digital environment, often happening “in mediated contact with participants rather than in direct presence” (Pink, S. et al., 2016, p. 3). In this case, it was used to analyse the users of Curso Enem Gratuito in an online environment.

The ethnographic investigation was focused on the CEG’s YouTube channel. This study began informally, in May 2018, when I became CEG's producer. Over nearly two years, I became immersed in its YouTube community. As a result, I have developed deep first-hand knowledge about the YouTube channel, the user experience, common practices, and communities.

Moreover, the paper focuses on the user's perception creating a collection of user's comments in order to illustrate the relationship that they engage with the YouTube channel. In order to do that, for seven days I analysed the comment section of the videos published. By doing this, I became part of the YouTube channel's regular viewership. It was also possible to enhance my understanding of the user's individual experiences and the social impact that CEG had on their lives.

In addition, I interviewed a SEO copywriter who currently works at CEG. As an employee of the company, she is a dense source of inside knowledge and was able to give insights about the company results and business model. The interview was conducted via audio/video chat and lasted thirty-nine minutes. It was recorded, and later transcribed. I used a semi-structured qualitative interview format, focusing on personal experience, opinion, the relationship with the users and the relationship between the educational system in Brazil and CEG's goals. The transcript was then coded and divided into categories (see Appendix 2).

Theoretical framework

This paper develops concepts from prior work to frame the investigation of how a social impact company which uses a data-collection business model stimulates technomoral changes. It starts by showing how the YouTube channel and its community are built and which impact the content had in the user's lives. It examines these findings in light of the sensitizing concepts to clarify CEG's results as a social impact business.

To this extent, it discusses how the company's financial sustainability is achieved by "data being triggered to produce systems of economic gain" (Couldry & Van Dijck, 2015, p. 3). In this context, Marres's, Couldry's, and Van Dijck's concept of 'datafication' of sociality are considered. The scholars claim that this type of business model creates a new powerful techno-economic possibility that is very questioned by sociologists and other social researches. According to them, this organization of social life ends serving the goals of digital industries and their clients, and not the users who are domesticated to serve a concept of 'sociality' created by the big media companies. In addition, Jordan's perspective on the digital economy is reviewed to understand the concept of 'reading communities' in online advertising. Jordan argues that, to be able to use a free online service, communities have to give away information about themselves to be profiled, thus becoming a possible successful target for advertising.

To talk about providing educational content for free on the Web, this paper adopts Paulo Freire's perspective from the book Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1968). The educator argues that a solution to equality cannot be achieved in idealistic terms once we already live in a reality of oppression. Nevertheless, the oppressed and the oppressor should not see the system we live in as a dead-end situation. On the contrary, the world should be seen as an environment that is limited but that can be socially transformed. To this extent, if we believe in the idea of possible social transformation, we need to start critically noting in which ways reality and its resources can enhance egalitarianism.

In this matter, this paper applies the idea of Kellner and Kim that "new media like YouTube (UT), combined with a transformative critical pedagogy, can help realize the Internet’s potential for democratization and transformative pedagogy" (2010, p. 5). To this extent, this paper argues that the use of online applications aiming for social impact can change our concept of morality related to this technological application and its economic possibilities. To further develop this discussion, it is introduced Swierstra's concept of technomoral change. To the author, "moral change is not caused by technological change, but can be provoked by it. Human beings devise moral solutions to the problems of the world. But technologies can fundamentally change the world, solving or redefining old problems and creating new ones" (Swierstra, 2015, p. 7). Thus, our morals are being shaped together with the technologies they are presumed to influence.

YouTube's educational potential and sense of community

CEG's YouTube channel has currently 866 videos published, 325 thousand subscribers and more than 15 million views. According to the interviewee, the channel aims to cover all the content demanded by Enem. Teachers are hired to record the videos of each course and a video lesson is posted every day from Monday to Friday. Moreover, the profile of the audience are mainly students in the last year of high school or who have just finished it. A large part of them divide time between study and work. They have a very low family income per capita, even lower than the national average. Thus, these are students who really missed a good learning environment.

I was interested to know if the users had accomplished the goal of entering university by using CEG. During my research on the comments, I found answers. Although it would be impossible and unfair to generalize saying that the course has only positive feedback, they exist. Here is one student's comment who felt a difference in his results:

"That's an incredible channel... I don't have conditions to pay for a private course and you guys are saving me! I will be grateful forever!" (janaina, 2020)

According to McMillan, "the first task of a community is to make it safe to tell “the truth". That requires community empathy, understanding, and caring" (1996, p. 2). To this extent, it is possible to see a community sense emerging from this user with CEG. The user felt comfortable to share his own experiences, especially when related to their involvement with the course. Similarly, another student shared her story while studying writing. In Enem, the student needs to write an essay which corresponds to one fifth of the final grade. The essay's score goes from 0 until 1000. Her comment was directed to the writing teacher of the channel:

"Teacher, I would like to thank you ... I was a student from a public school all my life and I practically didn't have a writing teacher. I didn't know anything about writing and as a consequence I hated it, after all, we don't like what we don't know. In 2018, I finished high school and so I decided to take Enem. During the exam, I stayed a long time facing the essay proposal and I didn't know what to do. I ended up delivering a blank sheet. In the next year I discovered your videos and my God, they have helped me! My score went from 0 to 920! Thank you so much, you are now an important part of my life!" (amorizando, 2020)

The two comments show that there are students who in fact achieved a career goal because of the channel's content. Therefore, applying the Freire's concept of critical pedagogy (1968), it is possible to say that by using internet resources such as YouTube, individuals and communities can utilize these digital tools to enhance self-education and, consequently, to promote social transformation in their lives through literacy.

Personal data and economic value

To make possible the production and free distribution of educational content, the company developed an economic strategy in which user's personal data and profit are intrinsically correlated. To guarantee that, the users need to register themselves on the website with an e-mail or Facebook-verified access. They do that to be able to keep track of their development in the course. CEG has a technological intentionality: the website is not neutral in relation to the users. It provides scripts that they should follow (Verbeek, 2006). Thus, this "traffic control comes at a price: the exchange value for ID services is data access" (Couldry & van Dijck, 2015, p. 4). User data is then sold to private universities and the students end up receiving emails, ads on the website and on Facebook from them. The interviewee argues:

It is a little contradictory, because our main objective is for students to enter public universities. But those who end up partially financing the company are private universities, it is in the interest of these universities that students enroll in them ... So there is this conflict of interest.

In addition, the website needs to have a sufficient number of access in order to be financially viable. To this extent, she adds:

This is something that bothers me, which is to think more about the ranking of posts on Google, because the more clicks the post has, the more income we will have, because more people will see the ads. There is a lot of concern about this, and I think there is a lack of concern with the quality of the material that is destined for students, ... there is this discrepancy between what is important for the student and what is important for Google.

This relationship is indeed complex once the company business model needs Google to attract users and make profit, therefore the Google algorithm and the current advertisers turn to be the first priority in order for the company to exist. The education quality comes after. The users are not aware of this fact. If they had this information in mind, they could question the quality of the CEG's education. Or happily accept thinking that it is a fair change as they consider they are receiving free quality education. In both perspectives, this model raises moral issues.

Technomoral change

Digital business often deals with an asymmetry in information: a platform makes choices and decides which information it will share with the user (Jordan, 2020). Therefore, "perception is mediated, for instance, because technologies can highlight some aspects of reality and hide others. (...) This technological mediation doesn’t stop at the door of our moral experience" (Swierstra, 2015, p. 10). In order to examine the technomoral change that CEG can raise, I discuss two controversial perspectives discussed by the interviewee when asked about her moral viewpoint about the company.

In the first perspective, the user could interpret the business as a social impact company which provides free education for students that otherwise would not have access to it. To this extent, Freire declares that "true generosity consists precisely in fighting to destroy the causes which nourish false charity" (1968, p. 45). As the Brazilian government is currently cutting financial resources from public education, it is possible to believe that the company is providing opportunities to fight social barriers that difficult the access of underprivileged youngs to the public universities. The interviewee adds:

Since you want to have a business that will work with selling data, at least bring something good to society. I think it is one of the fairest exchanges. Of course, reminding to inform who is using the website of this business model, let them know that their data is being sold. This divides the responsibility a little bit, although I think the company has a lot more responsibility, but at least the user is more aware of what they are exchanging.

On the other hand, what CEG offers can be seen as a disintermediation of school and the personal well-structured relationship between teacher-student (Jordan, 2020). For instance, CEG's students do not have the possibility to receive personal feedback from teachers and often do not know what they could improve. One could argue that the company offers precariousness of education sold as good deed. To this extent, Freire argues that "any attempt to "soften" the power of the oppressor in deference to the weakness of the oppressed almost always manifests itself in the form of false generosity (...) In order to have the continued opportunity to express their "generosity," the oppressors must perpetuate injustice as well" (1968, p. 42). Therefore, the discrepancy between students in different social classes would just be maintained and not ceased.

These two points of view raise ethical discussions about how a social impact company which uses a data-collection business model raises technomoral changes. This debate makes us aware of the role technology can bring to our lives. Moreover, this technomoral perspective is totally correlated with our individual engagement within the world. As Swierstra argues, "the most basic component of morality is our experience of our own vulnerability and capacity to flourish, that enables us to recognize this vulnerability and this capacity in other beings." (2015, p. 9). To this extent, the experiences that each individual had in life, their social and economic background and position on the left-right political spectrum are some of the guides which will lead to different modes of seeing CEG's business model and its impacts.

Conclusion

Alarming statistics illustrate the severity of problems in the current Brazilian educational system (Sandoval, 2012). Therefore, this paper presented an alternative to combat the inequality in education using resources from the Web 2.0. By showing how the CEG's YouTube channel is built and which impact it had in the user's lives, this paper has demonstrated that YouTube is today an educational tool that can strengthen learning in innovative ways.

Thus, disadvantaged students that in the past did not have the opportunities to follow a preparatory course, now can do it online and for free. This could lead to improvements in their exams results, and consequently enhance egalitarianism. Nevertheless, there is a complex relation between social impact and the business model of big corporations such as Facebook that CEG adopts. This paper argues that the technological intentionality and the datafication of sociality that CEG presents can be contradictory to the extent that the advertisers' and the company's goals are not aligned. Moreover, the fact that students are not aware of this business' background raises ethical questions. Thus, the association of personal data with economic value in this case study establishes a new paradigm of Swierstra's concept of technomoral change.

To this extent, the availability of educational content for free can enable a positive impact for underprivileged youth. On the other hand, there are critical perspectives about the inconsistency of online education being sold as social impact to bring income. This question asks for further research aiming social transformation co-produced by the user and by the technology.

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Social impact business in an era of Big Data: Texto