We live in an era where a handful of corporations wield unprecedented power over the flow of information, the shape of our workplaces, and the very infrastructure of our daily lives. Their business models profit from the extraction, commodification, profiling, and surveillance of our data, turning the internet into a private utility that serves shareholders rather than citizens.
The economy of the digital age has become one where every interaction, every search, every message is quietly transformed into data; mined, analysed, and sold. Some call this stage of capitalism technofeudalism[2]: a system where Big Tech controls the digital land we inhabit, demanding rent in the form of our privacy, attention, and autonomy. With the rise of artificial intelligence and machine learning, this imbalance of power deepens further, monopolies are consolidating and human agency is eroding.
We are told we are "users", but what we really are is products. Our connections, our communities, and our creativity are enclosed within walled gardens. Interoperability is deliberately broken. Terms of service dictate our freedoms. To dissent is to be disconnected.
The consequence is a creeping loss of sovereignty: the slow decay of our ability to govern our digital lives, make informed choices, and build technologies that serve human needs rather than corporate interests.
And yet, those who critique Big Tech too often fall short of offering real alternatives. We see brilliant technologies, powerful tools, and vibrant communities working to create another path, but too rarely do these efforts meet people where they are.
User experience, accessibility, and design are treated as afterthoughts, leaving everyday people locked out of the very tools that claim to liberate them. The result is a vast gulf between the polished convenience of corporate platforms and the rough edges of their alternatives. Unless we close this gap, resistance risks becoming symbolic rather than transformative.
We refuse this. We assert the right to digital self-determination.
Self-determination means building tools that empower communities rather than extract from them. It means rejecting dependency on systems designed to keep us captive. It means reclaiming the internet as a commons; a space of participation, not enclosure.
Sovereign is not a product. It is not a brand. It is a commitment to reclaim our future.
We call on technologists, activists, communities, and citizens to refuse resignation. To experiment, to federate, to build true alternatives. To create a digital ecosystem grounded not in extraction but in dignity.
Kasun Benthara
Oct 02, 2025 · Berlin
[1] Aaron Swartz, Guerilla Open Access Manifesto, July 2008, Eremo, Italy. This line is reproduced here in tribute to Aaron Swartz — whose vision for a freer, more open digital world continues to inspire this manifesto.
[2] The term "Technofeudalism" has been popularized in critical political economy, notably by Yanis Varoufakis (Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism, 2023), and has also appeared in earlier academic and activist debates to describe the monopolistic, rent-seeking dynamics of Big Tech platforms.