Inside the Data Spectacle

This paper focuses first on the scopophilic aspects of large scale data visualization—the fantasy of command and control through seeing—and places these in relation to key sites and conventions inside the tech industry. John Caldwell’s notion of “industrial reflexivity” provides a framework to explain the charismatic power and performative effects that attend representations of data as a visual spectacle. Drawing on twelve months of personal experience working for a large technology company, and observations from a number of relevant showcases, conferences, and events, I take a “production studies” approach to understand the forms of common sense produced in industry settings. I then offer two examples of data work understood as a new kind of “below the line” labor.