# Ground Level: Streaming and Surveillance w/ Eric Drott Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/speri-presents-7048864/ground-level-streaming-and-surveillance-w-eric-drott Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/speri-presents-7048864/ground-level-streaming-and-surveillance-w-eric-drott.md Podcast: [SPERI Presents...](https://stenobird.com/podcast/speri-presents-7048864) Published: 2026-03-26T07:00:00+00:00 Episode link: https://shows.acast.com/speri-presents/episodes/ground-level-streaming-and-surveillanc Audio file: https://sphinx.acast.com/p/open/s/6683f98604b201dd34f20976/e/69bacc547739fc93d7e6a548/media.mp3 Processing state: not_requested JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/speri-presents-7048864/episodes/ground-level-streaming-and-surveillance-w-eric-drott Duration seconds: 3199 ## Resource Scholars argue that streaming platforms have turned music into a technology of surveillance. Thanks to music streaming, now more than ever before, music accompanies us as we move across the physical, social and geographical spaces that define our everyday lives.  Music has been traditionally imagined as a means of self-expression. More often than not, it is used to channel our emotions and deal with our everyday lives. Music becomes a soundtrack to the routine, to the mundane, to the banal, but also of the special and most eventful moments of our lives.  Today, with the help of our guest, we will start from this idea, but we will problematise it by outlining how streaming platforms use and commercialise the relationship between music and everyday life, collecting and selling behavioural data.  Concepts discussed: commodity, commodification, decommodification, consumer surveillance, social reproduction, crisis of social reproduction, self-care, protest music, resistance.  Host: Dr Frank Maracchione , SOAS University of London.  Guest: Professor Eric Drott , Professor of Theory at the University of Texas in Austin. His research spans several subjects, including contemporary music cultures, streaming music platforms, music and protest, genre theory, digital music, and the political economy of music. His first book, Music and the Elusive Revolution (University of California Press, 2011), examines music and politics in France after May ’68. His second book, Streaming Music, Streaming Capital (Duke University Press, 2024), examines the political economy of music streaming platforms. He is also co-editor of the Oxford Handbook of Protest Music with Noriko Manabe.  References: Appadurai, A. (Ed.). (1986). The Social Life of Things: Commodities in… ## Actions - request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/speri-presents-7048864/episodes/ground-level-streaming-and-surveillance-w-eric-drott/transcription-requests` β€” Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode. - read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/speri-presents-7048864/ground-level-streaming-and-surveillance-w-eric-drott.md` β€” Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource. A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed. ## Transcript Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.