It is not surprising that strategy video games, which are all about the expedient management of resources in the context of colonization, should follow this 4X model. But what of data colonialism? In this chapter, we use the framework of exploring, expanding, exploiting, and exterminating to conduct a transhistorical comparison of dispossession that will reveal continuities between historical colonialism and today's data colonialism. To truly recognize the injustices of today, we need to look at them through the eyes of yesterday. By understanding the detailed parallels, we can uncover fully the coloniality3 of data relations, a concept that points to the broader continuities in how the legacy of historical colonialism resonates in the present—in this case, through social relations as abstracted and commodified by data.

Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection, loc. 274