The future of data ownership: An uncommon research agenda

Responding to the current data monopoly by Big Tech firms, there is increasing interest in the potential for collective ownership of data in a ‘data commons’. This article aims to introduce the topic to non-specialists, highlight the broader social significance of data ownership, and reframe the data commons as a problem of social interaction rather than regulatory design. It critically engages with existing work on the data commons to suggest alternative directions for research which draw on humanities and interpretive social science approaches. It recommends the addition of research that (1) includes knowledge from non-Western legal traditions to overcome objections to the possibility of data ownership, (2) studies existing social relations of data governance rather than seeks to design ideal regulations, (3) prioritises a focus on the social and communicative practices involved in a data commons rather than seeing it as a solution to a specific problem, and (4) analyses the meaning-making practices of people as they engage in their own data governance, and the evolving narrative around what constitutes a data commons. The purpose of this alternative research agenda is to provide discursive scaffolding for the ongoing regulatory work on the data commons, while ensuring that its full potential remains imaginatively open.