Talk:Commodification

message: Is a job an example of commodification of a person?
It has a price and transactions (hiring and firing) are conducted with regard to job holders.
Yes, a job is commodifaction because it turns normal labour-power  a form of life-activity into a commodity to be brought and sold. --Monty Cantsin 13:18, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: I'm new to contributing to wikipedia, so forgive me if I am doing this incorrectly, but I wanted to comment on the way that slavery was referred to as an extreme case of commodification:
"An extreme case of commodification is slavery, where human beings themselves become a commodity to be sold and bought."
Especially since this is under the Marxist thread, by no means would slavery represent this, but labour itself would.  Human beings are bought and sold from the unionized construction worker to the slave because their labour is what is being commodified, they share the premise that they are selling their labour (granted one is getting a much better price).  In fact the slave doesn't receive anything (in theory) for his/her labour, and I'm not sure it would be a commodity to anyone but the slave trader.  To the slave, its just slavery.
But I do think that since this is under the subtitle of Marxist Theory, that it should accurately reflect Marxist theory.  Karl Polanyi's explanation about capitalism creating fictitious commodities would be appropriate, Land, Labour, and Money:
“To isolate [land] and form a market out of it was perhaps the weirdest of all undertakings of our ancestors.”Polanyi, Karl. The Great Transformation. 1946  Land is nature, trees, food, rivers and mountains supplied by god or by certain geological processes, depending on what you believe.  To “organize society in such a way as to satisfy the requirements of a real-estate market was a vital part of the utopian concept of a market economy.”Polanyi, Karl. The Great Transformation Labour is the activity of human beings.  Believing we are produced to be sold on the market is not only depressing but highly illogical.  Furthermore, the supply of labour is a result of population trends that operate independent of market forces.  Lastly, money supply is not produced through the operation of market forces.  However, for a period of time in the 19th century, classical economists were successful enough to convince various governments to try the experiment.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Esteves.situation (talk • contribs) 00:42, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  slavery vs. labor 

message: Commodification and commoditization section was excellent.  Really well done!  Thanks CD-Host (talk) 15:38, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  good section! 

message: I was wondering today whether this was also a valid term.  For me it would imply the process by which a product might cease to be a commodity. 
For example some key aspects of a commodity are that it is widely available and one instance of the product is just as acceptable as another. Hence the market tends to pay the same price everywhere.  Hence key commodities like oil, sugar, cotton etc.  
As these resources become scarce then we start to see more complex costs added such as trade barriers, transport costs, political processes such as rules requiring stocks to be held and so on.  
Marketing and brand development are sometimes used to try to de-commidify a product for example making out that Nike running shoes possess something different to every other running shoe. 
Organic and Fair Trade labels acted to de-commoditize coffee and chocolate. 
The word has 13800 hits in the american spelling and 9700 in the british, 
some relevant examples.
http://www.dur.ac.uk/dbs/faculty/seminar-series/?eventno=9272
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-7679.2011.00515.x/abstract
http://creativekarma.com/ee.php/weblog/comments/decommoditization_of_gasoline/
http://profitablegrowth.com/tag/decommoditize/
I think this is worth documenting simply because I used the term myself today and then couldn't find it on wikipedia. 
Also not sure that bundling commoditization under commodification really makes sense. I expected to find more on commodities like oil sugar etc than marxist welfare stuff. 
Avowkind (talk) 04:21, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  De-commoditization De-commodification 

message: has made a number of changes over the last couple of days, notably to the lede, see [diff]. I am neutral as to whether these are improvements or not. Maybe someone with a good knowledge of the topic would like to comment? Jonpatterns (talk) 14:24, 27 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Changes from Nov - Jan 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Hello!
It seems to me that the section "Business and economics" belongs in the article on commoditization rather than here?
Nikolaj1905 (talk) 08:10, 24 September 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. Given that they make such a distinction about commoditization, the details on commoditization is unnecessary. Cmorris2018 (talk) 13:31, 12 October 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Misplaced section 

message: I removed a chunk of the section on Cultural Commodification due to inaccuracies, sourcelessness, and simply smelling like opinion but putting the previous language here because the two example may be able to be highly re-worked for objectivity:
"Socialist movements are losing their voices on change because members of the "movement" are not promoting the message but participating in a fashion statement. Activists' hard works are marketable to the masses without accountability. An example of commodification is the colors red, black, and green, which are the colors of the African Liberation Army (ALA). For people of African descent these colors represent red (the innocent bloodshed of Africans), black (African people) and green (stolen land of Africa). These colors are marketed worldwide on all types of apparel and clothes."
I think the commodification of socialist and anarchist symbols and culture can be argued for if sources can be found (Murray Bookchin's /Social Anarchism or Lifestyle Anarchism/ comes to mind).
The African Liberation Army seems to not exist (maybe the author meant the Black Liberation Army?) but these colors seem to derive from the banner adopted by the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) in 1920. I believe this symbol /has/ been a target of cultural commodification I could not find any source that speaks to that commodification. Maybe another can find one. Mycoolsighman (talk) 00:05, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not even sure if a combination of colors should be able to be exclusively claimed (trademarked or whatever) by any specific group. Certainly not a combination of common colors such as black, red, and green. --The owner of all ✌️ 16:38, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removed Cultural Commodification language un-cited and opinionated 

message: Because certain people use the term commodity with a different meaning than economists use the term, I wonder if it is even appropriate to link to the article commodity, due to that article focusing on the economics use of the term. In particular, 'commodities' are good (a competitive market is better than a monopolistic market), but commodification is not about commodities but rather the idea that there is, or should be, or should not be, a market for certain things (examples from article such as water, housing, etc). --The owner of all ✌️ 16:36, 24 April 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suggestion regarding linked term "commodity" 

message: This sentence makes no sense in context:
"Concepts that have been argued as having become commercialized include broad items such as patriotism,[14] sport,[15] intimacy,[16] language,[17] nature[18] or the body.[19]"
First, the introductory sentence says that commodification is talking about turning things into objects of trade. This refers to "concepts" being turned into objects of trade. I'm not sure how one trades the concept.
Second, this is talking about "commercialized" when the wiki entry is about a process called "commodification" - the difference is not explained, and there is no clarity in the included cites.
I recommend deletion or a rewrite.
96.241.35.140 (talk) 07:36, 8 January 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Concepts that have been commercialized? 

message: — Assignment last updated by Vsiguenza (talk) 07:56, 25 November 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Wiki Education assignment: COMM 500 Theory and Literature of Communication

message: Hello... I feel this: "Imagery of natural springs and mountains creates an idea of bottled water as a commodity associated with nature while being cleaner and more accessible. The water bottles have advertising and commercialized ways of promotion, despite the necessity of it as a resource for life. Public water has become conceptualized as dirty and unsafe, which makes it seem less of an issue when water sources are actually unsafe for consumers. Corporations are more trusted than the government regulation of public water. The distrust and acceptance of public water sources as unclean has in turn, allowed further commoditization of natural resources, a vicious cycle that enables itself. This is an issue, as the privatization and commodification of natural resources affects all humans, who rely on natural resources to live and especially harms marginalized communities who do not have access to the same level of commodities. The idea of water, which is a common natural resource which can be sourced from a multitude of sources and which is replenished by rainfall, has become commodified through the pollution of waterways. As such, bottled water is increasingly seen as a safer, more reliable and accessible option. Commodification overall creates an environment in which natural resources and human necessities are placed within the market to be advertised, creating a sense of fetishization." Seems a biased opinion and needs a citation.   I have removed but it is saved here Mitsuo500 (talk) 14:15, 20 November 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Public goods water section needs references and citation? 

message: I moved a section from my sandbox to the existing Commodification article, cut and pasted, but the font is different size on the live article  Mitsuo500 (talk) 22:39, 20 November 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  added section from Mitsuo500 sandbox.. font is different 

message: Moved lead section, History section from Mitsuo500 sandbox.. See Also section small edit moved from Mitsuo500 sandbox. Mitsuo500 (talk) 02:47, 22 November 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Updating article 

message: I have completed the WikiEdu semester course for evaluating and editing Wikipedia articles. The changes made are moved from my sandbox to live. Mitsuo500 (talk) 14:32, 16 December 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Changes made during Wiki Education assignment: COMM 500 Theory and Literature of Communication 

message: Added some paragraphs for explanations of Commodification of Culture. Structure cleanup with examples under Commodification of Culture section. Added History section to clarify research on Commodification. WikiEdu assignment is complete. I will not make any other large edits. Mitsuo500 (talk) 15:33, 16 December 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Completed moving edits from sandbox to live article 

message: Hello, I'm new to editing Wikipedia, and went through WikiEdu training this semester and editing the Commodification article was a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 21 August 2023 and 15 December 2023. 
The question is, does moving sections within the article, Alphabetizing the Examples section, cause the Wikipedia bots to flag sections as plagiarism? No changes, but reorganizing the structure for clarity. If this is the case, please undo any removals.  Mitsuo500 (talk) 17:45, 19 December 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Which bot is giving you these plagiarism reports? Could you point me to one? Re-ordering the article content should not itself create a plagiarism warning. MartinPoulter (talk) 10:46, 20 December 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you for all the help! Mitsuo500 (talk) 13:20, 21 December 2023 (UTC)

text: I hadn't heard of iThenticate before and I've just been learning about it. If you're using iThenticate reports to remove text from Wikipedia, then an important question is, where does the report say the text was plagiarised from? Wikipedia will naturally be in Turnitin and similar systems because Wikipedia is often copied from. So it's not a surprise that these systems will incorrectly report Wikipedia text as plagiarised. MartinPoulter (talk) 12:09, 20 December 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: thank you ..  please undo any removals if you believe the possible plagiarism is an incorrect bot flag. Mitsuo500 (talk) 14:41, 20 December 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: I've put the current version of the article through the Earwig copyvio detector and it finds no problem. If anyone is going to report that this article is plagiarised in future, they should transparently say where it is supposed to be plagiarised from, so we can check the claim and check that the supposed source is not just a mirror of Wikipedia. MartinPoulter (talk) 11:48, 21 December 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Plagiarism bot question 

message: Thanks for your hard work on this article. As a reader, I'm a bit confused by the lead.
"Mass Media is increasingly shown as the driving force of commodification as seen in, the commodification of culture" What does this sentence mean? Why is "Mass Media" capitalised that way? Why is there a comma after "in"?
"American culture, is an example of this form of commodification," Are you sure American culture is commodification? This is much stronger than saying commodification is a feature of American culture. And why mention American culture in particular, rather than capitalist cultures generally?
"Media, [...] are a leading force for disruption." What does this sentence mean? It seems very vague; "leading force" especially. How does "disruption" relate to "commodification"?
This whole paragraph is cited to a book, but no page numbers are given so the citation is not checkable. MartinPoulter (talk) 10:44, 20 December 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree and also think this new 2nd paragraph in the lead needs to be highly reworked or better removed. It's not explanatory - not helping us understand the overall concept. Mycoolsighman (talk) 18:21, 21 January 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Second paragraph in lead 

message: I'll put here an explanation of why I deleted this section, for Mitsuo500's benefit. This text could be put back but it would have to be much more precisely phrased and would have to say something about commodification.
"Mass media is shown to be commodified as seen by the Hollywood blockbuster film" You don't need both "is shown" and "as seen". But my main concern is what you think is being "shown" by these examples. What is it about Hollywood films that makes them commodified, as opposed to other kinds of film, that you also have to pay to see?
"All sectors focused on quantity rather than quality." This has a capital letter and a full stop as though it's a sentence, but it's not a sentence. It could be made into a sentence by adding a couple of words: "All these sectors are focused..." but what's the evidence for the resulting statement? Are all pop music artists focused on quantity at the expense of quality? Who says? Spotify has music from literally millions of artists; are they all focus on quantity at the expense of quality? Why focus on Spotify when there are many, many other ways that music is distributed for money? "television sitcoms and spinoffs" - There are lots of television show formats: documentary, crime drama, reality TV, stand-up comedy... Why pick out situation comedies? What relevance do they have to the topic of commodification that the other formats don't? You've picked a set of examples and it seems like you think it's self-evident that they show commodification of media, but there needs to be explanation of what it means for media to be commodified and why those things in particular.
There is a citation in the paragraph, and it's a scholarly book published by a reputable academic publisher. So it's a great citation to use for Wikipedia! We don't get a page(s) reference so we don't know which part of the book supports the statements in the paragraph. Does the book say that Spotify is focused on quantity rather than quality, or that sitcoms are examples of commodification? Seems unlikely, and if it does say that, we need it spelled out in more detail what point they are making.
You've spent a great deal of time on this article and made a lot of changes. You've also made good use of edit summaries and this Talk page to explain what you're doing. In this case I'm just asking you to make a smaller change with greater care; that's what will last in the article for a long time. MartinPoulter (talk) 21:43, 20 December 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Media section 

message: I've updated the lede to mention the important normative and pejorative connotation of commodification again. I think that is an important starting point to understand the difference in usage between a business or neoclassical story of commodities and cultural change versus the tradition that developed this term.
In the past, the lede of this article explained that commodification is a normative concept and had this language: "commodification is the transformation of things that normally exist outside the market [...] into commodities or objects of trade". in 2022 an IP editor objected to the word "normally" and explained that if things are on the market now then it is "normal" that they are market items. I agree that that sentence isn't the best. But the theory of commodification does come from a normative and prescriptive philosophical/sociological/economic tradition and it does imply a change in what's normal to the people who once had one custom around a thing, and that capitalism changed that custom.
So for clarity I added the context of the starting point for what commodification theorizes that customs change from: "transforming inalienable, free, or gifted things [...] into commodities, or objects for sale." And I added the basic definition normative/pejorative aspect that "It has a connotation of losing an inherent quality or social relationship when something is integrated by a capitalist marketplace."
Now hopefully we can stick to the point that this theory has a normative quality, or explains changes in norms, and not that any editor believes that the changes described here are normal or not. Mycoolsighman (talk) 19:34, 29 January 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Commodification is a normative concept, adjusted lede