The Logic of the Brand

This article delineates the ideal-typical model of what I call the “logic of the brand”. I argue that this logic, i.e. how brands create value, represents a paradigmatic example of the dominating value-logic of informational capitalism. Value is less based on the control of salaried labour and more on the ability to appropriate and commodify a socially produced immaterial externality. This externality consists in forms of knowledge; sociality and affect that arise in (relatively) autonomous processes of media enhanced sociality. It is the new empowered capacity to create what I call an “ethical surplus” that result form new information and communication technologies, that constitutes the real foundation for the wealth that brands valorise. The article suggests that the logic of the brand is applicable to a range of other socialized production processes, from the ethically conscious company to the contemporary participatory online economy, or Web 2.0.