Julian Posada

Personal Website: https://posada.website/

Julián Posada is an Assistant Professor of American Studies and co-director of the certificate in Computing, Culture, and Society at Yale University. His research examines the social and cultural dimensions of information, especially the role of labor and infrastruction in the development of artificial intelligence.

He is the author of Platform Extractivism: Data Work and The People Powering Artificial Intelligence (University of California Press, 2026). This book argues that the development of datasets for artificial intelligence depends on labor organized through “platform extractivism,” a system that exploits economic instability to capture value from precarious populations. By reframing AI data work as a continuation of historical extractive relations, the monograph intervenes in debates on the future of work and the hidden costs of AI and digital platforms. 

Posada’s interests include platform studies, labor studies, digital ethics and policy, social computing, and science and technology studies. His interdisicplinary research combines qualitative and quantitative social science methods with  computational approaches to data collection and analysis.

Posada earned his Ph.D. in Information Science from the University of Toronto. He also holds a maîtrise in the Humanities from Sorbonne University and a master’s degree in Sociology from the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS). He has held visiting appointments at the Weizenbaum Institute and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.