Machine Visuality and Automated Power by T. Paglen

The article analyzes the transition from traditional photography as testimony to so-called machine visuality. The author invokes Trevor Paglen's theses, pointing to the emergence of operational images – data structures intended not for the human eye, but for algorithms. In this new paradigm, the image ceases to be a window to the world and becomes a switch triggering specific procedures: from behavioral scoring to risk classification. This shift moves the center of gravity from the interpretation of meanings to mechanisms of activation and coercion. As a result, a system of automated power is created in which humans cease to be viewers and become objects of processing within an invisible surveillance infrastructure, optimized for specific economic and institutional interests.