In 2016, Facebook cofounder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg traveled to Lagos, Nigeria—the
first stop on his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa. The trip was a commercial endeavor, a
digital capitalist exploration of the potential of Africa’s largest nation. Zuckerberg’s visit
provides a critical lens for examining the colonizing tendencies of global media
corporations and the context of Africa in the circuit of digital capitalism. Africa is
emerging as a market for digital tools, with increasing penetration of mobile
telecommunications services, including mobile Internet. However, it is estimated that
about 60% of the continent’s population will still be unconnected in 2020. This low
penetration provides an opportunity for digital enterprises such as Facebook to explore
the African market. Through benevolent capitalism, Facebook is attempting to capture a
huge market in Africa. The lack of investment in an Internet infrastructure in Africa
provides both challenges and opportunities for digital capitalists who, in their benevolent
pursuit of digital capital, aim for global domination.