Process of emergence of an ‟android youth” and construction of a new entrepreneurial figure in the era of the digital economy in Cameroon: the downloader of cultural productions in Yaounde
At the time of digital economy, the democratization of the social uses of digital tools by people has given rise a new sector of production in the informal sector in Cameroon. This paper seeks to analyze the way the youth, who are facing the increased worsening of their life conditions, invest their digital skills as an economic opportunity, by exercising the job of "downloader" of cultural productions in urban areas. The study is based on an ethnographic survey combining interviews and the participative observation. It shows how youth, in their self-employment dynamics, mobilize their imagination and entrepreneurial skills. The appropriation of digital technologies by downloaders structures social gender relations, contributing to the production of masculinity in the urban space. By invading the roads, these youth maintain socially hierarchical interactions between themselves, whereas their relationship with employees of the council in charge of regulating the occupation of urban space are characterized by power states and corrupt practices which partly structure the functioning of the postcolonial State.