Reputation Addiction

“Reputation Addiction… explores some of the ways in which social networks encourage excessive preoccupation with professional profile and public image. Sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Academia.edu (Rosamond’s main case study) use mechanisms designed to encourage regular return visits based on the popularity of an individual’s content. These platforms are economically invested in the creation of regular flows of traffic to their sites, as the data produced can be sold for a profit. Rosamond frames the emotional payoff gained by users when their content receives additional attention as a building of affective intensity. Yet this escalation of affect is not simply driven by individualistic narcissism from users fixated with their own image. Obsessive profile checking is spurred by professional necessity for economically insecure individuals in a highly competitive job market where social capital has become sacrosanct. Rosamond’s essay is another reminder that internet addiction, far from being a matter of simple biological dependency, is a social and political issue closely tied to matters of economic security and personal survival.”

- Vanessa Bartlett and Henrietta Bowden-Jones, “Digital Dependence: Introduction,” Are We All Addicts Now? (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2017) p. 15.