CS 371

Social Media and Social Life

Blog Post Assignment #4

Fall 2016

Last year the world of social media was rocked when one of its “stars”—Australian social media “influencer” Essena O’Neill—publically disavowed her stardom and the machinery of social media that produced it.  She released a confessional video on YouTube in which she testified to the inauthenticity of social media stardom, killed her existing social media accounts . . . and then started a new web site called “Let’s Be Game Changers” in which she purports to offer a more “real” and authentically inspirational version of her self.  As she wrote on her new web site (now defunct):

“Nothing is perfect about spending every single day making your life look perfect online. That is not real. That is not inspirational. There is so much more we could be doing than editing ourselves and proving ourselves to others.”

In her book, Jose Van Dijk argues that the “culture of connectivity”:

is a culture where the organization of social exchange is staked on neoliberal economic principles. Connectivity derives from a continuous pressure—both from peers and technologies--to expand through competition and gain power through strategic alliances.  Platform tactics such as the popularity principle and ranking mechanisms  . . . are firmly rooted in a ideology of that values, hierarchy, competition and a winner take all mind set” (page 21)

In your post take a position where you assess Essena O’Neills recent actions as being characteristic of or oppositional to what Van Dijck calls the “neoliberal economic principles” of the culture of connectivity of contemporary social media platforms. 

It may be helpful to refer to the following resources on the Internet concerning Essena O’Neill:

1)   Her YouTube ‘Why I REALLY am quitting social media” confession: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe1Qyks8QEM

2)   This story from the Guardian (UK) “Instagram star Essena O'Neill calls out fake social media couples” http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/nov/11/instagram-star-essena-oneill-fake-social-media-couples

3)   This story from WIRED, “Hipster Barbie Quits the Internet, Leaving Us Without a Hero”, about Darby Cisneros, the creator of Instagram star #socialitybarbie http://www.wired.com/2015/11/socality-barbie-quits/

4)   This story from The Globe and Mail about “An anti social media star” http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/i-gained-almost-100000-instagram-followers-in-two-weeks-but-i-lost-myanonymity/article27212061/?ord=1

5)   This story from Time Magazine “Instagram Star Essena O’Neill Breaks Her Silence on Quitting Social Media” http://time.com/4167856/essena-oneill-breaks-silence-on-quitting-social-media/

6)   And this article from New York Magazine that reports on Essena one year after she “quit social media “Where Are You, Essena O’Neill?” http://nymag.com/selectall/2016/11/esenna-oneill-one-year-after-quitting-social-media.html

The due dates for this assignment are Monday, December 5, 6 PM for your original posts and Saturday, December 10, 6 PM for your responses.