Australian Instagram Celebrity Essena O Neill's Impact On Social Media

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On October 27th 2015, Australian Instagram celebrity Essena O’Neill made the decision to quit social media; in addition to deleting pictures from her Instagram account, she edited the captions of the pictures to reflect the truth behind them (Hunt, 2015). O’Neill’s decision to quit Instagram was inspired by her realization that social media is not real life (McCluskey, 2016). O’Neill’s experience with social media demonstrates the position of social media within the three spheres of communication, private, corporate, and public. This also relates to the creation of identity and the interplay of representation and power through self-branding and a connection between public and private life. José van Dijck (2012) discusses the notions of connectivity …show more content…

The corporate sphere and the monetary gain associated with social media can be described, “In a world where social structure is everything, connections become the prime economic value” (van Dijck, 2015, p. 170). In the case of Instagram, the connections can be represented through the amount of followers a user has and the number of likes their pictures receive. O’Neill’s experience is able to demonstrate how the corporate sphere infiltrates the social world through monetary gain and economic value as a result of self-branding and promotion. Hearn (2008) discusses how the process of self-branding works, “The function of the branded self is purely rhetorical; its goal is to produce cultural value and, potentially, material profit” (p. 198). O’Neill’s edited captions, for example when she acknowledged a picture of her wearing clothing that she was ‘secretly’ promoting and writes, “If you find yourself looking at “Instagram girls” and wishing your life was there’s… Realise you only see what they want […] We are a generation told to consume and consume, with no thought of where it all comes from and where it all goes” (Hunt, 2015). This critique of the relationship between social media and corporate commodities, such as clothing or an idealised life style, demonstrates how the corporate sphere is relevant to …show more content…

The overlap between the three spheres is evident, it is also apparent that they must coexist. O’Neil’s Instagram experience is representative of how identity and a false reality can be constructed through social media platforms and profiles. This reveals issues with representation and how the private, corporate, and public sphere are connected with online representations. This includes the transparency of an individual’s private life, the concept of self-branding and promotion as a result of commoditisation, and the revelation that identity and representation are affected by the public nature of social media

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