Influencer Creep: How Optimization, Authenticity, and Self-Branding Transform Creative Culture

A look at how the rise of influencer culture has changed creative work

A sculptor works while wearing a GoPro camera to capture Instagram content. A painter decides whether to make pieces that she won't be able to share on Instagram, after her account was blocked for sharing "sexualized" content. An artist finds that her portraits of light-skinned women get an algorithmic boost over those featuring dark-skinned models. These creative workers are now using the content-generation skills and promotional strategies pioneered by influencers to compete for visibility online.

Influencer Creep explores what happens when creative workers must go beyond their work to build a comprehensive online presence. Creator studies expert Sophie Bishop delineates how the tactics of professional influencers affect the ways creative workers navigate social media platforms. They must optimize their content to win the favor of opaque algorithms they do not control. They must engage in relentless self-branding, creating a compelling, consistent, and platform-ready image. And that image, in spite of being carefully manufactured, must be perceived as authentic.

Taking seriously the motivations that drive more and more people into the contest for online visibility, Influencer Creep documents a creative workforce nervously conforming to the monopoly power of social media platforms--and occasionally resisting it.