Playing the visibility game: How digital influencers and algorithms negotiate influence on Instagram
By Kelley Cotter. New Media & Society, 2018
762 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Algorithms are said to affect social realities, often in unseen ways. This article explores conscious, instrumental interactions with algorithms, as a window into the complexities and extent of algorithmic power. Through a thematic analysis of online discussions among Instagram influencers, I observed that influencers’ pursuit of influence resembles a game constructed around “rules” encoded in algorithms. Within the “visibility game,” influencers’ interpretations of Instagram’s algorithmic architecture—and the “game” more broadly—act as a lens through which to view and mechanize the rules of the game. Illustrating this point, this article describes two prominent interpretations, which combine information influencers glean about Instagram’s algorithms with preexisting discourses within influencer communities on authenticity and entrepreneurship. This article shows how directing inquiries toward the visibility game makes present the interdependency between users, algorithms, and platform owners and demonstrates how algorithms structure, but do not unilaterally determine user behavior.
Subfields: Sociology and Political Science
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/3f94845cfec2ed04bfd0d0b1a41b994a56e5f6d9
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In Sociology and Political Science
Citations in the corpus
- Managing visibility on YouTube through algorithmic gossip (2019, background): “To this end, Kelley Cotter (2018) examines a number of algorithmic strategies undertaken by aspiring and successful Instagram influencers, which she defines as ‘playing the visibility game’ (p. 1).”
- Experiencing Algorithms: How Young People Understand, Feel About, and Engage With Algorithmic News Selection on Social Media (2021, background): “This matters because much previous work on algorithmic literacy pertains to subgroups that are already relatively digitally literate, such as algorithmic activists (Velkova & Kaun, 2019), web shop owners (Klawitter & Hargittai, 2018), and social media influencers (Bishop, 2019; Cotter, 2019).”