Curation in the Age of Platform Capitalism The Value of Selection, Narration, and Expertise in New Media Cultures

The algorithmic spectacles and other curated content, this book argued, are further evocative of cultures in the anthropological sense of the word. The book navigated the values, emotions, socialities, and, generally, the cultural dimensions of platform curating by following it in a diverse range of sites. I discussed some of the behavioral, stylistic, and larger anthropological traits which platform curating mediates in public spheres, indicatively reflexivity (Chapter 3), coolness (Chapter 4), authenticity (Chapter 5), and inspiration (Chapter 6). To return to Adorno, to whom we referred to at the beginning of the book, it is not that these cultures did not exist before but that these cultures assume a widespread canonization with the advent of digital platforms. Coolness, as we saw, is a posture and stylistic ritual of banal luxury around the Balenciaga–Vetements–Demna complex. Before the emergence of platform connectivity, coolness was a posture principally associated with mass culture, such as jazz music or Levi jeans, and less to high fashion, as the latter would mostly privilege traits such as elegance, exclusivity, and sophistication. The mere availability of platform infrastructures mobilizes luxury brands to relate to forms of popular culture, such as coolness, as they need media engagements, followers, and visibility; luxury fashion pursues high and low cross-promotions to curate brand connectivities before a globa audience well versed in memes, films, art, music, and even cultural theory. I explored coolness, authenticity, and inspiration in respect to specific areas, namely fashion, food, and life coaching, however these cultures co-exist and overlap over the whole platform economy. For instance, together with its hyper-conceptual outlook, the banal luxury complex also displays some of the other cultural tropes I discussed, such as authenticity (e.g., a commitment to the values of the brand), reflexivity (e.g., the ethical brand positionings vis-à-vis fast fashion), and inspiration (e.g., Demna posing as visionary guru). Or food authenticity, which in curated gastronomy mobilizes figures like a local grandmother for gaining symbolic capital, can overlap with cultures of coolness (e.g., the counterintuitive selection of rare ingredients), reflexivity (e.g., the awareness that the food industry exploits animals and environment), and inspiration (e.g., the promotion of figure of the visionary chef). In this sense, the cultures this book discusses can be understood as varyingly present all over the spectrum of platform capitalism.

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Finally, the book aimed to contextualize the ascent of curation from the realm of art to a dominant cultural trope by pointing to the wider social logic it inhabits. Distributed curation, as this book argued, is not a market aberration vis-à-vis art curation but an expansion of the latter’s logic of value production. Businesses embrace this logic of value production in the realm of economic transactions for boosting market value, while for audiences and users it becomes an imperative pertaining to the question of what stories to tell about oneself to oneself and others. The term “imperative” here signifies a push in a direction, instead of a totalizing and overpowering regime. As with all social injunctions, the curatorial imperative is an efect of hegemonic economic, technological, and social forces. Via this imperative, platform capitalism shapes an anthropological condition across contemporary mediascapes and beyond, a homo curatorius whose embodiment of the “story you should be telling on your own” informs desirable horizons of class, status, and belonging. Its logic encompasses diverse spheres ranging from high-brow art and the fashion world to low-brow experience economies and economies of authenticity, from confidence cultures and pick-up artists to algorithmic rationalities. To put these diverse spheres under the umbrella of homo curatorius is to underscore how the questions of who to be, how to appear, and what to consume—the imperative to curate and be curated, the logic of guiding one’s practices, emotions, and life paths as if these will lead to a higher vision or concept of the self—cut through various spheres of contemporary platform cultures. It is a globalizing yet situated mandate where the artification of social and economic life—creativity, art, and design—meets the rationality of the market actor, rational consumer choice, and the spirit of entrepreneurialism. To curate and to be curated in the context of platform capitalism marks socializing processes of (especially) urban subjectivities surrounded by a seemingly abundant choice. If anything, it deepens the preoccupation with the self as the fundamental unit of analysis, which requires constant examination and reflection amid bewildering social complexity.

Note

1 The Runpee app: https://runpee.com/

References

Concluding Thoughts

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Disclaimer

This book is part of a project that has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under Grant Agreement No. 101004488. The information and views in this book are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official opinion of the European Union. Neither the European Union institutions and bodies nor any person acting on their behalf may be held responsible for the use which may be made of the information contained therein.

Adorno, T. 7, 9, 160

Andrejevic, M. 5, 54, 56, 69 apparatus 10, 15, 17, 19, 52, 56, 59, 63, 67, 69, 78, 93, 130, 133, 135, 142–3, 150–1, 159

artification 6, 14–15, 28–9, 37, 79, 117, 121, 161

aspirational labor 61, 63, 64, 72, 151 authenticity 6–7, 14, 16, 18–20, 64, 68, 103–5, 107–11, 114–15, 118, 121, 136, 145, 160–1

Bhaskar, M. 17, 41–3

Bourdieu, P. 15, 67, 84–6, 105, 113

capitalism: communicative capitalism, 11, 51–6, 66, 69, 71, 91, 121; cool capitalism 79, 82; platform capitalism 5–8, 10, 12–13, 18, 20, 45, 52, 56–7, 59–60, 69–70, 75, 122, 130, 150, 158–9, 161

Carpentier, N. 34

coaching: coaching discourse 139, 144, 149; intimacy coaching 145; life coaching 5, 6, 10, 19–20, 29, 70, 127–8, 130–2, 138, 148, 150, 160

commercial platforms 9, 10

commodification of emotions 14

cosmopolitanism 28, 39, 42, 1 109, 111, 117–18; see also gastro-cosmopolitanism cultural exchange 15–16, 67

curation 3, 5–8, 10, 14, 16–20, 27, 29–30, 37, 40–3, 45, 49–52, 56–9, 68–70, 104–7, 135, 139, 150, 161

curated consumption 66–7, 69, 70, 158–9

curatorial imperative 8, 12–15, 18, 21, 44, 61, 64, 70, 122, 135, 139, 141, 144–5, 150, 159, 161

Currid-Halkett, E. 68, 78, 81–2

Dean, J. 11, 51–2, 54–6, 69–70, 121, 160

discourse 6, 18–19, 29, 33–41, 56, 66, 84–5, 91, 93, 109–10, 114, 129, 132, 139, 143–6, 149, 152, 159

Dumont, G. 12, 65, 83, 136

economy: gig economy 26, 52, 58, 61, 73, 74; Warhol Economy 20, 77, 80–4, 92, 96, 117

Foucault, M. 15, 98, 131

gastronomical imaginary 102, 104, 107, 109–11, 117–18, 120; see also imaginary

gatekeeping 60

Gill, R. 131

Gilmore, J. H. 44, 69, 104–8, 110

governmentality: capitalist governmentality 129; governmentality school 131; neoliberal governmentality 15, 140

Graham, M. 11, 51, 61, 63

Heinich, N. 14, 28–9, 37

homo curatorius 1, 8, 21, 51, 161

Illouz, E. 6, 14, 93, 129, 133, 144–5, 148

imaginary 27–8, 40–1, 44, 56, 68–9, 102, 104, 107, 109, 110–11, 117–18, 120, 133, 158

Index

intimacy: cold-intimacy 93, intimacy coaching 145–6

Langley, P. 5, 10, 49–50, 54, 57, 59–60, 64
Leyshon, A. 5, 10, 49–50, 54, 57, 59–60, 64
Lury, C. 16–17, 68, 134

Marwick, A. E. 12, 15, 136, 151
McGuigan, J. 79, 82
McRobbie, A. 15, 81, 131
market rationalization 14
micro-celebrities 12–13, 15, 51, 65, 127,
130, 133–4, 136, 138, 151, 159
Mylonas, Y. 117–18
neoliberal capitalism 6, 129
Nieborg, D. B. 9–13, 51, 58–9
Orgad, S. 131
O’Neill, R. 28, 39, 46, 148
O’ Reilly, K. 16
Pine, B. J. 44, 69, 104–8, 110
platform ecosystem 50
Poell, T. 9–13, 51, 58–9
populism 84, 87, 96
psy-disciplines 131
regime of truth 111, 113
relational labor 65, 72, 93, 136
Rose, N. 129, 131
Rosenbaum, S. 17, 27, 41, 44, 56

self-curation 15, 17, 19–20, 128, 138–9, 150; see also self
self: the self 6, 8, 28, 29, 68, 90, 108–9, 120, 128–32, 139–40, 146, 150, 158–9, 161
Shapiro, R. N. 14, 28–9, 37
Skeggs, B. 15, 28, 66–8, 130
Srnicek, N. 5, 9, 11, 51, 53, 70
surveillance capitalism 11
symbolic rebellions 82
terra incognita 11
transgression 80, 82–3, 90, 96, 108, 130

Van Dijck, J. 9, 11–12, 50–1, 60, 70, 78, 159

Wayne, C. 146–9, 153
Williams, R. 13, 68, 110
Woodcock, J. 11, 51, 61, 63
woke-washing 67

Zubof, S. 11, 69

Index

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