Influencer Creep
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A01=Sophie Bishop
audience engagement
Author_Sophie Bishop
bias
branding strategies
Category=JBCT1
Category=KCF
Category=KJSG
Category=UDBS
content monetization
creative entrepreneurship
creators
digital identity
digital labor
digital marketing
eq_bestseller
eq_business-finance-law
eq_computing
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
inequality
online authenticity
online visibility
optimization
platform capitalism
platform governance
platformization of art
social media
surveillance
Product details
- ISBN 9780520402706
- Dimensions: 140 x 216mm
- Publication Date: 28 Oct 2025
- Publisher: University of California Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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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.
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.
Sophie Bishop is Associate Professor in Media and Communication at the University of Leeds and former Specialist Advisor to the UK Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. She is a contributor to the Financial Times, the BBC, The Atlantic, and other outlets.
