Personfied Brands : Identity Projects in Social Media

Sammanfattning: The popularity of social media have increased over the last years, appearing under variousbrands with millions of members worldwide. This thesis exemplifies how the features in twoof the most popular social media of today, Facebook and Twitter, can enable individuals touse these forums as tools for presentation and promotion of their identities. The empirical material was gathered through qualitative interviews with 13 users of socialmedia, illustrating how individuals actively strive to use these forums to create positiveassociations around their persons. What is perceived as beneficial communication varies with individuals different socialcontexts, learned through socialization mechanisms similar to those in real life. Social mediacommunication allows individuals to highlight preferable parts of their personality whileminimising negative to a higher extent than what sometimes is possible in the physicalreality, thus increasing the possibilities to communicate a desired self. The insights providedin this thesis can contribute to the understanding of social media as a phenomenon, as wellas increasing the knowledge around individuals purposes and user preferences as consumersof these media.The popularity of social media have increased over the last years, appearing under variousbrands with millions of members worldwide. This thesis exemplifies how the features in twoof the most popular social media of today, Facebook and Twitter, can enable individuals touse these forums as tools for presentation and promotion of their identities.The empirical material was gathered through qualitative interviews with 13 users of socialmedia, illustrating how individuals actively strive to use these forums to create positiveassociations around their persons.What is perceived as beneficial communication varies with individuals different socialcontexts, learned through socialization mechanisms similar to those in real life. Social mediacommunication allows individuals to highlight preferable parts of their personality whileminimising negative to a higher extent than what sometimes is possible in the physicalreality, thus increasing the possibilities to communicate a desired self. The insights providedin this thesis can contribute to the understanding of social media as a phenomenon, as wellas increasing the knowledge around individuals purposes and user preferences as consumersof these media.