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Comment by puranjay | Hacker News Reader

I really wonder if anyone ever really does anything for themselves anymore. Every experience, even the most intimate and introspective ones, seem to be telegraphed and advertised as a part of your "branded identity"

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This is a prime example of selection bias.

How would you even know if the vast majority of things people are doing don't get broadcast regularly if the things these people are doing does not get broadcast regularly?

Yeah, people do things for themselves. I have written, drawn, and programmed many things that I've never shared with anyone, and never intended to share. In some cases I've destroyed the work in such a way that I couldn't reproduce it exactly even if I wanted to. You could argue that I'm putting that on display right now, but I could just as well be lying to you, so I don't think that argument would hold up with regard to my motives. Also, my identity here isn't easy to tie to my identity IRL; if it was intended to be, I would have picked a more professional and socially acceptable name than blotter_paper :)

Hi, yes, thank you & welcome to the Society of the Spectacle.

Some of us are not focussed on building our brand identity. I enjoy photography and back in the day my Flickr portfolio had 500k views. I still take photographs, but don’t now post them online because I want to enjoy the craft of creating them, not help others maximise engagement or similar

But you do want to point out to strangers that you’re above sharing your photos.

It’s easy to be super cynical about everyone’s motivations, and it’s turtles (or signaling) all the way down

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