Metaphors of Visibility: Rhetorical Practices in the Normalization of Individual Online Image Management
Abstract
Online image management has become a routine component of contemporary self-presentation. While popular media have concentrated on covering issues related to privacy, individuals in a social environment that prizes visibility face a more implicit mandate to balance concerns about overexposure against the perceived dangers of invisibility. A new class of promotional intermediaries, those that sell personal online reputation management services, have emerged to help individuals navigate the inevitability of “being seen” online with the urgency of image management. These companies apply strategies familiar in advertising and public relations to online self-presentation. This article explores how industry efforts to sell image management as an individual imperative draw on metaphors—including digital tattoo, digital footprint, and digital doppelgänger—to foster anxieties about how our digital identities are constructed, encountered, and interpreted. It argues these metaphors, which warn of the dangers of both visibility and invisibility, reveal a tension that informs popular discourse around digital self-presentation. Ultimately, this article considers how “strategic transparency” is offered to assuage fears, thereby generating a market for personal image management services.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Artificial intelligence will be churning in the background of a metaverse, generating improvements and constantly learning from the actions of digital doppelgangers and from individual customer interactions.
“Artificial intelligence (AI) will be churning in the background of a metaverse, generating improvements and constantly learning from the actions of digital doppelgangers (Draper, 2020) and from individual customer interactions.”
From Metaverse beyond the hype: Multidisciplinary perspectives on emerging challenges, opportunities, and agenda for research, practice and policy (2022) · cites this paper as Draper, 2020
Cites
The contemporary theory of metaphor
Lakoff, G. P. (1993) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9781139173865.013 · Cited by 5,565 · see citing works
Warren, S. D., & Brandeis, L. D. (1890) · University of Washington Press eBooks · doi:10.1515/9780295803661-014 · Cited by 4,092 · see citing works
Automating Inequality: How High-Tech Tools Profile, Police, and Punish the Poor
Lebovits, H. (2018) · Public Integrity · doi:10.1080/10999922.2018.1511671 · Cited by 3,318 · see citing works
Gillespie, T. (2010) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/1461444809342738 · Cited by 2,522 · see citing works
Ananny, M., & Crawford, K. (2018) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/1461444816676645 · Cited by 1,836 · see citing works
Hogan, B. (2010) · Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society · doi:10.1177/0270467610385893 · Cited by 1,318 · cited 1× · see citing works
“This version of self-presentation, which Bernie Hogan (2010) calls the “lowest common denominator,” operates as a risk mitigation strategy consistent with the ORM industry’s urging that individuals take steps to manage their “digital ink.””
BackgroundWant to be on the top? Algorithmic power and the threat of invisibility on Facebook
Bucher, T. (2012) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/1461444812440159 · Cited by 1,305 · see citing works
(2013) · The MIT Press eBooks · doi:10.7551/mitpress/9302.001.0001 · Cited by 1,173 · see citing works
Status update: celebrity, publicity, and branding in the social media age
(2014) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.51-5062 · Cited by 1,163 · see citing works
Generative metaphor: A perspective on problem-setting in social policy
Schön, D. A. (1993) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9781139173865.011 · Cited by 1,151 · see citing works
Algorithms as culture: Some tactics for the ethnography of algorithmic systems
Seaver, N. (2017) · Big Data & Society · doi:10.1177/2053951717738104 · Cited by 1,010 · see citing works
Empowered: Popular Feminism and Popular Misogyny
Banet-Weiser, S. (2018) · doi:10.1215/9781478002772 · Cited by 1,000 · see citing works
Abidin, C. (2016) · Media International Australia · doi:10.1177/1329878x16665177 · Cited by 936 · see citing works
(Not) Getting Paid to Do What You Love: Gender, Social Media, and Aspirational Work
Duffy, B. E. (2017) · Yale University Press · doi:10.12987/yale/9780300218176.001.0001 · Cited by 931 · cited 2× · see citing works
“Indeed, scholars have argued that visibility is necessary for engagement in various arenas including blogging and social media (Duffy, 2017), social justice (Banet-Weiser, 2018), and academia (Duffy & Pooley, 2017).”
BackgroundA New Algorithmic Identity: Soft Biopolitics and the Modulation of Control
Cheney-Lippold, J. (2011) · Theory, Culture & Society · doi:10.1177/0263276411424420 · Cited by 684 · see citing works
The digital person: technology and privacy in the information age
Solove, D. J. (2005) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.42-5512 · Cited by 607 · see citing works
“Having it All” on Social Media: Entrepreneurial Femininity and Self-Branding Among Fashion Bloggers
Duffy, B. E., & Hund, E. (2015) · Social Media + Society · doi:10.1177/2056305115604337 · Cited by 605 · see citing works
Sociological perspectives on identity formation: the culture–identity link and identity capital
CÔTÉ, J. E. (1996) · Journal of Adolescence · doi:10.1006/jado.1996.0040 · Cited by 522 · see citing works
The New Politics of Surveillance and Visibility
(2005) · University of Toronto Press eBooks · doi:10.3138/9781442681880 · Cited by 519 · see citing works
Life Online: Researching Real Experience in Virtual Space
Markham, A. N. (1998) · Cited by 495 · see citing works
The Future of Reputation: Gossip, Rumor, and Privacy on the Internet
Solove, D. J. (2007) · Scholarly Commons - George Washington University Law School (George Washington University) · Cited by 480 · see citing works
The corporate cultivation of digital resignation
Draper, N. A., & Turow, J. (2019) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/1461444819833331 · Cited by 419 · see citing works
Self-citationAuthentic: The Politics of Ambivalence in a Brand Culture
Jacobson, J. (2013) · Canadian Journal of Communication · doi:10.22230/cjc.2013v38n4a2699 · Cited by 389 · see citing works
New Media Campaigns and the Managed Citizen
Howard, P. N. (2005) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511615986 · Cited by 312 · see citing works
The limits of transparency: Data brokers and commodification
Crain, M. (2018) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/1461444816657096 · Cited by 237 · see citing works
The Intersectional Internet: Race, Sex, Class, and Culture Online
Noble, S., & Tynes, B. M. (2016) · doi:10.3726/978-1-4539-1717-6 · Cited by 217 · see citing works
The Oxford Handbook of Law, Regulation and Technology
Novitz, T. A. (2016) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199680832.001.0001 · Cited by 190 · see citing works
Algorithmically recognizable: Santorum’s Google problem, and Google’s Santorum problem
Gillespie, T. (2017) · Information, Communication & Society · doi:10.1080/1369118x.2016.1199721 · Cited by 178 · see citing works
Digital Contagions: A Media Archaeology of Computer Viruses
Parikka, J. (2007) · Cited by 177 · see citing works
Gendered Visibility on Social Media: Navigating Instagram’s Authenticity Bind
Duffy, B. E., & Hund, E. (2021) · mediastudies.press eBooks · doi:10.32376/3f8575cb.3f03db0e · Cited by 176 · see citing works
Performing a Vanilla Self: Respectability Politics, Social Class, and the Digital World
Pitcan, M., Marwick, A. E., & boyd, D. (2018) · Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication · doi:10.1093/jcmc/zmy008 · Cited by 164 · see citing works
Danger! Metaphors at Work in Economics, Geophysiology, and the Internet
Wyatt, S. (2004) · Science Technology & Human Values · doi:10.1177/0162243903261947 · Cited by 145 · see citing works
Introduction: risk and sociocultural theory
Lupton, D. A. (1999) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511520778.001 · Cited by 142 · see citing works
Birchall, C. (2014) · Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies · doi:10.1177/1532708613517442 · Cited by 123 · see citing works
“Facebook for Academics”: The Convergence of Self-Branding and Social Media Logic on Academia.edu
Duffy, B., & Pooley, J. (2017) · Social Media + Society · doi:10.1177/2056305117696523 · Cited by 107 · see citing works
Gandini, A. (2016) · Palgrave Macmillan UK eBooks · doi:10.1057/978-1-137-56107-7 · Cited by 105 · see citing works
Technologies of Speculation: The Limits of Knowledge in a Data-Driven Society
Hong, S.-H. (2020) · doi:10.18574/nyu/9781479860234.001.0001 · Cited by 96 · see citing works
The Costs of Privacy: Surveillance and Reputation in America.
Rule, J. B., & Nock, S. L. (1994) · Contemporary Sociology A Journal of Reviews · doi:10.2307/2075358 · Cited by 89 · see citing works
Data Is the New What? Popular Metaphors & Professional Ethics in Emerging Data Culture
Stark, L., & Hoffmann, A. L. (2019) · Journal of Cultural Analytics · doi:10.22148/16.036 · Cited by 65 · see citing works
Radically Transparent: Monitoring and Managing Reputations Online
Beal, A., & Strauss, J. P. (2008) · Cited by 59 · see citing works
Young, J. J. (2001) · Critical Perspectives on Accounting · doi:10.1006/cpac.2000.0455 · Cited by 53 · see citing works
Identity theft and the care of the virtual self
Whitson, J. R., & Haggerty, K. D. (2008) · Economy and Society · doi:10.1080/03085140802357950 · Cited by 47 · see citing works
FEMINISM, TECHNOLOGY AND THE INFORMATION SOCIETY Learning from the past, imagining the future
Wyatt, S. (2008) · Information Communication & Society · doi:10.1080/13691180701859065 · Cited by 45 · see citing works
Wood, T., & Aronczyk, M. (2020) · American Behavioral Scientist · doi:10.1177/0002764220945359 · Cited by 44 · see citing works
Transparency, Publicity, Democracy, and Markets: Inhabiting Tensions Through Hybridity
Edwards, L. (2020) · American Behavioral Scientist · doi:10.1177/0002764220945350 · Cited by 42 · see citing works
The Defining Decade: Why Your Twenties Matter--And How to Make the Most of Them Now
Jay, M. (2012) · Cited by 34 · see citing works
Pitfalls and promises of transparency in the digital age
Vujnović, M., & Kruckeberg, D. (2016) · Public Relations Inquiry · doi:10.1177/2046147x16635227 · Cited by 34 · see citing works
Apprehending public relations as a promotional industry
Aronczyk, M., Edwards, L., & Kantola, A. (2017) · Public Relations Inquiry · doi:10.1177/2046147x17706411 · Cited by 25 · see citing works
Salvation or destruction: Metaphors of the Internet
Johnston, R. (2009) · First Monday · doi:10.5210/fm.v14i4.2370 · Cited by 24 · see citing works
Schulte, S. R. (2016) · New York University Press eBooks · doi:10.18574/nyu/9780814708668.001.0001 · Cited by 23 · see citing works
The Face That Launched a Thousand Lawsuits
Lake, J. (2016) · Yale University Press eBooks · doi:10.12987/yale/9780300214222.001.0001 · Cited by 15 · see citing works
Metaphors of Internet: Ways of Being in the Age of Ubiquity
Grønning, A., Tiidenberg, K., & Markham, A. N. (2021) · University of Southern Denmark Research Portal (University of Southern Denmark) · Cited by 15 · see citing works
Wild west 2.0 : how to protect and restore your online reputation on the untamed social frontier
Fertik, M., & Thompson, D. (2010) · Cited by 14 · see citing works
Understanding the Impact of the Transnational Promotional Class on Political Communication
Aronczyk, M. (2015) · International journal of communication · Cited by 8 · see citing works
Reputation Anxiety: Consumer Background Checks and the Cultivation of Risk
Draper, N. A. (2019) · Communication Culture and Critique · doi:10.1093/ccc/tcz010 · Cited by 7 · see citing works
Self-citationSzpunar, P. M. (2018) · NYU Press eBooks · doi:10.2307/j.ctvf3w4j4 · Cited by 7 · see citing works
The reputation-management industry and the prospects for a “right to be forgotten” in the US
Medeiros, B. (2017) · First Amendment Studies · doi:10.1080/21689725.2017.1308262 · Cited by 4 · see citing works
Online Social Networks and Restrictions on College Athletes: Student Censorship?
Leslie, A. K. (2015) · Digital Commons-DePaul (DePaul University) · Cited by 1 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Dwivedi, Y. K., Hughes, L., Baabdullah, A. M., Ribeiro-Navarrete, S., Giannakis, M., Al-Debei, M. M., Dennehy, D., Metri, B., Buhalis, D., Cheung, C. M. K., et al. (2022) · International Journal of Information Management · doi:10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2022.102542 · Cited by 2,753 · see citing works
Autopsy of a metaphor: The origins, use and blind spots of the ‘infodemic’
Simon, F. M., & Camargo, C. Q. (2021) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/14614448211031908 · Cited by 115 · see citing works
Transparency, Publicity, Democracy, and Markets: Inhabiting Tensions Through Hybridity
Edwards, L. (2020) · American Behavioral Scientist · doi:10.1177/0002764220945350 · Cited by 42 · see citing works
Tactics of invisibility: How people in vulnerable positions make datafied everyday life livable
Talvitie–Lamberg, K., Lehtinen, V., & Valtonen, S. (2022) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/14614448221136077 · Cited by 31 · see citing works
Jiménez, C., & Edwards, L. (2022) · Communication and the Public · doi:10.1177/20570473221146661 · Cited by 26 · see citing works
Hernández-Tamurejo, Á., Fernández-Fernández, M., & González-Padilla, P. (2025) · European Journal of Innovation Management · doi:10.1108/ejim-07-2024-0811 · Cited by 11 · see citing works
Journalistic Visibility as Celebrity and its Consequences for Harassment
Miller, K. C., & Lewis, S. C. (2022) · Digital Journalism · doi:10.1080/21670811.2022.2136729 · Cited by 10 · see citing works
Chen, S., & Jiang, X. (2025) · Journal of Consumer Culture · doi:10.1177/14695405251330768 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
Häusler, L., & Baraghith, K. (2023) · Biology & Philosophy · doi:10.1007/s10539-023-09928-8 · Cited by 6 · see citing works
Blockbuster, Quotenhits, Shitstorms und virale Botschaften
Fürst, S. (2023) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-658-41172-5_8 · Cited by 2 · see citing works
Promoting Self-image in the Online Environment
Bratu, M. L., & Cioca, L. (2024) · Intelligent systems reference library · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-55952-5_8 · Cited by 2 · see citing works
Dwityas, N. A., Wahyuni, H. I., & Andarwati, S. (2025) · Gender Technology and Development · doi:10.1080/09718524.2025.2506957 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
Delivering personalised, digital experience
Kuksa, I., Skinner, M. K., Fisher, T. A., & Kent, T. (2023) · Elsevier eBooks · doi:10.1016/b978-0-08-101987-0.00017-5 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
Sholahuddin, M. I., & Damastuti, R. (2024) · Jurnal ISO Jurnal Ilmu Sosial Politik dan Humaniora · doi:10.53697/iso.v4i1.1744
Exploring value concerns in social media issue reports: a human-LLM study of Bluesky and Mastodon
Mougouei, D., Azarnik, A., Mougouei, E., Pham, S. H., Kinchin, N., & Senewiratne, S. (2026) · Behaviour and Information Technology · doi:10.1080/0144929x.2026.2686827
- Authors
- Draper, N. A.
- Affiliations
- University of New Hampshire (US)
- Corresponding author
- Draper, Nora A.
- ORCID
- Draper, Nora A.
- Venue
- American Behavioral Scientist
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2020-09-23
- Volume
- 64
- Issue
- 11
- Pages
- 1627-1645
- ISSN
- 0002-7642 (ISSN-L)
- 1552-3381
- OpenAlex
- W3088107892
- Cited by
- 15
- References
- 58
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 1 · 2020: 1
- FWCI
- 3.00
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- American Behavioral Scientist (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Privacy, Security, and Data Protection
- Social Sciences › Communication › Public Relations and Crisis Communication
- Social Sciences › Communication › Cultural Studies and Postmodernism
- Keywords
- online self-presentation, online reputation management, digital identity, visibility, invisibility, digital footprint, digital doppelgängers, metaphor, strategic transparency, privacy
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
