TRANSCRIPT – How Selfie Culture Took Over the World

“If you didn’t take a selfie, it didn’t really happen.”

Selfies are more popular than ever, but lately this trend has turned deadly with
people falling off the Grand Canyon and being struck by trains. It begs the
question, just how far people are willing to go for their personal brands.

Why do you think people are taking those selfies?

I see it for Instagram, I’m like, you take pictures and you post them, or social
media in general, and you want to get all those likes, and you know cool, and
you were so close and you did that.

Essentially, you want up the ante, so you take more and more amazing photos
in more and more riskier places because those draw views.

With social media and stuff, it’s kind of people are always trying to one-up
each other.

Trying to compete, always trying to one-up each other. We saw some people
sitting on the edge of Brooklyn Bridge earlier today, and I thought how silly
that was.

Once you build this up over months, weeks, years, all these pictures of you
doing a certain thing, then all of a sudden it’s like, oh, I can maybe market this?

And you usually got to do a little funny face.

Okay, okay, duck face

Are you a brand if you’re not a celebrity?

Yeah, I have a brand, and like anything that I love, I consider my brand and I
just showcase it. I posted a picture of us at a cute brunch place.

For me, I’m a dancer for a living, so I obviously post every job I do, which feels
very narcissistic of me, but I feel like I have to do that to get more jobs.
What you’re selling is your market value, so people recognize you, you know
that’s why companies pay you a lot of money to put your face in front of their
products, to draw market attention.

Why are you taking a selfie?

I think for us, we sort of have a reputation online, and like, oh we travel here,
we travel there, like we have to look good. Like, we actually carry a spare bag
of like changing clothes, makeup.

It’s the norm now to post a picture to wherever you’re at, mostly with your
face in it, and it’s like how interesting you are. You know, you are a traveler, or
do you just sort of like stay in your comfort zone? And so everyone is branding
themselves.