The Clothes I Wear
While I’m rarely active on Facebook anymore, I am tagged in photos especially when I hanging out with friends. The picture up above was at an Indian wedding, and the clothes that we’re wearing in the picture are our fancy-dress Indian clothing. I’m emphasizing fancy dress because, I often get advertisements for expensive Indian clothing websites on my Facebook home page. If you actually look through my Facebook, you would see that, while I’m not always dressed in Indian attire, there are more than a handful of pictures that have been taken at Indian parties and weddings that would probably have garnered enough evidence that I am interested in Indian fashion, or so Facebook believes anyways.
I would therefore go further to say that my clothing is the biggest influence on the advertisements that appear on my social media. In a few of my Facebook photos, I have been wearing NC State attire. This not only encourages ads that are relevant to NC State students such as student housing ads, but also ads that are relevant to college students like credit card promotions that are specifically targeted towards students. Another key item of clothing that has influenced the promotional content on my Facebook is my Marvel t-shirt. Just a few photos of it and suddenly I’m seeing advertisements for the next Marvel film (those, I don’t mind as much).
I am a person who doesn’t really put too much thought into what I wear everyday, but now I’m becoming more aware of the fact that anytime a picture of me is posted on the internet, my clothing might determine whether or not I see expensive Indian fashion or the new promo for the next superhero film. It’s as intriguing as it is unsettling.
I loved your point about how strange it is that the Internet could assume you are a fancy person, just because you have a lot of pictures in fancy clothes. I have had a similar experience on my own profile. The irony is that I am rarely in fancy clothes, so if I do happen to be wearing something extravagant, I am quick to document the moment since it comes so rarely. Thanks so much for participating in this homework assignment, you did a great job!