The Capitalization of the Self. The Face Between Seduction and Monetization

This article aims to explore webcamming – a digital activity in which many individuals have begun using webcams for live sex performances – a sector that offers spectators the opportunity to interact in real-time. The study examines how digital self-representations transition from “seductive models of meaning communication” (Soro 2021), with a particular focus on the capitalization of intimacy, the new criteria of self-exposure in digitalized environments, and how bodies are perceived and evaluated. The paper seeks to present an additional monetizable configuration of identity that tends toward a networked self, analyzing cam sites and paid platforms in relation to case studies from the worlds of cinema and contemporary art. This scenario has also influenced contemporary relationships, now increasingly based on a “contractual relationship” (Benasayag and Schmit 2018), shaping a society that, by virtue of its hypervisibility, is defined as “pornographic” (Han 2014). All of this is facilitated by the ubiquity enabled by new media devices, which operate in an ongoing “on” mode, as summarized by the slogan 24/7 (Crary 2015). The smartphone, in this context, becomes the prosthesis of desire that ensures continuity between body, image, and commodity.