Capitalism moved from commodifying having to commodifying appearing.

Evidence

At the time of writing in the 1960s, television and advertising had forcefully unleashed an overflow of images that saturated social life. Lived experiences became reified and removed into an orbit of representations that was ultimately inaccessible, out of reach. Yet revealingly, the pull of that era’s illusionary capitalist promises (e.g., of consumption) remained active (that is, visible), even though they were no longer being fulfilled. Commodification of having was thus superseded by commodification of appearing, and sociality itself became an object of value exchange. — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 304

Categorization

• SEED: The thesis that appearance-sociality itself became a value-exchange commodity is a strong angle for an essay tying visual culture to financialized self-promotion.
• FICTION: A world where sociality is literally traded as value would be a sharp speculative-fiction premise about late-stage spectacle capitalism.
• XREF: connects to: Capitalism commodified things for their exchange value, not their intrinsic worth — Yanis Varoufakis, Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism, 122; Under spectacle capitalism, appearing replaced having as the commodity exchanged — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living with…, 304; Under always-on capitalism, partying itself has become unpaid work that creates value. — Mark Fisher, Ghosts of My Life: Writings on…, 463 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Under spectacle capitalism, appearing replaced having as the commodity exchanged #corroborates (0.95) — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 304