Branded Selves: How Children Relate to Marketing on a Social Network Site

Abstract

During the past few years, the use of so-called social network sites has been a rapidly growing trend in young people’s communication on the Internet. This chapter explores how marketing affects a group of 11–12 year old classmates’ use of a network site called Piczo. Piczo enables young people to create “sites with multiple pages featuring photos, graphics, guest books, comment boards, music, and more” (www.piczo.com ). Social connections are made explicit and social networking emerges when users subsequently link their pages to those of their friends.