Appendices

Appendix I: List of Influencers

• @tamkhan

• @brpraak

• @olafarahat

• @karenwazen

• @supercarblondie

• @_avelentina

• @millimidwood

• @Kween_Kamm

• @monzgupta

• @kimkardashian

• @hushpuppy

• @lilmiquela

• @shudugram

• @raniaofficial

• @a_hinda

• @wheremyfoodat

• @rsbelhasa

• @hudabeauty

• @trillionairelife

• @amyroko

• @hadeelmarei

• @Ranoy_

• @arabianfox

• @mounirlazzez

• @britneyspears

• @loganpaul

• @black_arab_official

• @Tracey (pseudonym)

• @justin (pseudonym)

• @danbilzerian

• @richkidsdubai

• @housemaid.supplier

• @massagedubai;

• @massageindubainext678;

• @serves_massager_full_in_duabi

• @girls_dubai8

• @girl_dubai_russian_full

• @miyhang40

• @areeshay_soomro

• @kavyaadahal

• @kymallysa

• @jyo_john_mullor

• @notaspace

• @esl_zayed

Appendix II: Case Studies

1. #Hashtag and Starfish Influencer Agency

2. @wheremyfoodat

3. @rsbelhasa

4. @hudabeauty

5. @Ranoy_

6. @arabianmeercat

7. @mounirlazzez

8. Dubai's case of British Influence

9. @Tracey

10. @black_arab_official

11. @justin

12. Case of Global Media Insight

13. Case of Mobile Migrant Women's use of TikTok

14. @jyo_john_mullor

15. Case of #notaspace

Appendix III: Glossary

• Affordances: uses of an application and/or platform

• City-branding: strategic promotion of a city's identity

• Cityscape: visual conception and imaginaries of a city

• Cultural sensibilities: cultural value system

• Diegesis: narrative world

• Decolonial: disruption of colonial values and ways of thinking

• Deterritorialisation: forces bringing labouring populations into working-class sectors and spaces of wealthy societies

• Fantastical authenticity: glamourised portrayal of the everyday or authentic

• Gamification: adding game mechanics into nongame environments

• Genealogy: family tree of relationships

• Global South: theoretical concern with geographical locations, cultures and social actors beyond the west

• Hegemony: dominance

• Ideology: belief system

• Imagined communities: conceptual communities

• Influencer: person of influence who impacts the living, buying and political beliefs of others

• Like economy: affective metrics collected by platforms via users' emoji response tabs.

• Mediatisation: multiple forms of content calibrated in numerous formats

• Platformisation: domination of the Internet by a few large companies whose products work as markets between users and other sellers.

• Platform capitalism: profit-driven logics of big tech

• Playbour: hybrid form of play and labour, specifically in social media and the digital games industry.

• Pentimento/i: a visible trace of earlier painting beneath a layer or layers of paint on a canvas. The term is refashioned in this study to explore postdigital visual layers of people, places and cityscapes.

• Postdigital: critical term indicating the merging of the offline/online sphere due to ubiquitous Wi-Fi.

• Postcolonial: cultural, political and economic legacy of colonialism and imperialism

• Scopic regimes: complex sets of aesthetic cultural codes and visual practices

• Self-branding: an individual's public image that demonstrates his or her values and overall reputation.

• Self-(re)presentation: display of the self via icons, symbols or indexical signs

• Semiosis: how signs come together to create meaning via interpretation

• Semiosphere: fluid, interactive aspects of culture

• Superdiversity: new patterns of social, cultural, political and economic migration

Appendix IV: List of Acronyms

• Global Media Insight (GMI)

• Middle East and North Africa (MENA)

• Mobile migrant women (MMW)

• United Arab Emirates (UAE)

• United Kingdom (UK)

• Word of mouth (WOM)