Purpose – The activities of academic researchers are increasingly regulated by neo-liberal ideals, includingexpectations that researchers are visible online and actively promote their output. The purpose of this paper isto explore how researchers take on this responsibility. It uses the concepts of genre, authorship and self-writingin order to understand how the story of an academic life is constructed on academic web profiles.

Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative content analysis was conducted of material on 64 profilesbelonging to 20 researchers on institutional and personal websites, as well as on ResearchGate, Academica.edu and Google Scholar.

Findings – The study shows that while institutional websites primarily contain researcher-producedmaterial, content on commercial platforms is often co-constructed through distributed authorship by theresearcher, the platform and other platform users. Nine different ways in which the profile of an “academicself” may be said to highlight the particular strengths of a researcher are identified. These include bothmetrics-based strengths and qualitative forms of information about the academic life, such as experience, theimportance of their research and good teaching.

Social implications – This study of academic web profiles contributes to a better understanding of howresearchers self-govern the story of their academic self, or resist such governance, in online environments.

Originality/value – The study furthers the knowledge of how researchers make use of and respond todigital tools for online visibility opportunities and how the story of the “academic self” is “made” for suchpublic presentation.