I don't doubt that there are many things that can be explained with psychology around __why__ we take selfies, but I feel that this is a perfect case of Occam's razor. As in we take selfies because we want to take a photo of ourselves, and the easiest way to do that is to do it yourself. I can imagine you would get considerable less selfies taken if it would actually require another person taking the photo for you (while still making it qualify as a selfie).

> I feel that this is a perfect case of Occam's razor. As in we take selfies because we want to take a photo of ourselves

I think this is just jumping up a level of abstraction, abstracting away precisely what this article is attempting to explain.

As a counterpoint, when I was grew up it was very common to ask a random passerby to take a picture of you while you posed. Maybe we don't do that anymore because we've become too accustomed to doing it ourselves, maybe we're just too isolated from each other to invite/allow others into our lives, if even for fifteen seconds.

If we're considering all possibilities, I think you need to consider the possibility that it's simply because we have front-facing cameras now, so taking it yourself is much easier than it used to be. It's hard to take a selfie with a traditional camera.

Hint: it does not matter who takes the photo. It matters who is on the photo.

I love that the event included “a self-customisation bar”. Do you think you could amputate a limb? Or far more exciting to me, add one?

This tantalizing phrase was sadly not explained by the article.