protection racket

"racket" はこれまでに二度（9/19/2013と3/18/2008）に取り上げていますが、Reader's Digest 5月号の記事に次のように出てきた "protection racket" の意味がピンと来ません。
SOCIAL MEDIA feels like a protection racket. Your reputation will be murdered unless you join in this thing that is, in significant part, about murdering reputations. Why would I want to feed that machine?
"protection racket" を辞書で確認します。
・Collins Dictionary: informal a criminal activity in which money gangsters extort money from victims in exchange for freedom from molestation ⇒ ran a major protection racket involving 100 pubs and bars Wikipediaにも "protection racket" の項目があり、次の説明がありました。
Protection rackets are often indistinguishable in practice from extortion rackets since, for the latter, there will be an implied threat that the racketeers themselves may attack the business if it fails to pay for their protection. In an extortion racket, the racketeers agree simply to not attack a business. In a protection racket the criminals agree to defend a business from any attack. Conversely, extortion racketeers will have to defend their clients if threatened by a rival gang to avoid the client transferring their allegiance.