The social media and digital platforms we know and love and are possibly addicted to are… changing. Maybe a better word is converging. TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, even Facebook (gross) are all pushing us to make short form, vertical video. The same, the same, the same format across the many digital places we go to for entertainment, information and connection. And while there is a lot to dislike about these changes – particularly the way it has made Instagram borderline unusable – they are having an interesting effect on the influencer economy.
In the original, static image-based era of social media, the main commodity was beauty. In the video-based creator economy, you can’t just serve looks – the people want ideas. Let me explain.
Static-image beauty
Most people would credit Instagram with the birth of The Influencer – otherwise ordinary people who built celebrity-level followings and careers for being, mainly, hotties. The prime era of Instagram, between 2012 and 2015, established the stereotype of the career influencer: someone who gets lots of attention and makes lots of money simply for being objectively beautiful in photos.
On the photo- or static-imaged based version of the social Internet, being good looking is the commodity. Pre-Instagram, becoming famous on MySpace, Tumblr or Pinterest required the same (although it offered fewer commercial opportunities back then).
That’s not to say these influencers didn’t have other important and valuable skills. Lots of the most successful influencers from the Instagram era have loads of charisma and genuine talent in their industry. Tammy Hembrow certainly wouldn’t be well-known or rich today without legit business savvy; Nicole Warne (a.k.a Gary Pepper Girl) would not be a mainstay of the global fashion industry without her creative talent and personal style.
But at the core, looks are the commodity because that’s what grows the following, and the following is what brands are buying. Influencers on photo-based apps may also have other skills, but beauty is the requirement.
Short form video requires a message
On the video-based social Internet, looks alone aren’t quite cutting it. Even the terminology for this new era tells us what has changed – people with social media careers are no longer Influencers, they’re Creators. And in the Creator Economy, the commodity is ideas.
Videos have to give the viewer something to take away, an idea or a message. You must have something to say, both figuratively and literally (there’s audio, in most cases you have to speak).
It’s most noticeable in categories like fashion, beauty and lifestyle, where good looks in photographs used to be enough. Nicole Warne didn’t have to give advice in 2014, she had to wear beautiful outfits and look lovely in them (a skill of its own, of course). Now, the biggest, most successful fashion creators on TikTok are those who give styling tips, why-this-works outfit advice and answer questions from viewers. It’s less glossy fashion shoot, more advice column.
In the lifestyle category, you can’t just post aesthetic pictures of your day – you have to produce mini-vlogs, give restaurant recommendations, show your Sunday reset routine, explain how you style your coffee table. Bridal Instagram is an endless stream of stunning photographs; on Bridal TikTok (where I currently spend a lot of time for stage-of-life reasons), it’s less aesthetic than I expected. There are a lot of videos of people sitting at home in pyjamas, talking through a Notes app screenshot of the 33 things they wish they did at their wedding.
While there are definitely still examples of TikTok creators who are famous for ‘just’ being beautiful (internationally, the likes of Addison Rae, and locally Sophia Begg aka sophadophaa), there are fewer examples than on the Instagram of 2015. Even creators who post only thirst-traps still present some sort of entertainment concept, usually with an element of comedy or irony. Thoren Bradley’s account is one example – while the whole thing is just a vehicle for horny folks to ogle, he ultimately does still have to chop the wood.
In absence of a solid concept, hot young TikToker’s often default to a trademark Lazy Lip Sync – barely mouthing the words to a trending song, while recording themselves at flattering angles in a bathroom mirror. It’s the equivalent of the static selfie. Under these empty videos, it’s not uncommon to find sarcastic comments of of “Go girl, give us nothing.” And for what it’s worth, the Lazy Lip Sync method doesn’t seem to attract the kind of commercial partnerships that other creators can attain. To be honest, they would have fared better in the photo-socials era.
Of course, beauty still plays a big role in achieving success as a video creator. Not only are we humans visual creatures, but investigations into the TikTok revealed moderators have been told to suppress videos by “ugly” creators and those who don’t fit the conventional beauty standard.
But I’d argue that beauty is amplifying the success that people are achieving – it’s not the commodity being sold. To build a following on the video-based Internet, you have to have ideas and information to sell.
@wisdm8 Reply to @cenajohnfr ♬ original sound – Wisdom Kaye
Less ‘vacuous’, more dangerous?
It is tempting to think video’s focus on ideas will make the new creator economy ‘better’ than the comparatively empty Instagram-era. Taking the focus off looks alone and requiring content with substance could only be a good thing, right?
Unfortunately, this new landscape is still governed by algorithms that reward ‘engagement’ – often code for ‘outrage’. Engagement-based content algorithms can radicalise people in just days.
So while video demands that you present an idea for others to engage with, it does not need this idea to be high quality, helpful or backed by evidence. It has paved the way for dangerous ideas to become ‘trends’ – for example, so-called ‘alpha male’ podcasts that seem to exist only in snippet clips on TikTok. Whether or not the full-length episodes have a big listenership is irrelevant, because the most offensive and outrageous clips can be uploaded to TikTok, Reels or YouTube Shorts for mass consumption.
These antisocial and damaging ideas have always been circulated online, but in their attempt to bully us all into this one format the apps have created in-built tools to make video editing and production very easy. That fun little tool for you to edit a 40-second highlight of a weekend away, also lowered the barrier to entry for grifters with bad intentions.
Maybe I was just living a blessed existence, but I had simply never heard of Andrew Tate before his insane, angry takes started showing up on my TikTok feed. He and people like him are benefiting immensely from the universal push to short-form video, and the way the algorithms are hungry for ideas regardless of whether those ideas are worthy of being shared.
So while asking everyone to show up in video format is undeniably a shift, the jury is still out on whether it’s for the better.
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