Keep scrolling for why America won’t miss TikTok, allegedly.
What’s the Price of a Childhood Turned Into Content?
Discussions about putting children on the internet without their consent (or without their ability to give it) have exploded in recent months — largely thanks to the arrest and sentencing of Ruby Franke. In a piece for Cosmopolitan, Fortesa Latifi delves into the unregulated world of sharenting, speaking to the daughter of a mommy vlogger and other creators.
The former child influencer remained anonymous in the piece. However, she shared many details of her experience growing online.
She reveals that being a part of a vlogging family "was the equivalent of having a full-time job," recalling instances when she spent hours recording content with her mother, encroaching upon her schooling and social activities.
“If it seemed like I wasn’t trying hard enough to maintain that image…that would usually devolve into accusing me of not caring about our family. I was told by my mom, ‘Do you want us to starve? Do you want us to not be able to make our payment next month on the mortgage?’" she tells Latifi.
With content being part of every aspect of life, she struggled to discern between what was genuine and what was produced solely for social media. This left her feeling confused and also strained her relationship with her mother.
“Being an influencer kid turned my relationship with my mom into more of an employer-employee relationship than a parent-child one…Once you cross the line from being family to being coworkers, you can’t really go back,” she continues.
To make matters worse, she didn’t even receive any compensation for her work before the age of 18.
Given that the viral space is highly unregulated, this is the reality for many child vloggers. Only one state in the United States, Illinois, ensures that child influencers receive a percentage of the money they help earn.
However, as the conversation around family vlogging takes centre stage, an increasing number of family vloggers appear to be setting aside funds for their children's future.
For instance, Latifi spoke with Garrett Gee of the Bucket List Family and Adrea Garza of the Garza Crew, both of whom save money from their brand deals for their children.
Though family vloggers may be taking more steps to support their children, continuously posting them online puts them in vulnerable situations.
“[For child influencers] getting a paycheck won’t give them back what they lost—a normal childhood unobstructed by the cameras pushed into their faces. But it could be the beginning of some version of restitution…” Latifi adds.
Read the story via Cosmopolitan.
The Kate Middleton scandal shows the worst of a generative-AI-filled social media world
Everyone online is obsessed with the Royals—and no, this time, it's not because Trisha Paytas is pregnant with a royal reincarnate. Internet users are convinced that things with Princess Catherine, a.k.a. Kate Middleton, are sus. In a new piece for Fast Company, Chris Stokel-Walker explores how the AI revolution heightens this sort of conspiratorial mindset in the digital space.
For the uninitiated, Kate hasn’t been spotted publicly since having abdominal surgery in January. While the Palace maintains that she is recovering at home, internet users aren’t so sure.
Attempting to quell any rumours, the Palace released a photo of Kate with her children for Mother’s Day this week. Soon after the picture was shared, internet users noticed visual inconsistencies, prompting press agencies to withdraw the photo from circulation.
In a twist (that no one expected), Kate later admitted to editing the photo herself in a statement. Of course, no one believed this to be the truth, further fuelling the rumour mill.
In the AI era, internet users are becoming increasingly skeptical about what is posted from ‘official’ accounts.
Sociologist Gemma Milne tells Stokel-Walker that “debates around trust in digital media due to generative-AI advancements, [leave] us with challenging verification tasks [and] debates about what counts as a ‘real’ image.”
This distrust intensifies when it comes to public figures. People tend to feel a sense of entitlement to know every aspect of a celebrity's private life. This sentiment is amplified for the Royals, especially amid the UK's economic challenges and the privilege associated with the Royal family.
Such expectations, coupled with the growth of AI, suggests that speculation and conspiracy regarding public figures will not slow down anytime soon— especially when it comes to Kate.
“There are a number of issues that the case of the Photoshopped princess highlights; but above all, it helps show how we have entered a new era in which we need to be more suspicious of what we see. It used to be the case that seeing was believing. Not anymore!“ Stokel-Walker concludes.
Read the full piece via Fast Company.
Everyone’s writing sounds the same now
As AI makes it harder to differentiate between fact and fiction, it often feels like the whole internet is merging into a single mass of information. Eliza McLamb of the words from eliza newsletter reflects on how people communicate on the internet.
From the Barbie movie to "Girl Dinner" to the coquette aesthetic, 2023 really was the year of girlhood. Alongside it came a plethora of content and essays exploring the different experiences of womanhood or the life of a "twenty-something" teenage girl.
While mainstream culture welcomed anything and everything girl last year, it seems that social media users are already sick of this genre of content.
“[There] is a certain fatigue at the young-woman-writer-type and their increasing prevalence,” Eliza reflects.
She explains how the girlification of culture might just be another example of the ever-changing and fast-paced trend cycle.
“This whole thing, in my view, is a series of cycles that have happened and will happen forever and ever in culture,” Eliza writes. “Something is at first new and niche, then becomes popular, then becomes the norm (widely replicated with varying results), then is rejected and probably embraced again twenty to thirty years later.”
But just because there is an excess of girl-adjacent essays doesn't mean they are not useful or important—especially for budding writers.
“There will always be new innovations that create their own historical cannon and inevitable copycats that trail behind them. I’m not saying that every “girl essay” is good. It’s not. A lot of them are bad… But most of the failures here are simply natural parts of any young writer’s process and they should be allowed and even encouraged to happen,” she adds.
As the "Substack industrial complex" gains momentum and essays about girlhood proliferate, various audiences will connect with different perspectives, even if some themes seem repetitive.
“We can all pull from the well of beauty and feeling and meaning and it will never run out. We may all be telling the same stories over and over again, but they will mean different things to every person who encounters them,” she adds. “We can see the shape of our own stories in a feeling shared by millions, and millions may see their feelings in the shape of one particular story.”
Read the piece via the words from eliza Substack.
There has long been talk of a TikTok ban in the United States. But this week, the US House of Representatives took a significant step, voting for ByteDance (TikTok’s parent company) to divest from the app or face a country-wide ban. Kate Lindsay reflects on the vote for The Atlantic, concluding that “America won’t miss TikTok.”
For better or for worse, TikTok has transformed internet culture. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, TikTok has dominated the world of short-form video, emerging as the buzziest place to consume content and build a following.
But, as Lindsay notes, TikTok is not the preferred social media platform for many Americans.
“In a recent Pew survey, a third of adults said they had ever used TikTok—about half the percentage of people who have used Facebook, and slightly less even than Pinterest,” she writes. “In another recent Pew survey, 63 percent of 13-to-17-year-olds said they’re on TikTok—but more are on YouTube, and Snapchat is nearly as popular as TikTok.”
Lindsay goes on to suggest that TikTok may have already peaked, explaining that the longevity of a social media platform depends on its ability to build its user base.
As more Millennials join and post on the app, she questions whether “TikTok is beginning to struggle with” Gen Z and Gen Alpha.
“Millennials are its fastest-growing demographic, and they are more likely to actually post something. If this demographic continues to dominate, it’s hard to see how TikTok remains the hub for internet and youth culture,” she continues.
Aside from the demographic breakdown of TikTok users, the app has been going downhill. From UMG pulling its catalog to the introduction of TikTok Shop, users are already frustrated with the platform, with many longing for the 2019 era of TikTok.
“Those who are loyal to TikTok will tell you that the good old days are long gone. It went from a plaything for regular people—the dancing tweens, the animal antics—to a stage for brands and creators, and continues to make moves that push itself further from its original premise,” Lindsay reflects.
As TikTok struggles to find its footing in 2024 and other apps copy its format (looking at you, YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels), a TikTok ban feels less and less significant.
Read the story via The Atlantic.
Has The Era Of Brand Trips Run Its Course?
While internet culture may be on the brink of another change with a looming TikTok ban, users wonder whether it's time for influencer marketing practices to shift. In a piece for Rolling Stone, CT Jones questions whether companies should reconsider sponsoring fully-funded trips for creators.
Tarte recently took a bunch of influencers to Bora Bora for a brand trip— a year after the makeup company faced massive amounts of backlash for unequal treatment on a trip last year.
In January 2023, Tarte took beauty creators from around the world to Dubai on an all-expenses-paid vacation. As the attendees shared content from the trip, social media was flooded with opinions on the brand’s decision to spend such an exorbitant amount of money amid a pending recession.
Tarte faced criticism months later after flying a group of creators to the Turks and Caicos for “Tarte Island” (a play on the reality show Love Island). One creator who attended, Shawtysin, took to TikTok to share her experience, noting that there was some unequal treatment on the trip — with the brand seemingly favouring white creators.
The makeup company’s most recent trip was not shrouded in controversy (for a change). However, many internet users are frustrated with Tarte, claiming that the trip was in “poor taste for rewarding creators who are already successful and could have probably used their own money for a vacation.”
“I think the reason [Tarte’s] receiving this backlash is because it feels quite tone-deaf with the sort of economic climate that most of us are [in],” Ed East, co-founder and group CEO of Billion Dollar Boy, tells Jones.
While many average TikTok users feel disappointed by Tarte, these types of all-expenses paid trips are not necessarily meant to cater to them.
“All-expenses-paid trips aren’t just about selling products, they’re about building a community of creators who want to work with them — which can produce a return on investment much larger than the cost of a few private planes and some waterfront bungalows,” Jones writes.
So long as influencers wield power in social media, it’s unlikely that these brand trips will stop any time soon. Ultimately, Tarte is gaining visibility — whether it's positive or negative, they're increasing brand recognition and that is always the goal.
“The hashtag #tarteborabora has 37 million videos on TikTok alone — which doesn’t include the thousands of followers each trip attendee has gained since leaving their island retreat,” she continues. “If Tarte’s goal was eyes, they have them by the millions.”
Read the piece via Rolling Stone.