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Comment by eloff | Hacker News Reader

If that were true, influences wouldn’t exist. Clearly they can make money because they add value for people.

If that value is actually improving people’s lives it’s another matter, but from an economics standpoint it seems to exist.

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Advertising works because it is a psychological hack. Influencers are using the same hack and once it becomes more than a passion or hobby project then the monetary incentive perverts their judgement.

I'm all for people sharing their knowledge and hobbies to inform others but the term 'influencer' has a connotation in which they are earning money from 'influencing' others and that seems an awful lot like basic advertising to me.

>I'm all for people sharing their knowledge and hobbies to inform others

And I'm all for them getting paid to do so. I'm not sure where you draw the line. Is a cocktail influencer sharing a cool hobby or pushing a product? The answer is usually "both." So where do they fit in for you?

If the cocktail influencer started making videos with the intent of getting paid then their judgement is already clouded. Even if they decided they wanted to do the morally correct thing and give honest reviews, their livelihood now depends on this income and as such they are biased subconsciously. Ultimately they are self-employed advertisers. We need less advertising in this world, IMO.

So making movies with the intention of getting paid means my judgment is clouded? Can’t a job be a job? Does it have to always be in the service of some grander or more artistic purpose?

You aren't wrong. "Influencer" is another word for "manipulator" and the world sure doesn't need more ads, but companies wanting to take from us love influencers because a lot of people, children especially, consume that "content" without even recognizing that they're watching an ad.

I think you missed my point. The fact that these people have the audience that they have is because people want to see their content.

Whether or not they monetize that via advertising or not it’s largely irrelevant to that value proposition.

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