What do they actually do all day? If you can believe the Instagram profile “InfluencersintheWild” (3.9 million followers, for comparison: Kim Kardashian has 210 million), then they make mostly nonsense: One lolls on all fours in the spray on a beach another tries a balancing act between the fenders of two sports cars, the third does gymnastics in a plastic ball through a park, the fourth pulls her panties out of her buttock during a bikini shoot. What connects everyone (otherwise we wouldn’t know anything about it): You are photographed or filmed in the process.
The influencer profession is one of the most ridiculed of today. Despite the often seven-digit number of followers, just to be on the safe side: Influencers are mostly young people who have become prominent on social media and who shape their fans’ purchase decisions, opinions and behavior through their posts. To put it in the old-fashioned way: Influencers are stars who let the world take part in their lives practically non-stop. Or at least a significant part of it. They earn money by testing products, putting them on and holding them in front of the camera. Or more recently, by designing new products with brands. “Business of Fashion” has just reported that cooperation with influencers is playing an increasingly important part of the marketing and communication strategies of fashion companies. In a sense, a successful influencer is a model, customer and designer in one.
What do you post when trips and branded jobs are canceled?
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Like every new youth culture, this is also analyzed and criticized. The German journalist Nena Schink described in a book how she became addicted to Instagram and went so far as to photograph herself in a bikini on an inflatable flamingo – to this day it is not entirely clear what is problematic about it. The fast-paced Netflix mockumentary “Follow Me” appeared as early as 2017, in which the influencer, when asked “Do you take selfies?”, Just snapped in dismay: “Is that a question?” Now the authors Ole Nymoen and Wolfgang M. Schmitt have it Subject made. Your book “Influencer. The ideology of advertising bodies ”appeared in the predictable influencer-skeptical, but naturally glorious Edition Suhrkamp – whose rainbow design is super instagramable, by the way.
The authors are serious: The meticulous references range from “Prokla. Journal of Critical Social Science ”to the article“ Foucault, Ugly Ducklings and Techno Swans – Fat Hatred, Slimming Surgery and Biomedicalized Ideals of Beauty in America ”. Adorno, Marx and Fukuyama also have their say, of course. Unlike the influencers, who don’t even mention them by name. Which is a rather helpless (or very self-confident) approach, not to provide the subjects of consideration with additional acquaintance.
Front rows for Instagram stars
“National parks have already complained about the devastating onslaught of selfie celebrities; In Paris, streets that are particularly suitable for photos were closed to protect the residents ”, write Nymoen and Schmitt in their foreword:“ The consumer goods industry, on the other hand, welcomes the new celebrities with open arms: Their portraits adorn a growing number of product lines in supermarkets and drugstores; Trade journalists have to move to the back seats at fashion shows because the front rows are reserved for Instagram stars with millions of followers. ”One wonders if it was so different when Kate Moss ruled the world. And during her decades-long career, she only uttered one meaningful sentence in public.
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“Fake Famous”, a new reality series on US broadcaster HBO, also tells the way to digital fame. “More than any other profession, America’s youngsters want digital fame,” says the trailer. In this respect, it was more of a rhetorical question with which the director Nick Bilton was looking for three actors: “Do you want to be famous?” wants to turn fake luxury trips into internet stars.
“I take tranquilizers, but who doesn’t?” Says one of them, but the idea of the format is only half-speed. Casted boy and girl groups, for example, have sufficiently proven that you can make stars out of any number of people. In any case, it is not proof of the fatal power of social media. Because in the days of the Bay City Rollers there was no internet. Their faux-Scottish outfits would have been perfect for Instagram or TikTok. Immediately recognizable even with the most fleeting wiping over it.
Questionable teen app
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This is considered one of the original sins of the social media society. She subjects everything to her addiction to strong, quick, visual stimuli. Fashion, art, food, your own body – everything has to be extra clear. Outdoor sculptures at the Venice Biennale as well as the lips of Kylie Jenner, the new Prada gloves with the attached mini logo pockets like the avocado toast, which has become so cliché that the “Fake Famous” candidate herself Dominique Druckman boasts on her Instagram profile that she hates avocado.
“For many people it is already outrageous when they say I”, Theodor W. Adorno once said. Today, young people reportedly take an average of 25,000 selfies over the course of their lives. Influencer probably even more per week. A large part of these pictures show beautiful, slim, sporty people doing sport, eating healthy food, having “fun”. Is that a balanced view of man? Certainly not. Was that different in the past? Of course not. From Elvis to Grammy record holder Beyoncé, idols were almost always slim and above average attractive.
In fact, however, social media has tended to encourage the acceptance of other skin colors and body shapes. The hotly controversial topic of diversity today has also been driven by influencers. It is doubtful whether they have always been in line with the academic discourse. When many influencers only posted black squares on June 2nd, #blackouttuesday, after the murder of George Floyd, opportunism may also have played a role, but would a duckface selfie by the hotel pool have been more appropriate?
Feminism in front of luxury hotel in Dubai
The fact that Russian influencers play homeless people in short films and stage naive ways out of their misery is a piquant detail in the book by Nymoen and Schmitt. “Nothing prevents successful influencers from appropriating socially relevant topics that have long been plowed up by only a few committed activists, such as anti-racism or climate policy, and stealing the big stage from the real experts,” they write.
Indeed, when trying to be “woke” and committed, things often go wrong. Nymoen and Schmitt describe an influencer who is invited to Dubai by the cosmetics chain Douglas, where she holds a poster with a feminist slogan in front of the camera, of course in front of the luxury hotel “Burj Al-Arab”. Nice and stupid from the drugstore chain, nice and stupid from the influencer, only Dubai Marketing can be happy: The hashtag #mydubai has already been used 33 million times.
Sought-after luxury paradise
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The book “Influencer” begins with the opening scene of “American Psycho” (2000), the morning fitness program of the murdering yuppie Patrick Bateman. Apart from the Robert Longo on the wall (too expensive), it could also be the start of the day for an influencer: 1000 sit-ups, ice mask, water-active cleansing gel, honey-almond body peeling, herbal mint mask, etc.
The scene is a visionary look into a world that is shaped by outward appearances and self-presentation. With the influencers, according to the authors, we have arrived at the matrix: a hermetic world of simulation. The codes of a youth movement, however, and influencerism is nothing else, are often indecipherable for older people. And a makeup tutorial can be just as entertaining as Bateman’s morning routine.
Caro daur (2.8 million Instagram followers). Always wide awake and extremely smart from Hamburg, permanent guest at fashion shows in Milan and Paris (when they still existed). Keeps himself fit with kickboxing. Has really big abs and a goofy sense of humor.
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Chancellor Louisa Dellert
Source: picture alliance / Bernd Kammerer
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Louisa Dellert (455,000 followers). So-called Sinnfluencerin (or Greenfluencerin): homosexuality, feminism, ecology, mask affair – with her topics she could be the Chancellor candidate of the Greens. Collect rubbish while jogging.
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Sports teacher Pamela Reif
Quelle: Getty Images
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Pamela Reif (7.5 million followers). In the “Forbes” list “30 under 30”. Your Pam app offers 360-degree fitness from shopping lists to high-intensity training. Admitted in an interview with ICONIST: “When I sleep, I don’t look perfect either.”
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