MEDIA- How Social Media Creators Are Writing Our Future. A new book gives a social history of how the internet has transformed our lives. Reviewed by Jessica Schrader
Against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, misinformation about the virus and vaccines spread online. Therefore, many public health leaders partnered with social influencers in attempts to educate audiences they couldn’t reach through more traditional modes.
We’ll only see more of that in the future, argues Taylor Lorenz, a tech columnist at The Washington Post, and the author of Extremely Online: The Untold Story of Fame, Influence, and Power on the Internet.
The book is a social history of the last 20 years of our increasingly online lives.
I talked with her about what she’s learned throughout her career reporting on the front lines of the internet, and how social media platforms have transformed society.
Why did you write this book?
TL: I wanted to write a kind of people's history of the internet. I wanted to talk about the rise of social media from the user perspective and specifically through the lens of the half-trillion-dollar content creator industry. This narrative has been completely left out of the Silicon Valley corporate stories you'll read in books on the platforms themselves. Although I do love those books and read them, they really only tell one side of the story. I wanted to tell a different story, and force people to reexamine this recent history of the internet.
What lessons can we learn about the rise of the online creator industry?
TL: Many millions of people are not served by the traditional media landscape that speaks almost exclusively to rich, conservative, white men. This is a very narrow audience and it's a very ideologically homogeneous group of men. If the creator industry has taught us anything, it's that we have a much wider range of perspectives on issues than are represented in the traditional media.
How have influencers utilized their platforms for good, upholding democracy and speaking to audiences the establishment media is missing?
TL: A lot of creators have used their platform for good. People like Aidan Kohn-Murphy from Gen-Z for Change and other creators like Victoria Hammett use their platform to push for progressive values and change. It's really crucial for content creators to push back on the establishment media and fact-check information, and not simply accept what the establishment media says about a specific issue. Content creators are often the ones holding the establishment accountable. Look at the young Gen Z content creator Elise Joshi who pressed the White House press secretary on Biden's record on climate change and approving drilling projects. It's really crucial to have a robust independent media ecosystem to fact-check traditional corporate media and institutional power.
How is influencer culture reshaping the health ecosystem?
TL: Influencer culture and the creator economy has warped our health ecosystem. Because most people in this country don't have access to robust health care, they turn to the internet and specifically health care influencers and lifestyle influencers to tell them how to keep healthy and how to manage sickness. They're turning to psychologists on TikTok, for instance, to try to self-diagnose certain conditions or they're looking to big Twitter personalities to decide whether or not to get the latest COVID vaccine.
Pharmaceutical companies have recognized this for years. That's why they spend a massive amount of money on influencer marketing and why you have an entire industry of patient influencers who essentially act as small media companies informing people about their specific diagnosis.
How can influencers push back against misinformation being spread online?
TL: Content creators are the new media, and so it's crucial that they're responsible in how they educate and inform their audience. But a creator can't effectively educate their audience if they themselves don't have a robust understanding of media literacy. The first thing that needs to happen is more content creators need to learn how to discern what's misinformation and not misinformation before they can educate their audience. This means talking to experts in different subject areas, building relationships with reliable journalists, and having a trusted circle of people that they can fact-check information with before sharing it to their broader audience.
How has the creator industry disrupted traditional gatekeeping in publishing and art?
TL: The creator industry has completely upended the media ecosystem and the entertainment world. It's reshaped pretty much every single aspect of our society. That's why things like #BookTtok emerge, where instead of book reviews, TikToks about books are what drive sales now. You see it in sports with young athletes able to sign major brand deals and getting recruited because of clips of them that have gone viral online. Even Dr. Fauci worked with influencers to talk about the vaccines when he was promoting the COVID vaccination for young people. He didn't he didn't go to traditional celebrities—he went to these TikTokers and content creators because at this point these creators are more influential than traditional celebrities.
How can the creator industry tell stories that are more representative of our communities, with voices that are often ignored in more traditional media?
TL: The content creator ecosystem inherently operates outside the traditional media ecosystem. It's much more diverse. It's much more representative of certain communities. There are niches and channels and newsletters for every subgroup or niche community. It's really important again to have this robust creator-driven independent media ecosystem because it pushes back on institutional power, which is generally very un-diverse.
Why is the online creator industry growing so quickly?
TL: It is exploding because more and more people are using the internet and putting their lives online. We're spending more time online than ever and we're all consuming more and more content on the internet primarily from content creators. People want news, information, and entertainment. And they're increasingly turning to social media platforms and the internet to get that. With the writers strike and actors strike—and so many people taking breaks from traditional entertainment—the content creator industry is only going to continue to grow.
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