I won’t be telling you anything new by saying that influencers shine from social networks, by essence, so from nowhere and everywhere at the same time: YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok… You could have sold a million books that would have changed two million lives, but if you haven’t recruited enough subscribers on these platforms that you can stuff with your content, you are not an “influencer”.
I told you that I got lost on TikTok, which is not surprising since I only venture there very rarely, and in a whirlwind. I am mostly a “YouTube” type, less and less “Facebook”, a little “Instagram” for certain culinary accounts and that of a Korean westie who frolics in his dog raincoats.
Twitter? In small doses, just enough to suppress a possible excess of good humor and faith in humanity. I confess to an unhealthy appetite for the idiocies of my species captured by surveillance cameras.
On TikTok, I ended up in a “Live” section where gamers s‘perform live, among other things, like on Twitch, which I’ve never been to. You can see how many people are watching right now, the attendance easily goes up to a few thousand people in some cases, much more than at a part of the Capitals.
I understand the interest, we meet high caliber in disciplines practiced by hundreds of thousands of young people around the world, although I realized after a few minutes that I was not the most competent to judge it.
I hadn’t gotten lost yet. It was when I left the games, I must have clicked somewhere by mistake, but still I found myself in spite of myself on the channel of a young woman who could be my neighbor, not beautiful or atrocious, she was wearing curlers and was putting on makeup. Live.
She managed to look straight into the camera while putting on makeup, which gave the impression that she could see me too, through her mirror. To tell you how I don’t understand anything about the concept, I experienced the same feeling that one can have when one is caught spying on someone a little too insistently in a public place.
I was embarrassed, especially since there weren’t thousands of us watching it.
There were nine of us.
Easy money
Yes, so I also said that I was doing “research” there. Not very thorough, I must say. Two articles motivated me in my business, the first was based on a survey according to which investors gave as much credibility to “finfluencers” as to their advisor, if not more.
This paper appeared in Finance and Investment was based on a survey by the Investment Regulatory Organization of Canada. For an article aimed at an audience of investment professionals, the title seemed rather ill-advised in its affirmative form: Finfluencers live up to industry advice.
Because it’s nonsense. There may be competent experts, but how can you distinguish real advice from bogus opinions in this jungle? I’ve actually counted a phenomenal amount of videos in which douchebags promoted obscure cryptocurrencies, dubious stock market tips, incredible sinecures. Everything seems so easy, it makes you wonder why everyone isn’t a millionaire…
Or why so many people believe it.
Girls Math 101
What’s most amusing is that not all those who pay money into “consulting” appear to be full of cash, finfluencers have instead chosen the path of guilt-free finance, another promising niche.
This time it’s an article from Globe & Mail who put me on the trail: Are these popular online finance trends actually good for your bank account ? (Are these popular online financial trends good for your bank account?) In most cases, you guessed it, the answer is “no.”
But I found it so entertaining!
I laughed, because I recognized myself in one of the most idiotic trends there is. Called girl maththe phenomenon has gone viral on TikTok. We refer here to these lame calculations that we tinker with in our heads to justify any expenses.
In the article of Globewe give the example of a young woman who convinces herself that her place at the Olivia Rodrigo concert cost nothing since she had paid for her ticket months before. Come on, say that this is the kind of reasoning that allows you to spend more on vacation, when the plane ticket and hotel rooms have been paid for long in advance.
Above all, don’t spread it around, but I’m pretty good at it myself. girl mathwhich proves that it has nothing to do with girls and even less with his knowledge of finances.
I can’t say whether these vague calculations are used to justify expenses that I wouldn’t have made otherwise or simply to absolve myself of guilt for those that I would have made anyway, but here is a fine, completely personal example.
Do you remember the “anti-inflation” checks paid by the Legault government? I received some, I don’t remember how many, but I’m thinking of one particular payment, a few hundred dollars.
When I bought a plane ticket for a last-minute solo getaway to New York, I figured this out-of-nowhere cash was going to cover part of the trip’s costs.
That’s not what’s funny.
The same check also allowed me, still between my two ears, to pay off part of the bill for a bicycle, to buy yet another pair of shoes and to replace an old television.
Admit that I have a future as an influencer!
And you, your math prowess, I would be curious to read them…
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