Everyone wants to stay on trend, including the trendsetters. The addition of celebrities brings any platform a huge influx of users, and the celebrity gets a whole new platform to advertise from. Celebrities have been exploring new ways they can reach their fans now more than ever, as many of this year’s social gatherings where they’d usually get to interact with fans have been cancelled or postponed. Using new platforms that rose to fame during quarantine is an easy way to maintain relevance and rake in a little cash along the way. It’s a seemingly good deal for both the celebrities and the platform developers, but what about the content creators who were already on that platform?
Brie Larson, the actress who portrayed Captain Marvel, made a YouTube channel. The three month old account only has twelve total videos thus far, but boasts a 426,000 subscriber count thus far. Kelsey Impicciche, a YouTuber whose account is sevenyears old and makes similar content, has less than a hundred thousand more followers than the newcomer.
While YouTube isn’t necessarily a very competitive platform, live-streaming and pay-for-view platforms tell a different story. You can only watch one streamer on the live-streaming platform Twitch, and while the streamer is live many people can donate money for shoutouts or a simple acknowledgement from the streamer. Celebrities such Brendon Urie, Snoop Dogg and even Terry Crews all livestream on the platform from time to time. When it comes down to it, how are fans going to spend their money; donating an independent content creator, or donating money for a chance at being recognized by a celebrity?
Celebrities taking over spaces made for smaller content creators is harming creators who may be relying on their view count, subscribers, or donations for their source of living. While it may be a sweet deal for the brand and the celebrity, the overall changes to the platform made to support celebrities has the ability to hurt content creators as well. Many application algorithms promote accounts that have larger followings, and celebrities may be willing to pay more money to promote their accounts, drowning out smaller content creators.
Over the last year, people have begun flocking to up and coming platforms such as TikTok and OnlyFans, both originally created in 2016. It didn’t take long for celebrities to invade these spaces, either.
Popular users on TikTok can pay to make sponsored posts to promote themselves. Seeing as young people especially have begun using TikTok on a daily basis, using the popular platform would be an easy way for already known and loved celebrities to gain a larger following and more of a cash influx.
OnlyFans offers a personal connection between content creators and their fans, offering a monthly subscription service to view content and interact with creators. However, celebrities such as singer Cardi B and reality television star Dorinda Medley have already hopped on the bandwagon. According to OnlyFans own earning calculator, if only one to five percent of 1 million of Cardi B’s followers subscribed to her OnlyFans, she would make between $49,900 to $249,000 a month on the platform.
Both platforms are heavily used by independent artists, musicians and other content creators to share their work and garner support and new customers. Celebrities joining these platforms meant for smaller content creators not only hurts them by taking attention away from their profiles, but continues to add to the wealth that they don’t really need. Celebrities need to learn how to share the spotlight, share their platforms and share their wealth.
