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Most of us have probably heard the old adage ‘crime doesn’t pay’ and probably some of us have heard our parents give this advice or have passed it on to our children. As law abiding citizens we would like to adhere to this ideal although we have all probably heard stories of crime paying in some circumstances. Maybe the adage should be changed to ‘crime shouldn’t pay’!
But what about popularity? Does it pay to be popular? We only need to look at social media to answer this question.
Take Instagram for example; the more followers you have the more opportunity you have to earn money from companies looking to use your influence to sell their products to your followers. Once you have enough followers you become an ‘influencer’ and start to get the perks associated with the title including getting paid to take photos of yourself with products, eating in restaurants and not to mention the freebies sent in the hope you take a photo or post a comment about the product.
Let’s move on to Youtube or Twitch where the top streamers earn 7 figure commissions from their subscribers / viewers. What about websites? We have Google Adsense, which will pay for placement of ads on your website based on the number of monthly page views your website receives. I think we can answer the question of whether it pays to be popular with a resounding ‘YES’.
So then what’s wrong with being popular and earning money from it?
One of the potential issues comes from how the popularity is earned. Let’s say that I chose to promote a conspiracy theory or spread disinformation. Whilst I will likely turn many potential people away, I will also likely gain many followers and I can then monetise this popularity.
We just have to look at the influencers, Youtubers and websites spreading disinformation about COVID vaccines. You might ask yourself why anyone would do this? Well, regardless of whether the individual believes what they are saying / posting, they are earning money from their actions!
This takes us back to the problem of being able to monetise popularity. Individuals are incentivised to become popular and this means that doing whatever it takes to gain popularity pays. Ever read a post and wonder how the poster could possibly believe what they are writing? Well a better question to ask is whether they are purposefully taking this stance to makes money?
Unfortunately there is no way to govern popularity, so individuals can become popular from doing the right thing or doing the wrong thing. Regardless of the approach the financial incentive for popularity remains and, as with most things in life, doing the right thing takes more work and time than doing the wrong thing.
So whilst ‘crime doesn’t pay’, you can still spread hate, disinformation and conspiracy and earn an income through it from gaining popularity for your opinions. I hope one day we come to our senses and realise that popularity shouldn’t pay and create the adage ‘popularity doesn’t pay’!
