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Comment by onion2k | Hacker News Reader

Survey results show more men than women feel becoming an influencer is their only viable career path.

How bad do things have to get in your life for you to feel that "become a TikTok star" is your only option. It's one thing to think you want a fun and exciting career when you become rich and famous (I mean, who doesn't?), but another thing entirely to feel that you have no options for a fulfilling life except internet fame.

If a lot of people genuinely feel this way then that is truly terrible, and society needs to start making other careers viable and attainable possibilities.

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I know this is going to get laughed at, but you know how so many in our generation were like "oh man, it was SO EASY to start a tech startup back in the 80s and 90s compared to now!"

Same thing is going to be said about how we had it online during the early 2000s. Kids these days go to war for followers and the social media companies have caught up to the new meta and have started just directly paying them. Only going to get more fierce from here.

Already is being said. 'Influencers' were a thing early in 2000s and many of them already said 'if I started YT today I wouldn't make it'. Many of them coast by doing what they used to without major changes, but their format would fail today.

We’ve told every kid in Gen Z that they need to go to college and become coders. But a majority of the population is not qualified to do that. Even if they go to college, they’ll be getting the same job they would have gotten a generation ago without a college degree because that’s what they’re qualified to do. And a lot of them are smart enough to realize that. What they don’t have—because boomer parents failed to properly socialize them—is a conception of a fulfilling and dignified life that’s actually attainable to them.

The preference isn’t social media influencer over pharmacist.

It’s social media influencer over Amazon warehouse, hospitality house keeping, home health aid, and shit like that.

Careers are the result of luck. Usually the ordinary luck of birth into social status.

Most people in the world have to take whatever job is available. And a job harvesting melons is only available if they are lucky.

Had I known my career success would be the result of luck, I wouldn't have taken on debt as an adult to go back to school to get out of jobs like you listed.

Sometimes I think that the border of GenX and Millenials have the best grasp on reality.

US Boomers had literally the world handed to them in the shadow of WW2 and therefore have no conception of the privilege into which they were born.

US Zoomers have assumed they're screwed and have given up all consideration that working hard has any sort of payoff.

In the middle, you find those who understand that success is borne of a combination of hard work, talent, privilege, and luck. Not any single one of the above.

back to school

Good fortune is why “back” was an option.

I am not saying that lucky people never work hard.

Or that success is entirely a matter of luck.

No, sacrifice is why "back" was an option.

Eh, everyone wanted to be a rockstar or some sort of celebrity.

At least now they can give it a go for free.

But it does seem like fewer people want to do metalwork or be a mechanic or do electr-ic/onic repairs of some kind.

Many of my peers became welders and they're the ones raking in cash all the time, stable as hell.

Incidentally work that is being outpriced by mass production, proprietary solutions, planned obsolescence and to a lesser degree, automation.

To me, it showcases both the lack of necessity to have a stable career to survive, and the struggle people foresee going for a traditional career trying to 'make it'.

Even software devs, despite (proclaimed) massive shortages, have to deal with a lot of BS worldwide. Some places, you can't even afford a family home without a long commute (remote? Just kidding, culture insists hybrid at best). Now extrapolate that to other careers. It ain't pretty.

So is it really a surprise, in a world that makes it easy to play the 'famous person' lottery, where people are increasingly more individualistic, where society continues to disincentivise traditional careers, young people opt to try the lottery?

> It's one thing to think you want a fun and exciting career when you become rich and famous (I mean, who doesn't?)

I just want the rich part, thank you very much

I would argue recognition by your peers is a sort of fame, and many want that without associating it with "fame".

let's put it into context, to some people, becoming a TikTok/Hollywood star or work for FAANG or whatever is just a way to achieve financial independent, a mean to an end.

Think about the fact that some of these "stars" now has so much money they start doing charity, while the righteous salary men are still saving for their investment property or whatever.

I don't think it's objective badness but more the perceived and probably real lack of social mobility.

Oh come off it. Lots of professions like journalism are supported by ad dollars and work for a company who makes money via ads. Influencers are no different than working for a news corp as a journalist, just without the "noble" fakery

Agreed, and it's the one line in this article that explains almost all of the rest of it.

The question is whether this isn't more a problem with the perception and attitude of the surveyed people. Maybe they have prospect for a decent career, just not as a good as the funny and lazy career they see with influencers.

This is splitting out two things that are really conjoined: people do think that becoming a TikTok star will make them rich and famous. And they're right in a sense: my understanding is that the small percent of "big" influencers make a lot of money.

Social media is civically poisonous in a lot of unique ways. But the desire for fame it induces in people, especially young ones, is not one of them.

> But the desire for fame it induces in people, especially young ones, is not one of them.

For me, it's not the desire for fame that's concerning, it's how everyone is equipped to become an influencer and the lengths people will go through to achieve their goals.

The scary thing to me (and this isn't unique to children) is how many people are willing to lie and put out disinformation in order to generate a following, and I'm not just talking politics here. People were sharing their own baby formula recipes when that shortage spiked, regardless of whether or not it was actually safe for babies to consume. If young people feel that the best way for them to succeed financially is to become an influencer, they're gonna prioritize the fame and money above putting out high-quality content if they're serious about reaching their goals.

I share this concern, and I think it tidily summarizes the underlying problem: social media is itself civically corrosive. I'd rather we focus on that then shock-quotes telling us things we already know (that children want to be rich and famous).

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