Although humans have been influencing other humans for as long as we’ve been around each other, the category of “influencer” is a relatively recent phenomenon, really only emerging in the last decade. In fact, the term “influencer” as we currently understand it—a thoroughly platformized figure who documents, optimizes, and monetizes their self as “brand”—wasn’t officially included in English dictionaries until 2019. Today, influencers are everywhere: primarily on social media platforms like YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok, but also in less glamorous professional and even academic fields, where they sometimes moonlight as trendsetters, thought-leaders, entrepreneurs, or just garden-variety “celebrities.”

Today, we’re going to chat not only about influencers—what they are, what they do, and to what ends—but also influence. What does it mean to influence or be influenced by someone? What difference does it make if an influencer is “authentic”? What dangers may underlie the monetization of influence or, in what may amount to the same thing, the political manipulation of influence? Are we all being subtly influenced to mimic influencers—not just in terms of what they eat or buy or how they work out or moisturize their skin, but their self-conscious practices of self-documenting and self-branding? And, finally, can influence really be “measured,” or are the follower counts that climb every time someone is influenced to smash that like and subscribe button just a whole lot of smoke and mirrors?

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