Looking straight into the camera, Valeria Fride holds up a tube of lip gloss. But instead of saying how amazing it is, the young brunette trashes it as “so sticky” and “really expensive,” with not enough color.
“It just didn’t do it for me,” the 23-year-old concludes.
Welcome to the art of deinfluencing, one of the latest trends on TikTok, in which influencers tell you what not to buy. As of early April, the hashtag had more than 430 million views on the wildly popular video-sharing app.
Photo: AFP
“It’s an honest version of what we see every day on social media,” Fride says.
If you venture onto TikTok, you can find all kinds of videos about which soaps not to buy because they’re too pricey, or which dumbbells not to buy if you’re just a beginner with using weights.
Some have cast deinfluencing as a response to soaring inflation, or even an anti-consumerist movement — basically, don’t buy things that are not worth your money.
“Do you really need 25 different perfumes? Are you really going to use them all?” said a TikTok user in a video with the hashtag.
But others say influencers are doing the same thing as before, with a slightly more palatable name.
Indeed, influencers are everywhere on social media. They make short, catchy videos promoting everything from mascara to tea to sneakers to video games — all for a tidy fee.
In theory, criticizing products would run counter to their business model. Who would pay for that?
Fride admits that at first, she was “really scared” how certain brands would respond to her new tactics.
When one of her videos went viral, she says she told her mother: “I hope they don’t hate me.”
But it ultimately led to offers of new partnerships with companies who appreciated her negative reviews for their rivals.
For Fride, it’s a sign that companies “want a more nuanced review.”
56 PAIRS OF SHOES
Jessica Clifton, a 26-year-old American influencer, explains that the deinfluencing trend rang true for her. A few years ago, she became aware of the impact her conspicuous consumption — new clothes virtually every day in separate packaging, endless varieties of foundation makeup, a plethora of lipsticks — was having on the environment.
“I don’t even know how to use makeup,” Clifton says, adding that she realized she owned 56 pairs of shoes.
“I was like, ‘Oh my God, how did I get here?’”
Clifton opened a new TikTok account dedicated to responsible consumption. So she was thrilled when deinfluencing took off. She’s even posted a few videos with the hashtag.
But she says she’s disappointed that the trend quickly became about “buy this, not that” instead of curbing overall consumption, and about users simply trying to get new followers.
AUTHENTICITY
A glance at the latest videos posted on TikTok with the #deinfluencing hashtag shows that Clifton is not alone in her disappointment.
But Lia Haberman, an expert on influencer marketing who lectures in the continuing education program at University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), says seeing the deinfluencer trend as a rejection of consumer culture is misguided.
“That’s not how the trend originated,” she says.
According to Tubular Labs, a social media analytics firm, the trend — which really took off in January — first emerged in September last year, thanks to one Maddie Wells.
Wells is not exactly a campaigner; the influencer was simply using her experience working in cosmetics stores to explain why customers were unhappy with certain products.
Her videos were not “really a judgment call,” explains Haberman.
For Americus Reed, a professor of marketing at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, influencers are “no longer seen as authentic” by the public, which knows they are being paid to promote products.
A deinfluencer, at least for now, is seen as more honest.
“That’s a way to stand out,” Reed says, while admitting that in the end, “a deinfluencer is still an influencer.”
That US assistance was a model for Taiwan’s spectacular development success was early recognized by policymakers and analysts. In a report to the US Congress for the fiscal year 1962, former President John F. Kennedy noted Taiwan’s “rapid economic growth,” was “producing a substantial net gain in living.” Kennedy had a stake in Taiwan’s achievements and the US’ official development assistance (ODA) in general: In September 1961, his entreaty to make the 1960s a “decade of development,” and an accompanying proposal for dedicated legislation to this end, had been formalized by congressional passage of the Foreign Assistance Act. Two
Despite the intense sunshine, we were hardly breaking a sweat as we cruised along the flat, dedicated bike lane, well protected from the heat by a canopy of trees. The electric assist on the bikes likely made a difference, too. Far removed from the bustle and noise of the Taichung traffic, we admired the serene rural scenery, making our way over rivers, alongside rice paddies and through pear orchards. Our route for the day covered two bike paths that connect in Fengyuan District (豐原) and are best done together. The Hou-Feng Bike Path (后豐鐵馬道) runs southward from Houli District (后里) while the
March 31 to April 6 On May 13, 1950, National Taiwan University Hospital otolaryngologist Su You-peng (蘇友鵬) was summoned to the director’s office. He thought someone had complained about him practicing the violin at night, but when he entered the room, he knew something was terribly wrong. He saw several burly men who appeared to be government secret agents, and three other resident doctors: internist Hsu Chiang (許強), dermatologist Hu Pao-chen (胡寶珍) and ophthalmologist Hu Hsin-lin (胡鑫麟). They were handcuffed, herded onto two jeeps and taken to the Secrecy Bureau (保密局) for questioning. Su was still in his doctor’s robes at
Mirror mirror on the wall, what’s the fairest Disney live-action remake of them all? Wait, mirror. Hold on a second. Maybe choosing from the likes of Alice in Wonderland (2010), Mulan (2020) and The Lion King (2019) isn’t such a good idea. Mirror, on second thought, what’s on Netflix? Even the most devoted fans would have to acknowledge that these have not been the most illustrious illustrations of Disney magic. At their best (Pete’s Dragon? Cinderella?) they breathe life into old classics that could use a little updating. At their worst, well, blue Will Smith. Given the rapacious rate of remakes in modern