Why influencers are pretending their Coachella trip was cancelled — Top Comment

[0:00] i've not been able to escape videos of influencers being like this is what i'm wearing this is outfit [0:04] day one this is our vlog this is what we're up to i don't think i've ever experienced a festival [0:10] through influencer content like this we often joke about like which which side of social media [0:15] are you on are you doing sabrina chella or bieber channel i believe you're on uh the belieber side [0:20] uh what no what makes you think that your t-shirt that says i love justin bieber that no [0:26] anyone looking at the youtube will see that that's a lie um the social media version of coachella [0:32] because it is experienced by more people uh is more real than this coachella it's yeah which is [0:38] already a vastly commercial corporate enterprise that arguably like destroyed music culture 10 years [0:46] ago when it and and when it switched to two weekends a year to like make more money i think that was [0:51] the the the final death of it but it is also like it is america's closest thing to glastonbury [0:57] so it's and there's an interesting discussion as to why coachella is so fake and influencery but [1:05] glastonbury isn't could glastonbury become like coachella but where's glastonbury it's a culture [1:10] it's political you know it has a history it's a very different experience so coachella has always [1:15] been commercial but i think what you're seeing now on social media is the apogee of that commercialism [1:21] combined with social media so a lot of these influencers they aren't actually at coachella [1:26] they're pretending to be at coachella they're like in an airbnb somewhere being like this get ready [1:31] with me here's what i'm wearing to coachella and it's like but you're not going yeah and that's [1:35] worrying that makes me worried it's like fake it's like it's like fake core i mean you've never [1:41] because i guess like influences to some extent have become kind of synonymous with like being a bit [1:46] fake eg you're trying to push a particular product or push a particular point of view or whatever [1:50] and so we're all kind of used to that now but the idea that you would go all the way to a festival [1:56] and then like not actually go but make it seem like you were going and dress like obviously it's [2:00] worth saying a lot of influencers are going though it's worth yeah yeah of course also remember like [2:06] again because this is the closest thing america has to glastonbury if you are a celebrity you have [2:10] to go like yeah it's like why would you not go and there are amazing performances like and it is [2:14] obviously fun i've actually been to coachella um but uh influencer one of the things that's been [2:19] happening is influencers have been saying i was invited to coachella and then my brand deal fell [2:25] i've seen so many of these videos and then people saying in the comments like i don't want to say [2:29] what the brand is or like i can't say until or i can't say the name of the agency until like more [2:34] information is revealed but i will but is that real i think in one at least one case it was real [2:40] that an influencer got invited then uninvited to coachella but a lot of them just appear to be [2:46] pretending they were invited then pretending they were uninvited the content that comes from [2:50] say a real influencer who says i was invited on this trip and it got cancelled looks the same as [2:54] an influencer who's possibly saying i was invited on this trip and it got cancelled but they're doing [2:58] it for different reasons so one you know one camp might be doing it because the trip did actually get [3:03] cancelled the second camp might be doing it because that means that they are then inserted into the [3:09] coachella conversation they're getting engagement and they're engaged on the virality of the festival [3:13] without being present in the reality of the festival exactly and then also maybe they then do get offered [3:17] the chance to go because they are so hard done by i mean they don't care about going they just want [3:21] the engagement okay do you want to see the picture of me at coachella yeah i would love to okay are you [3:25] ready just kidding matt is showing an ai influence that's actually chella who is ripped although that [3:34] does look like me why are you laughing although this does look like me um no that is what i look like [3:43] when i'm shirtless and i've grown my beard out you trust me but no this is this is this is not me this is [3:49] actually an ai influencer at coachella um i've got this from a daily mail web article called co ai chella [3:57] co h coach co ai chella they're really struggling with the pun there co ai chella um and what is he [4:04] pretending so it's like it's an ai ai influencers are at coachella basically look i mean there there's [4:09] including your doppelganger yeah including my doppelganger i'm surprised people didn't think you were [4:13] there i know i know i know i'm surprised i haven't been tagged in this but that's what we've chatted about [4:17] this on an episode before the kind of rise of ai influences and when you've got such a curated event [4:22] and the content is so kind of like perfect and pristine and i mean you can totally see why people [4:28] would consume loads of ai influencer content because it's like oh great like it it really sort of creates [4:33] this version of coachella that i kind of like and i'll enjoy this content and obviously they can use [4:38] it to promote stuff as well which is how these influences kind of work and matt um given that you're [4:43] a believer i'm not okay so i like you and when i say you i mean you and the comment team like sent [4:52] me the justin bieber set i think you wanted me to talk about how it's kind of like lame that he was [5:00] what he's done is he's gone on a laptop and he's been youtube videos and it looks like you know he's [5:05] being criticized because he got paid 10 million to do it he's just like in a hoodie sitting at have you [5:09] not seen all the memes that are like when you work from home and it's like you're sitting at the [5:13] laptop because he's sitting on the stage with the laptop and he's got like youtube open behind him [5:18] but it looks like he's just sort of like hunched over the laptop at one point and the memes are [5:21] like when you work from home and you have nothing you you say nothing further to add to the meeting [5:26] but i i think this is really actually clever i like this because this is justin bieber displaying [5:31] an awareness of himself as a phenomenon of the digital era he's someone who became famous as a [5:38] child star on youtube like he's not just playing his he's playing his own songs from a laptop taking [5:43] requests from the audience of what to play on the laptop and then transitioning into him singing those [5:49] songs like you know professionally you know to a concert level but he's also playing like random [5:55] youtube videos like double rainbow um he's playing videos like including the viral video of him being [6:02] kind of attacked by paparazzi where he says like you're not getting it it's not clocking to you he's [6:08] he's meeting the audience where they are on a on their level because that is how they will encounter [6:13] encounter his music someone playing it from a laptop at a house party like while in between [6:17] he's like duetting his like young self i mean all those clips have gone so viral as you might imagine [6:22] exactly i actually think justin bieber here is um achieving quite a high level of of artistic um [6:30] merit i think he's he's he's occupying what david bowie famously called the gray space [6:35] in between the uh the viewer and the artist or the listener and the artist he's basically saying [6:40] like this is you know we're coming together to experience this music via a youtube playlist [6:45] which is so different to like sabrina carpenter for example where the set was also very social [6:50] media-able but it was like it was just like an amazing you know she turns up in a car and [6:56] there's like a house and you know it's like it's like barbie dream world kind of vibes right [7:00] right um and loads of people have also posted those clips which have gone really viral but in [7:04] a very different way it's like that very curated like you know blockbuster performance that feels [7:10] like it's kind of like hyper reality vibes um which is interesting there's been so much about like [7:15] the fomo thing which is because you're essentially experiencing this festival if you want to you [7:20] know if you're getting push loads of these videos you're experiencing coachella from your bedroom or [7:25] sofa or wherever it is you have this really intense feeling of oh wow everyone's there everyone on my [7:30] feed is there i'm not there which is such a effective way of getting people to keep coming back and [7:36] consuming all of that content as well it's like really playing on the fear of missing out issue [7:41] which we know is kind of integral to how the social media platforms work and so you're just watching [7:46] more and more of this stuff and you feel like you're not a part of it and you want to be a part of [7:49] it and that is a really powerful emotion in terms of getting loads of clicks and views and likes [7:52] which influencers know as well just like justin bieber is aware of the digital persona he as a [8:00] pop star exit exists in remember he started on youtube as well like he's grown up he started on [8:05] youtube yeah coachella itself seems slightly aware of it as a kind of meta experience because they have [8:14] billboards on the drive up to coachella about advertise about coachella so the only people like [8:21] seeing those are the people driving to coachella who are already going so it's just for them to [8:25] take a picture and from their instagram so it's like we're all experiencing this event through [8:31] social media and we're all aware of that and they're like a free advert for the festival like [8:35] the billboard is not the advert the influencer is the advert and another really trippy thing i think is [8:39] that coachella happens now over two weekends so they can make more money which to me feels straight [8:45] like if you care about kind of festivals and festival culture like it's in that experience it's a [8:51] it's a point in time like it's a thing like things happen there like oh yeah you can't rerun the like [8:56] that that just it's so it's so confusing to me it'll be dystopian on my tick tock when you're like oh it's [9:01] like a new batch of influencers who are going to this weekend yeah exactly