Tweenage kids hooked to Vlogging
My friend’s ten- year- old daughter has a new hobby. Like many of her school pals, she hopes to become a video blogger — a “vlogger”. She has started to record clips of herself for others to watch, share and “like”. She showed me a few, then gave me a list of famous vloggers to watch: JoJo Siwa, iJustine, Noodlerella, Zoella. Their names sounded so bizarre. But they are totally familiar to tweenage girls.
Like an earnest marketing executive, my friend’s daughter then explained to me that it was all a matter of numbers. If her videos are viewed 40,000 times on YouTube, she can have adverts placed on them; 100,000, and companies would start sending her products to promote. One million and she’d be a bona fide YouTube star. Her most recent video, about a doll she had been given for Christmas, had 11 views. There was still a way to go.
This seemed a peculiar phenomenon but my friend’s daughter is not alone. In fact, her dream is perfectly normal for her generation: one in three children between the ages of 11 and 16 have uploaded a video to YouTube.
In a survey last year, 75 per cent of the children asked said they wanted to be YouTube stars. The research also revealed that many of the children would rather learn video- editing than history or maths.
Who can blame them? Vlogging can now be a well- paid career. Unlike the more traditional dream jobs — pop star, doctor, footballer, astronaut — it doesn’t take much effort. All it requires is a smartphone and gallons of youthful selfconfidence.
There are plenty of people with that. The 27- year- old British vlogger Zoella and her boyfriend Alfie Deyes have both made millions from their respective channels. Ryan, the six- year- old American host of the YouTube channel RyanToysReview, made £ 8.5 million last year from reviewing toys and sweets.
At the pocket- money end of the scale is Erin Rose, an eight- yearold British girl who reviews stationery on YouTube, and made £ 200 last year. JoJo Siwa, a hyperactive 14- year- old from Nebraska, has made more of a fortune flogging her colourful “JoJo bows”. They are more than “just a hair accessory”, she explains to her millions of viewers. They are “a symbol of power, confidence, believingness”. They have also caused havoc in playgrounds, and a number of British schools have banned them.
Flogging overpriced tat to children is hardly a new phenomenon but the Internet has made the process much easier.
Now, kids sell stuff directly to other kids, from bedroom to bedroom. The videos have a curious mixture of entrepreneurial spirit, youthful narcissism, and materialism. Most are relentlessly positive and hopeful. The colours are bright and the music is catchy. Fans chat in the comments section. It is as much a social activity as a commercial one.