When those cute family videos are monetised
BUILDING an audience on Tiktok has been a way for Cam Barrett to reclaim part of her identity after spending much of her childhood as an unwitting social media influencer.
As early as she can remember, her adoptive mum posted about her on platforms like Facebook and Myspace. From intimate details about her adoption to her first period, the private information made public without her permission has had a lasting impact on the now 25-year-old. Barrett says that finally being able to be herself online helped her decide to become an activist for protecting child influencers.
“I didn’t have anyone to speak up or do anything when I was going through this, and I think we have to start somewhere,” says Barrett, who recently testified in favour of Maryland state legislation that would give child influencers special rights, including a share of income arising from content they appear in.
Maryland is also among at least nine US states entertaining laws like the one that will allow children, upon turning 18, to request that a social media platform delete video content in which they were featured as minors.
Family vlogging, short for video blogging, has become widely popular on platforms like Youtube and Instagram – and it can be lucrative. A Youtube account with a million subscribers posting weekly could make US$936,000 (Rm4.5mil) a year just from ads, according to Influencer Marketing Hub.
One of the most well-known instances of family vlogging gone wrong in Maryland occurred in Frederick County, where the couple behind the Youtube channel “Daddyofive” was sentenced to five years of probation on child neglect charges in 2017.
Under the proposed Maryland law, a parent vlogger required to compensate a child influencer would be obligated to place into a trust a share of their earnings commensurate with the child’s presence in the content. A child could access the trust when they turn 18. If not properly paid, a child could sue his/her parents/ guardians for the money they are owed under the Bill.
Baltimore County resident Lisa Summers rounds up activities for families and adults on Tiktok, Instagram and Youtube. She has surpassed 144,000 followers combined and made money from brand deals including with children’s restaurant chain Chuck E.
Cheese. Though her Instagram and Tiktok accounts are “eligible for monetisation”, Summers says she’s not receiving any payout from the platforms themselves linked to views.
She says her and her husband Tony Summers’ two children – Journey, six and Apollo, four – only sometimes appear in her videos.
“Anyone that works should get paid for their job,” Summers says of kids who would be impacted by the proposed legislation, drawing a comparison with child actors.
“Although they’re getting ... free trips and free fun, that’s not enough. Because 10 years from now, they’ll still be on the Internet.”
Summers’ kids receive an allowance and also have savings accounts, she says. The Maryland legislation ought to allow for more flexibility regarding where money is funnelled away for children, she says, like allowing for a college saving plan in lieu of establishing a trust.
Heather Aranda, the Montgomery County mum behind “The Family Arcade”, an Instagram account with 140,000 followers, suggests some children will want a say in how they are compensated.
“If we were to tell our almost 13-year-old boy, ‘Honey, we’d like to put the money that you’re going to receive away for you’. Our son would say, ‘Don’t I get a choice?’” says Aranda, whose videos frequently feature some of her and husband Jaime Aranda’s eight children.
Both Aranda and Summers support a person’s right to request that videos they appear in as a minor are deleted. So does Jill Smokler, the Baltimore County mum behind “Scary Mommy”, a blog she started in 2008 about her experience raising a family.
But Smokler notes that on the Internet, it isn’t always easy to ensure that every trace of content is erased:
“It’s so hard to get anything off the Internet, because [content] doesn’t live in one place anymore. So how could you possibly find all the places where something lives?” Smokler says.
She stopped writing about her kids when her oldest became a tween, and sold “Scary Mommy” in 2015 to a media company.
“It’s such a different climate,” Smokler says. “I would be very hesitant to put my kids out there now.” – The Baltimore Sun/ Tribune News Service