Taylor Lorenz on the ‘Extremely Online’ Influencers Who Shaped the Internet

KQED's Forum

KQED

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 656 Ratings

🗓️ 4 October 2023

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Most histories of social media focus on Big Tech: the inventors, the investors and the innovations they made. But Washington Post columnist Taylor Lorenz writes in her new book “Extremely Online” that “tech founders may control the source code, but users shape the product.” Providing a “social history of social media,” Lorenz looks at how influencers — the content creators, bloggers and uploaders who amassed followings just from their online posts — drove change on the platforms we use and guide how we post today. We’ll talk with Lorenz about the influence of influencers. Guests: Taylor Lorenz, columnist covering technology and online culture, The Washington Post; author, "Extremely Online: The Untold Story of Fame, Influence, and Power on the Internet" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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1:17.6	Coming up on forum, one in four members of Gen Z wants to become a social media influencer,
1:23.6	according to a poll by higher visibility.
1:25.6	That's even as older generations often malign content creators, as self-obsessed or fake celebrities.
1:32.2	But to dismiss influencers is to dismiss an industry that has been amassing significant cultural and economic power for decades,
1:39.3	says Washington Post columnist Taylor Lorenz, who documents the rise of the influencer industry in her new book
1:45.4	extremely online, centering not the tech and social media platform founders, but the users who
1:52.2	shape them. Who are the influencers you follow? Join us. Welcome to Forum. I'm Mina Kim.
2:02.7	Most histories of social media focus on individual companies or their eccentric inventors or even early investors.
2:11.9	In Taylor Lorenz's new book, Extremely Online, it's the users of these platforms who get their due, the content creators, the influencers, the bloggers.
2:21.5	Tech founders may control the source code, but users shape the product, writes Lorenz.
2:26.6	And as we look back this hour on the history of internet power users from Y2K bloggers to TikTok influencers
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