For years, musicians have been encouraged to promote their work on social media. They were told it was an indispensable tool, and to some degree, this became a reality. Musicians as social media influencers—it’s as bad and sometimes cringeworthy as it sounds.
Initially, the idea seemed promising: social media eliminated the middleman (i.e., music journalism) between musicians and fans, allowing for a more direct and intimate connection. However, in truth, social media has simply replaced the middleman, pretending to be only an impartial intermediary rather than an active participant.
In fact, not only musicians, but as a society, we have handed over control of the global digital infrastructure to a handful of mega-companies at the mercy of a few almighty billionaires calling the shots.
They Are Bad People
The latest example is Meta: In a sweeping change (and a cowardly, obedient move ahead of the Trump presidency), Meta‘s unimpeachable king, Mark Zuckerberg, rolled back fact-checking on its platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.