Latest / Mini Scroll / The Rise & Fall of 2010s Lifestyle YouTube: From Fake Content to Friendship Breakups

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The Rise & Fall of 2010s Lifestyle YouTube: From Fake Content to Friendship Breakups · Mini Scroll

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keep our deep dives going and of course keeping us hydrated.
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In January of this year, Nikki Dimartino took to TikTok in A10
0:44
part series to expose the reality behind her early YouTube
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career with her twin Gabby. The duo were teenage stars of
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the Nikki and Gabby YouTube channel where they racked up
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millions of followers posting G rated lifestyle content through
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the 20 tens. Then just a few days later, Ava
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Gatowski of My Life's Ava, another huge teen lifestyle
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YouTube channel at the time, posted her own TikTok series
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exposing the same era. Nikki, Gabby and Eva, who had
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all collaborated in the past were three of the most
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influential lifestyle vloggers of the mid twenty 10s.
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Their content helped shape girlhood for millions of Gen.
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Z viewers around the world. So these exposes where both
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Nikki and Ava opened up about the double life that so many of
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the lifestyle vloggers were living at the time, sent the
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Internet into a tailspin, questioning what was real about
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the lives, routines and friendships from this era and
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what was fake. This is an exploration into the
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rise and fall of 2010's lifestyle YouTube culture, how
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one niche became so influential among teen girls for its
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authenticity and family friendly content.
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But was it really all for show and does that even really matter
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anyways from Centennial world. I'm Lauren Meisner and this is
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infinite scroll, a podcast about Internet culture, the creator
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economy and how social media is shaping.
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Jen said welcome back to infinite scroll.
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Everyone 2 deep dives back-to-back like who am I?
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This episode was literally a labor of love for Annabelle
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before she left on her trip. She was so excited about this
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topic, so I am excited to bring it to you guys.
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As always, Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe.
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Please sign up to our newsletter, also called Infinite
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Scroll. On Fridays, we round up the five
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biggest thing pieces from the Internet that week. 10 years
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ago, scrolling through YouTube was an entirely different
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experience. Thumbnails were not aesthetic
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stills from blogs or two people sitting down to record a
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podcast. Everything was bright and over
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saturated, a barrage of neon thumbnails with bold fonts and
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clickbait. And it was a very specific time.
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While this was the era that brought us story times and
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vlogs, there was one content genre that dominated lifestyle,
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and within this niche was a group of lifestyle girlies that
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you could not escape. Pumping out anything from skits
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to DIY videos to lookbooks, these creators would go on to
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define what it meant to be a lifestyle influencer, and while
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a lot has changed since then, they are still a vital part of
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YouTube history. Now I'm sure when I started
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describing this era, there are a few signature creators who would
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have come to mind. Perhaps one of the earliest
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creators to breakthrough the mainstream in a meaningful way
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was Beth and Moda, but there were other iconic women in this
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niche like Alicia Marie, Laura DIY, Mia Stammer, Meredith
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Foster, and Sierra Furtado. Aspinoward and Meg Deangelis,
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who have since become associated with their TikTok content, also
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originated in this crew. And of course, we can't forget
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the twin contingents, most notably Nikki and Gabby and
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Brooklyn and Bailey. From this list, it's clear that
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the lifestyle niche at the time was vast, especially with the
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amount of girlies operating within it.
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With that in mind, we will definitely not have time to
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cover every single one of these women, their iconic moments, and
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the content they produced, but we have done our best to boil it
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down into some of the defining moments throughout this era to
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track exactly what made this niche so impactful.
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To begin, it's worth discussing some of the content that many of
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these creators posted. This predominantly took place on
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YouTube because through the 2010's, no existing platform
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could really compete with YouTube.
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While Vine existed, lifestyle content did not feel native to
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the apps 6 second format. Nonetheless, these women would
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post weekly, if not multiple times a week with anything from
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lookbooks, skits, DIY's, hauls and tutorials.
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And to be quite honest, this type of content has lived on as
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Internet culture has moved toward short form content.
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However, one area of content within the lifestyle niche
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hasn't quite had the same longevity in the mainstream, and
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that is back to school content. Through the mid to late twenty
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10's, the lifestyle girls were eating this type of content up.
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They would rush to create these videos every September.
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Oddly enough, many of them were not the prime demographic
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consuming this content, a theme we will come to see as common
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throughout much of their videos. Many of these creators had
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graduated from high school years prior and others chose not to
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attend college, but playing into seasons and events was massive
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on YouTube throughout this era. Nonetheless, it was the back to
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school videos that really had a chokehold on this side of the
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Internet, and arguably Alicia Marie was the Queen.
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Alicia Marie has been making content for over 15 years at
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this point. The earliest video on her
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channel dates back to 2009 and is a What's in My Purse video.
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She would go on to post lifestyle and beauty content,
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but it was her alter ego called School Alicia that may have just
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been her magnum opus. Alicia would make these types of
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videos every back to school season.
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They were often skit based and included collaborations with
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some of the other lifestyle girlies.
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They would become synonymous with the Alicia Marie brand.
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One of the most popular videos on her channel to this day is
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first day of school versus Last Day of school.
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The video is exactly what you would expect with Alicia
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including skit comparing scenarios of getting ready,
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waking up, and eating breakfast. At the time of recording, this
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video has amassed over 28 million views.
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Some of the other popular school Alicia videos included Girl
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Struggles, Back to School, and School Supplies Then and Now,
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both of which have over 15 million views.
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Alicia did private these videos for a while, but in 2023 she
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announced on Instagram that they were available to watch once
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again hashtag school Leisha forever.
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Surprise, I unprivated my old school Leisha videos.
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Happy birthday to me and you. Aside from the school themed
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videos, some other popular content in this niche were of
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course look books and halls, both of which continue to live
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on in one way or another in content today.
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But the DIY video was another extremely popular video during
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this era and Laura DIY dominated.
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Laura DIY, whose real name is Lauren, is a Canadian YouTube
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who started her channel in 2011. She first got into posting
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online by creating a website called Desire and Inspire where
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she would share different DIY tutorials through pictures and
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written explanations. She then decided to pivot to
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video based content, leading to the birth of Lore DIY.
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On her channel she would make many different types of videos,
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many of them art based. Some of her most popular DIY's
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to this day include DIY Halloween costumes for teens and
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Dollar Store and DIY Challenge. But no matter the DIY, the
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videos were always positive, bubbly and of course, over
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saturated. Aside from her DIY's, she was
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also known for her relationship with Alex Wasabi of Wasabi
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Productions. The pair were together for
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around three years and broke up in 2018.
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All in all, the success of this kind of content was driven by
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multiple factors. First, we have the personality
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factor. Many of these creators were
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young women, either in their teens or early 20s when they
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started. Their content, friendships and
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personal lives resonated strongly with younger audiences,
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mainly because they created relatively family friendly
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content. With many viewers of this niche
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being younger than the influencers themselves, they
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became like big sister figures. This in turn helped their
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audience develop a parasocial relationships with them and feel
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a part of the friend group. Of course, another reason for
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the success was because of their collaborations.
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We have spoken about this a lot regarding creator collectives
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like the Brit Crew and the Sister Squad, where constant
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collaboration catapults content to virality.
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With these lifestyle girlies working together, their content
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extended to new audiences, allowing them to grow their
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following and establish legitimacy in the space.
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But they didn't just collaborate because this was a rite of
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passage. It was certain industry
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developments and events that actually encouraged such
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collaborations. One of the most significant
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examples of this was Beautycon. For those unfamiliar with this
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event, Beautycon is a convention that started in 2011 and as
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Katie Chitticorn put it for Vogue Business quote, this was
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the Super Bowl of Beauty. While Beautycon was relatively
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small at first, it really hit its stride around the mid twenty
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10s under the leadership of Jonathan Buford as creative
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director and MoJ Madara as CEO. Katie notes that this was the
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turning point quote applying the fandom and experience associated
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with events such as Comic Con. They turned Beauty Con into a
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money spinning festival that took place across Los Angeles,
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New York, London, Dubai and Tokyo and thrived on ticket
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sales and partnership deals alongside subscription boxes and
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e-commerce, Katie writes. It will go on to become an
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important event on the calendar for beauty and lifestyle
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creators. Alicia Marie shared multiple
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videos from Beautycon, as did other massive lifestyle
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influencers like Nikki and Gabby, Tila Dunn, and Sierra
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Furtado. If we think of Beautycon as
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Vidcon for the lifestyle and beauty creators, it became a way
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for these influencers to solidify themselves in the
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industry while also bringing their audience in on a unique
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event. It became something that many of
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their followers would look forward to.
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Aside from Beautycon, there was also the Style Hall network,
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which was definitely different but was also impactful in the
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space. Style Hall was also founded in
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2011 by Stephanie Horbachevsky to expand the beauty and fashion
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landscape into the digital era. Essentially, it would go on to
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represent various creators, becoming a hub for beauty and
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lifestyle content, which in other words, is an organization
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that would partner with influencers to help them grow
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and offer services that would help support monetization and
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audience growth. According to a 2014 article from
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The Daily Beast, Style Hall has since become the largest online
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community in the categories of fashion and beauty, with 170
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million network subscribers and more than 60 million monthly
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unique visitors to its 4600 YouTube channels, which reach
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across 62 countries. Many of the lifestyle girlies
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were a part of the Style Hall network.
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Since then, Style Hall has been sold to European entertainment
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company RTL Group for $107 million.
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Nevertheless, these collaborations bring us to
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another central part of the era of YouTube, and that is of
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course the different friendship groups.
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To start though, we must mention the iconic Girls Night in Tour.
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This tour was announced in 2015 and was billed as the quote
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first all female tour focused on entertainment by Shirley Lee for
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Entertainment Weekly. The group was formidable,
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made-up of some of the most prolific lifestyle creators like
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Ava Meredith, Alicia, Sierra, Mia and Andy Case.
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As a special performer, Megan Ranks was also in much of the
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press around the tour. All of these women had carved
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out their niche in the digital world, but for the sake of this
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episode, it is necessary to take a moment to introduce Ava,
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Meredith, Mia and Sierra. Ava, who is known at the time as
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My Life Is Ava, started her channel in July 2011, but the
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earliest video currently available is a Black Friday haul
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from over a year later. Her content fit perfectly into
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the niche posting hauls, tutorials, and back to school
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content. But when people think of Ava,
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they will likely associate her with her song Literally My Life,
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an incredibly catchy song now with over 51 million views.
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The next one we need to introduce is Meredith Foster.
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Meredith started her Channel 2 years before Ava.
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She had also become a fan favorite within this content
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category, being friends with many of the other girls.
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She continues to make content today, but has made quite a hard
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pivot and rebranded to So Much Grace.
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As you can probably gather, much of her content now is spiritual
13:23
and faith-based. Some people have gone so far as
13:26
to believe that she has joined a cult.
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Next is Sierra Furtado. Sierra is another creator native
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to Canada, having been born in Montreal.
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She started posting on YouTube in 2012 as Sierra Marie Makeup.
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She grew relatively quickly for the time, accumulating over 9000
13:43
subscribers in around 5 months. Sierra would go on to be known
13:46
for her hairstyle and DIY videos, much like many of the
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other girls at the time. Sierras latest video on her
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channel was 10 months ago and it was actually from her bridal
13:55
shower. Otherwise, she continues to post
13:58
on TikTok. And lastly, we have Mia stammer
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alongside the types of videos we have come to expect from these
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creators. Mia was also known for her hair
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dye videos. Mia was part of me larisha, an
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iconic collaboration trio of Mia, Lord DIY and Alicia Marie.
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But we will get back into all of this later.
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OK, now back to the girls night in tour.
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For the 2015 tour, the women stopped at 20 cities across the
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United States. The show had range singing,
14:27
skits, challenges, and even a performance of The Whip and Nae
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Nae. It was almost like watching a
14:32
YouTube video in real life. The audience did seem to enjoy
14:36
it at the time, but with hindsight, many questioned
14:39
whether the show should have been taken on the road and
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whether it translated to the stage effectively.
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Although I will say this is a conversation that many people
14:47
have had over these early influencer tours.
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Nevertheless, the tour was a success with another round of
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creators heading off on the Girls Night in tour.
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A year later, Alicia Marie joins the cast again alongside with
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Nikki and Gabby, Jesse Page and Allison Stoner of Camp Rock
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fame. The tour headed to 24 cities
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this time, but it was rife with drama, much of which was
15:10
associated with Nikki and Gabby. I'm sure many of you are
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familiar with Nikki and Gabby, given they continue to post
15:17
content and go viral. But they are twins who gained
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popularity posting content together, often highlighting
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their differences. There have been comments on
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various podcasts and in Tik Toks hinting at what went down.
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Nikki, for example, has spoken about the tour in a TikTok,
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noting that a rift developed between her and her sister Gabby
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wanting to leave the tour early. But drama within this niche of
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YouTube wasn't limited to the Girls Night In tour.
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That brings us to the Savage Squad, another friendship group
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composed of Ava, Tila, Dunn, Meredith, Foster and Sierra.
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We've introduced all of these women already, except for Tila.
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Tila had a similar story to many of these creators we have
15:57
already mentioned, having started posting beauty content
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and lifestyle content online in the early 20 tens.
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She also tended to make kind of couply content with her most
16:07
popular video titled Ultimate Dirty Truth or Dare.
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Nonetheless, these four have a storied history.
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To keep it short, the group went through friendship breakups,
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reunions, and everything in between.
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Throughout it all, there was always speculation about whether
16:23
they were actually close or just teaming up for clout.
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They first started posting at the Savage Squad back in 2016,
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making all kinds of content together, but it didn't last
16:34
long. By 2017, Crack started to show.
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Tila, Ava and Sierra were still uploading videos together, but
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Meredith was absent. In a Black Friday haul video
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posted to Sierra's channel that year, one comment summed it up,
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with the user writing missing Meredith.
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Some assumed Meredith must have done something to cause the
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rift, but others, specifically her fans, believed she was
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struggling with an eating disorder at the time, which may
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have caused her to pull away from her friends.
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As an aside, Meredith has since been open about her struggles
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with food and her body, sharing that she has suffered from an
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eating disorder. In September 2017, Taylor posted
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2 pictures of the trio on what was then Twitter.
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That seems like the final nail in the coffin.
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The pictures were not necessarily what caused the
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drama, it was what she captioned to the post.
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Writing friendship is so important.
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Cherish your best friends. Many took this as a direct dig
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at Meredith, continuing to question where she was and what
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happened between the group. That same month, Ava later took
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to Twitter to share her thoughts on all the rumors, speculation,
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and backlash. As Teen Vogue noted at the time.
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Quote, she did not explicitly say that her tweets were about
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Meredith, but many fans have responded back to her tweets
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asking if it was about her. In the series of tweets, Ava
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said that she had been disrespected by someone I
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thought was my best friend, while also condemning Twitter
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users who were criticizing her without knowing the full story.
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Quote when 4 BF FS are not friends anymore and it's divided
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into 3 versus 1. The bigger party may look like
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the problem, but they are not. Just because it ends up being 3
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and 1 doesn't mean the three caused any problem.
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I'm sick of people thinking a bigger group means they messed
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up. Do not come for me, she wrote.
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Ava also touched on the situation in a comment under one
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of Sierra's YouTube videos that has since been deleted.
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In it, she made similar points, but she acknowledged that one of
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her friends was having a quote really tough time the past few
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months and even though they offered support, the friend
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continued to pull away. Quote after coming together to
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finally say something after the things got too bad and offer
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help, our best friend was defensive and stopped talking to
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us. It's only a normal part of
18:50
what's going on, but it breaks our hearts because someone who
18:53
needs love and support is pulling away from us simply
18:56
because we know what's happening and they don't like that we
18:59
addressed things and offered help.
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We now have lost our best friend to something much bigger.
19:04
It read. All in all, a lot of people
19:06
assumed the main fallout was between Ava and Meredith, but in
19:10
2019, Ava posted a video hinting that she had outgrown some of
19:14
her friendships, which many took as shade to the rest of the
19:18
group. Over time, certain members seem
19:20
to go back and forth, subtly shading each other online.
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There were a few moments that hinted at reconciliation,
19:27
especially between Tila and Meredith, but the drama left
19:30
many fans wondering if the Savage Squad friendship was ever
19:34
even real to begin with. And to be fair, over the years,
19:38
most of the women have admitted that the Savage Squad was
19:41
somewhat surface level. Now a friend group that was
19:44
adjacent to the Savage Squad was the Asian Girl Squad.
19:49
This group was made-up of Lord DIY and Mia, as well as Remy
19:53
Cruz and Tiffany Ma. Remy and Tiffany were another 2
19:56
popular creators in the space who started posting on YouTube
20:00
in 2012 and 2010 respectively. If Remy sounds unfamiliar, that
20:04
may be because she actually started posting on YouTube as
20:07
Miss Remy Ashton. As you probably have guessed
20:10
from the name, the Asian girl squad was made-up of Asian
20:13
women. That said, Alicia Marie was an
20:16
honorary member since she was super close with the group, but
20:19
more on that later. Before getting into the drama
20:21
that went down within the friend group, it's worth pointing out
20:24
that perhaps surprisingly, the lifestyle girly era actually had
20:28
some more diversity than some other creator niches in the
20:31
early to mid twenty 10s. While the majority of big name
20:35
influencers were still white, the beauty and lifestyle space
20:38
online did allow now for more representation more than
20:41
traditional media did back then, at the very least.
20:44
That said, there's since been valid criticism about how this
20:47
content often still upheld Eurocentric beauty standards,
20:51
but creator collectives like the Asian Girl Squad offered a level
20:55
of cultural visibility and diversity that definitely stood
20:58
out at the time. Mia, Lord DIY, and Alicia Marie
21:02
were probably the earliest version of the squad, but when
21:05
it comes to the Asian Girl Squad specifically, it's widely
21:09
believed that Mia was the one who brought everyone together.
21:12
Like the Savage Squad, they posted classic group and
21:15
lifestyle content and eventually moving into edgier content like
21:19
Truth or Drank videos. But through all the years, it
21:22
was the Big Bear trips that became extremely iconic.
21:26
These trips became a yearly tradition, usually around the
21:29
holidays, giving the women a perfect opportunity to create
21:33
vacation style and Christmas content in one.
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As a viewer, it was just also fun to see your favorite
21:39
influencers hanging out in a new place.
21:42
That being said, the annual trip started in the mid twenty 10's
21:45
and have stayed a staple on this corner of YouTube.
21:48
Sense the attendees of the Big Bear trips did vary from year to
21:52
year. While it may have started off
21:54
within the Asian girl squad, other lifestyle girlies were
21:57
invited over the years. In a video deep diving into the
22:00
Asian girl squad, Justine KOA noted that 2021 was when things
22:04
really started to change. 2021 comes around, they're back to
22:08
doing a small trip with just the core squad.
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This year is the last year that we get everybody in the core
22:13
squad. Alicia doesn't come, but Lauren
22:15
says in a vlog that she was invited but decided to pass, and
22:18
this is the last time that there's ever really an
22:20
expectation for Alicia to even still be.
22:23
Either that's largely because Mia and Alicia had fallen out
22:26
years earlier, which was shocking at the time since they
22:30
were best friends for years. Funnily enough, they first met
22:33
at a Style Hall shoot in late 2011 or early 2012.
22:37
After building a close friendship, they eventually had
22:40
a falling out in 2018. Since then, both have opened up
22:43
about what happened in various podcasts and videos, explaining
22:47
that it mostly came down to miscommunication, different
22:50
expectations, and clashing personalities.
22:53
But that wasn't even the main drama with this friend group.
22:55
Over the years, viewers had picked up on the vibe that
22:58
Tiffany was a bit of an outsider.
23:00
That suspicion was confirmed in 2023 when Mia, Lauren, and Remy
23:05
went on the Big Bear trip without Tiffany.
23:08
Then, in 2024, she was once again absent.
23:12
Internet sleuths has speculated about what caused the fallout.
23:16
Aside from the general sense that Tiffany never quite fit in
23:19
the same way, many points to her engagement party in December
23:22
2022 as a potential turning point.
23:25
All the Asian girl squad members were there, but just a few days
23:28
later, Lauren got engaged too, and people thought the timing
23:32
was a little strange. Of course, no one has to
23:35
schedule life events around their friends, but given how
23:38
close they seemed, viewers thought Lauren could have waited
23:41
or at least given Tiffany a heads up.
23:43
To make matters worse, Lauren and her then fiance Jeremy did a
23:46
podcast episode talking about the engagement where they
23:50
seemingly made a couple of digs at Tiffany.
23:52
Jeremy and Lauren do a whole engagement breakdown on Wild
23:56
Till 9 where Jeremy exposes that he told Remy and Mia about the
24:02
engagement but did not tell Tiffany because Tiffany's not
24:05
going to Keeping secrets and Tiffany is not a good liar.
24:08
By the time Lauren's engagement came around in early 2023,
24:12
Tiffany didn't appear to be in attendance.
24:15
Even more telling, both Lauren and Tiffany got married last
24:18
year, but neither was in each other's bridal party.
24:21
Having said that, many Internet users are convinced that
24:25
something went down specifically between Lauren and Tiffany that
24:28
led to the falling out. All of the drama between the
24:31
women feeds into why this niche declined in the 1st place.
24:35
That's not to say that many of these creators aren't still
24:37
doing well. Alicia Marie and Remy Cruz Co
24:40
host the pretty basic podcast Mia is now on.
24:43
Only fans and Ava still post content while DJ ING.
24:47
But the lifestyle niche doesn't hold the same power on YouTube
24:50
as it once did. This side of YouTube fell victim
24:53
to the same phenomenon we saw within the beauty community.
24:56
When it comes to the downfall of the beauty community, it's been
25:00
thoroughly documented. Aside from numerous
25:02
cancellations, audiences were exhausted by the seemingly never
25:07
ending drama. The Dramageddon's are a case in
25:10
point. Followers got tired of the call
25:12
outs, clout chasing and the sense that it was all just for
25:15
show. You could argue the same for
25:17
everything between the various friend groups that we have
25:20
mentioned. When they started to turn on
25:22
each other it just made the whole niche feel artificial,
25:25
stale and like the groups that many young women looked up to
25:29
were just for clouts. Two other significant changes
25:33
were happening at the same time that led to the side of the
25:36
platform losing relevance. First, the internet's overall
25:39
attitude toward consumption started to shift, and 2nd,
25:43
audiences were beginning to gravitate toward creators and
25:46
content that felt more real and authentic to start with.
25:50
The first point, the early to mid 2010's lifestyle niche was
25:54
particularly built on overconsumption.
25:56
From massive hauls to challenge videos, much of the content
25:59
revolved around buying clothes, products and random items, often
26:04
for one time use. This factor is often explored
26:07
when discussing the beauty community, but rarely applied to
26:10
this group of influencers. The women in this niche were
26:13
also sent truckloads of PR and constantly buying decor and
26:17
clothing to match every season or holiday.
26:20
But through the second-half of the 20 tens, social media users
26:24
started to push back against overconsumption.
26:27
By this point, influencers had become a mainstay in the
26:29
cultural environment where the appeal and curiosity that wants
26:33
to find the rising celebrity class started to wane.
26:37
Don't get me wrong, overconsumption is still an
26:39
issue online and developments like TikTok Shop aren't helping,
26:43
but there is much more awareness about this phenomenon,
26:45
especially compared to the heyday of the lifestyle girlies.
26:49
Next, we also started to see a shift toward more quote UN quote
26:52
authentic content across the board.
26:55
We've touched on this and other deep dives, but the rise of
26:58
influencers like Tana Mojo who were unapologetically themselves
27:02
honest and non not family friendly, directly contrasted
27:06
the lifestyle niche which as we have established, focused on
27:10
perfectly curated, clean content for all ages.
27:14
It's safe to say that the teenagers who were once the core
27:16
audience for lifestyle content had also outgrown this niche,
27:21
where influencers like Tana only accelerated that shift.
27:25
In a similar vein, there was a clear disconnect between the
27:28
content these creators were making and who they actually
27:30
were. By the mid to late twenty 10s,
27:33
most of these women were into their 20s, so the family
27:36
friendly vibe didn't necessarily reflect their lifestyles
27:39
anymore, and their audiences were starting to age out of it
27:42
too. Nikki Dimartino talked about
27:45
this in a video where she reflected on the Girls night in
27:47
tour. She explained how the cast would
27:50
be out drinking and partying, but then performing what was
27:53
basically a talent show for a out of kids and tweens.
27:57
Over the years, more and more creators from this era have
27:59
started speaking out about the disconnect between their content
28:03
and their real lives. Nikki went viral on TikTok for
28:05
it, making a whole playlist on her account titled Exposing
28:09
where she reflects on that time online.
28:11
The twins have since capitalized on the trend, posting a truth or
28:15
drink video to the Nikki and Gabby channel in March.
28:18
Alicia Marie also had a similar series on her YouTube channel in
28:21
2020 to 2021 where she would bring on creators like Mia,
28:25
Nikki, Ava, and Lauren to do truth or drink videos.
28:29
Similarly, Ava from My Life is Ava has a playlist called My
28:33
Life Is Ava Lore that gained traction on TikTok when creators
28:37
started confessing moments where they misled or lied to their
28:39
audiences. Sparked by the looming TikTok
28:42
ban, many former fans and viewers have since gone on to
28:45
criticize the girls for fabricating so much of their
28:48
content, while others contend that they were just aligning
28:51
with the popular content style at the time.
28:54
The rise of the lifestyle vloggers in the 20 tens like
28:57
Lore DIY, Miley Sazava, and Nikki and Gabby marked a
29:01
defining moment and Internet culture.
29:04
Unlike traditional celebrities, they built intimacy with their
29:07
audiences through sharing their lives.
29:10
This concept of lifestyle content became a cornerstone of
29:14
influencer culture and shifted the way audiences consumed
29:17
content. While some of their content may
29:19
have been fake, most of it was just them figuring things out in
29:23
an emerging industry that didn't exactly come with instructions.
29:28
These vloggers helped shape a generation's understanding of
29:31
self branding, monetization, and creative entrepreneurship,
29:36
becoming the blueprint for the creator economy that we know
29:39
today. Whether you loved them or found
29:42
the content cringe, the DIY's friendship drama and the Big
29:46
Bear trips definitely capture a specific vibe and for Gen.
29:51
Z, it will always represent some of their most iconic content
29:55
from their childhood. Infinite Scroll is a podcast
29:58
produced, presented and Co written by me, Lauren Meisner
30:02
for Centennial World. This episode was researched and
30:05
Co written by Annabelle David. Additional research support was
30:08
provided by Emily Griffiths. Thank you so much for listening.
30:12
I love you guys and I will talk to you next week.
30:14
Bye.