Influencers who leave well paid, essential jobs to travel the world/ make content

[Paramedia]

I seem to have been flooded with new accounts of white women in their 30’s/ 40’s who all seem to have similar stories of leaving teaching, medicine, corporate jobs, law to travel and create ‘content’ either with or without children whilst travelling.
Obviously I am a bit jealous, but I wonder why now? Ten years ago, people would be happy to have a two week holiday and then come back to work. Was that because there was no other ‘easy’ option such as influencing or that we were just happier in our jobs?
I wonder if it’s a mindset, I always hear ‘do what makes you happy’ and wonder ‘but we can’t all do that, all of the time?’. Someone has to be doing the watching, someone has to be working in those sectors and seeking the escapism that those accounts offer? So how do they, ‘the creators’, know that they will be the ones who make it, that their accounts will be the ones people engage with. Or are there enough people that all of the similar accounts can all be successful based on views alone?

Teaching and nursing are both careers that they will be able to go back to after a sabbatical. So perhaps it's more likely to be them than someone who works in accountancy / law / IT etc and knows they would be taking a bigger risk.

I'd guess most influences are (1) fake it till you make it - but actually it's never financially viable - or (2) financially supported by someone else

If (1), i hope they change direction before taxpayers have to bail them out. I'm happy to pay taxes to support people who are unwell, disabled or otherwise vulnerable. But seems unreasonable for tax payers to fund people who thought "YOLO. Work is for suckers. I'm here for a good time"

It's a job like any other and I would hate it! Travelling - great
Spending hours recording,editing and posting content spoils it.

I know a couple of people who did something similar using redundancy money, back when that used to be more of a thing. One of them was an admin worker and I shouldn't think was ever particularly well paid.

Operationtimecomingup
Sorry but I don't understand why anyone bothers with " influencers".
Why are people so sheep like they need someone to " influence" them?
Perhaps if people used their own brains and judgement these " influencers" wouldn't be conning people into thinking they have any relevance.
Turning this around why do you care enough to consider it’s better if they weren’t about? I like mindlessly scrolling TikTok and the like, if they make money out of me checking out them having fun why do people have a problem with it? Work and the daily life suck, if they can take advantage of escapism while making their money, they’re not exactly being a drain on society!!

How very dare they! Honestly, the misogyny (or is it jealousy?) on this thread is appalling.

Get back to your teaching/nursing/mothering jobs you terrible, terrible women. Whatever you do, stop making money. That’s for the men.

I have a side hustle (undoubtedly someone will tell me how cringe I am - but I’m crying all the way to the bank), I use insta and tik tok (it’s not hard), and I’m in my fifties. It’s on track to at least enable me to go part time in my, yes, teaching job.

Grow up and stop being crabs in a bucket.

If they can fund their continuous holidays making “content” then fair game to them. Very few actually do long term though more likely they sold house/inherited from parents/trust fund and thought stuff the 9-5 I’m off and are hoping to at least cover day to day living costs off the ad money. I follow a couple of bikers that have been travelling for more than 6 years and they put out very professionally produced “content” 2-3 times a week on YouTube (30 minutes per episode) as well as social media posts, emails etc, full time job basically but I enjoy hearing about the countries they visit (one is in Asia one is in Africa currently). This sort of content creator isn’t the same as sitting on a subbed In Dubai trying to get freebies though, it’s hard work

It’s insane how much some of them earn. You can’t blame them giving up corporate stressful jobs to make content if its paying the amount it does. Good for them. Not for me as I love my job.

I have zero time for "influencers" as I quite literally don't see the point. What's the use of someone banging on about her latest cleaning product, and insisting we all buy it? Cleaning has existed for centuries, do these people not know? Worse is seeing influencers rip open huge boxes of freebies, when you as a paying customer have no end of trouble with your goods. I've actually stopped using a cleaning brand I'd used for years due to how silly they've become.

My partner watches some of the travel videos on YouTube, and I find those really interesting and educational, but the fully grown men who sit there on YouTube playing video games, while other fully grown men watch and throw money at them is bewildering. One of the latter gave up work years ago because of it, and now his wife has been able to stop work too!

A friend of a friend does this kind of thing. She has a moderately successful Instagram account - not famous, but enough to get some sponsorship and freebies.

She can do it because her family are very, very wealthy and I would assume she has a trust fund or similar. She doesn't mention that!

If their content creation brings in enough money for them to live off, good luck to them.

However, they'd be foolish to make no provision for the future - if the tide turns and they lose popularity, or something happens that means they are no longer able to travel and make content.

This is something I've really noticed this year. Almost always male/female couples, although sometimes it's been two or a small group of women and they arrive somewhere and she starts posing and he films or takes the pictures. Utterly bizarre.

But I agree that, while a few might make it, most will run out of money quite quickly but it's usually fairly harmless while they're doing it although it's likely harder than it looks to keep making engaging content that gets enough views to make any money.

It could be that they've saved up, so have a decent chunk of money to spend on what is effectively a long holiday, but when/if they run out of money they will be forced back to work, often complaining how they're stuck renting 'because they can't get on the ladder' seemingly oblivious that they've just spent their deposit on travelling. Is also a risky strategy if they're in a sector where it's hard to drop in and out of work.

@Tutorpuzzlethats not what anyone was saying. I can only comment on women influencers as I only seem to have them suggested to me via the algorithms.

They never do. I have a (male, 50 something) friend who's never had a proper job or settled down and makes a big thing about how he does what he likes, which is bumming around being relatively competent but not competition winning at skateboarding and how everyone should be like him rather than 'working for the man' but what is never mentioned is that there's a lot of wealth in his family, so he's almost certainly got 'an income' that he doesn't need to work for and he'll obviously never be homeless because there's plenty of relatives with money and big houses who can help him out if needed.

They don’t need someone to film it. They use hand held cameras / tri-pods etc

I'd be surprised if they leave jobs unless they're getting a fair few followers etc already. If you make interesting content that people engage with, then you will do well. And I would think it takes a lot of time and effort to present daily content consistently and of good quality.

You sound pleasant.

A lot of them are bollocks.

But I think the idea of it is that we’ve been sold a lie, and working hard will not give most people the security we were promised I.e buy a home, be able to clothe and feed your self and your children whilst enjoying life in between work, then retire at a reasonable age with some financial security.

Lots of people who have followed the blue print that worked 30 years ago, are no where near the point we were promised. The idea of living for happiness instead of security it very appealing!

Reality TV is a huge market; people, for some reason, like to watch other people's lives, at least the online amateurs are mostly unscripted.

If you have a house or apartment in London, you could rent it out for a few years - evrn after taxes and fees that money goes a lot further in Asia.

Also if they’re living in a converted van or whatever, then their living costs are incredibly low.

Not all travel vloggers are the same as generic influencers. They’re not quite the same thing. Many travel vloggers are more educational / informational with some of them sharing tips / tricks / places to visit etc. I enjoy watching them. Some of their trips are promotional - and clearly labelled as such - but many aren’t. I’ve got many ideas for holidays and how to get to places from all the vlogs I watch. I have no interest in people posting about clothes and make up etc but that’s just life isn’t it? Everyone likes different things.

People have always left jobs to travel - I think it's just more visible to you now because you're that age and can see it on social media. I suppose there may be a few more now because it's possible to work online from where ever you may be. But I remember people in the 90s quitting to go travelling.

I know, women should be pleasant at all times, shouldn’t they? Even when they’re calling out rampant misogyny 🙄.

Exactly - there’s no way I’m going have the same housing/ pension situation my parents enjoyed, despite having a much better education than them.

Many younger people are looking for a different way of life, good for them if they can make it work.

When you plan a trip, do you look at reviews first? Read guide books? Ask friends for their impressions?

The skill is working out who is worth paying attention to.

Most influencers will be rubbish or not aligned with what you want.

But the fact we can now type basically any location or activity into social media and instantly see what’s it’s like and what people think of it is very helpful.