social media
Keeping it gritty on the Gram
A new generation of influencers is letting it all hang out as they give followers a look at real lives
At the beginning — or at least in October 2010 — there was Instagram, an online photo-sharing service that now has more than 1-billion users. Back then, the “Gram” was full of famous people sharing stylised, high-contrast photos of themselves eating fancy meals and posing in front of pink walls and enjoying themselves. Life on the Gram was good and it was prosperous, especially for a new category of people who had never existed before and were called “influencers” and got paid millions of dollars to take stylised, glossy, fashion-mag photos of themselves enjoying products and parties and creating envy and desire among millions of millennials. But times change and social media is driven by the tastes and aspirations of young people, and as those evolve so must the Gram. While over the last few years there has been a proliferation of Instagram-oriented pop-up museums, shops and specially created bathroom walls looking to attract the attention of influencers, this trend seems to be fad...
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