> It's some remote person attempting to manipulate you by also packaging something enticing along with that manipulation.

What baffles me is that they call this manipulation "influencing" and they consider this a positive word.

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djeastm 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Similar is when people refer to themselves or others as "content creators"

Not filmmakers or artists or writers... "content creators".

Like they exist just to produce a continual stream of this amorphous "content" for consumption.

Now, perhaps that's all that art/writing, etc ever was. But to just abandon even the pretense is another in a long line of surrenders we've made to commoditization.

	▲	reg_dunlop an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Was there ever a time when any of the classical/fine arts were used as propaganda or promotional material, prior to the medium elevating to loftier aims? Is this history repeating itself? The idea that content creators could be considered artists is one I may have considered before, but only tangentially. What I'm also curious about...is how this commoditization and consumption via "influencers" has altered any individuals attitudes towards blatant manipulation. Free will seemed to be a much more guarded value. Now, the willing surrender of our free will seems to be the norm...