I don’t know if it was some quirk of the YouTube algorithm, or some larger trend, but I’ve seen a bunch of videos pop up in my feed about the end of internet fame. I’ve seen an interview with the founder of Veritasium, who got a lot of hate for selling a majority stake in his channel, and now letting others do most of the work. And that guy struck me as the most intelligent guy of the bunch: Achieve internet fame, monetize and create a good business, sell the business, semi-retire in financial security, or use the money for new projects.

What I have also seen is videos about everything from TikTok lifestyle influencers to OnlyFans models at the end of their 15 minutes: Most of the time that was a story of a financially illiterate person making a lot of money, sometimes millions. When the fame ran out or they burned out, and the big income stream stopped, it turned out that they had wasted all the money (with the lifestyle influencer girls, mostly on designer handbags). Many bought too expensive houses on credit and couldn’t keep paying the mortgage. Others discovered that they had accumulated a huge tax bill. Lots of them ended up pathetically begging for their viewers to come back. And then I saw a bunch of videos from smaller creators who either said they would stop making content, or said that they would much reduce their internet activity and go back to their day job. Whether it is just the years that have gone by, or whether money from advertisers and patrons has dried up due to the economy, it seems that some people can’t make money anymore on the internet as they used to.

Depending on which study you look at, and who exactly was studied, between 30% and 60% of kids say that they want to become influencers / YouTubers / streamers when they grow up. That suggests to me that adults aren’t doing a very good job at explaining what a terrible career choice that would be. A huge majority of people trying will never make a living. And of the minority that manages to make a living as a content creator, most apparently can’t translate that into financial stability. YouTube, Twitch, TikTok, OnlyFans, none of these platforms have a pension plan.

My 15 minutes have been over for a long time now. Please support me on my OnlyFans page! Well, in reality I never even monetized my content properly, and didn’t quit my day job over my content creator career. I went from 3,000 viewers per day to 1,300 viewers per month without suffering any financial consequences. You could say that I was privileged to have a job that paid well enough and left enough time to create internet content. But it was always obvious to me that this is a hobby, and not a career.

The Rolling Stones gave their last concert in 2024, with Mick Jagger at the age of 81. That makes me question whether everlasting fame is actually a good thing. But the normal case is for fame to end. Maybe not after 15 minutes, but after some months or years. It is somewhat sad to see when people you think have “made it” as content creators end up financially worse off than if they had stuck to their day jobs.