The day before yesterday it was revealed that Snapchat's value dropped by $1.3 billion following a tweet by Kylie Jenner, the youngest of the Kardashian family. In the tweet (pictured), she claims that she no longer uses the popular social media app and this caused investors to take note and jump ship from Snapchat.
Who cares what Kylie Jenner has to say? Young people have been complaining about the recent Snapchat update and how it renders the app virtually unusable for weeks. I cannot believe that investors base decisions on flighty celebrities' likes and dislikes. It is worrying that our generation's collective consumer voice has less effect than the tweet of a single Kardashian.
This may seem like a trivial complaint yet when you consider that social media is young people's main platform, it does become worrying that we are unable to even influence that. Social media is how we politically and socially mobilise. It is responsible for fourth wave feminism, much of our discussion over Trump and Brexit and black lives matter. When the political world is reserved for older generations and our votes seem unable to affect change it's highly important that social media remains as our domain.
It is a two-way street and by ignoring young people's voices investors are only causing detriment to themselves. We are the primary consumers, not Kylie Jenner.
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