This was such an interesting read and it definitely made me think about a lot of aspects of my life - university, brands, the content I come across online. It’s engaging and accessible text and really worth a read if you’re wondering about what happens to all your data.

This book discusses the use of social media and influencer status to help push people into buying things. There is a chapter on MLM sales and social media, too.

Overall, I don’t feel like I learned anything new, after reading a few books about cult like behavior and being mildly obsessed with MLM schemes.

I fail to see the danger in influencers pushing things they like - whether it’s something on the tiktok shop or a coffee, is it really that bad? I understand if people are blowing their life savings, harassing people they’ve started a parasocial relationship, but we all buy what’s advertised to us - and when people we love like it, it’s just human nature to want it.

In all honesty, I’m not sure how I feel about this. While this starts out looking at predatory advertising tactics, it becomes more of a comprehensive tear down of social media. I mean, I’m here for it but the focus wasn’t quite what I was expecting. I felt as we got further along the book, the advertising theme was less and less prevalent and by the end of the book, I wasn’t quite sure what I was reading.

What worked for me:
🔼 I am so here for intricately cataloged analysis of the individual and collective harm that social media does
🔼 The stuff about cults was interesting, particularly exploring the BITE model. While the book explores similar themes as Cultish (Montell, 2021), it’s a bit more comprehensive around context and incorporates more recent examples.
🔼 Section on post-secondary education in the States was eyeopening: I had no idea how insidious this was and how much students are preyed on in high school and beyond. It makes me feel even more sick about how many people are drowning in debt because they’re basically coerced to go to college.
🔼 It was genuinely horrifying to read about how invasive geofencing and tracking is in the States
🔼 I liked the section on MLMs as these have fascinated me for a long time. I was particularly heartened to see so much mention of the antimlm movement!
🔼 I learned a lot about the shady influencer stuff: although I don’t understand the draw of social media or influencers, it was interesting to hear just how insidious this type of advertising is! (And how so many people don’t seem to realize this is advertising?!)
🔼 I appreciated the view that getting humans out of cults or extremist groups is a collective societal issue, not an individual issue. Marketing, social media, and technology conglomerates need to start being held accountable for the harm they’re causing. This isn’t a game.

What I wasn’t so keen on:
🔽 There’s a very sensationalist writing style that didn’t work for me in a non-fic.
🔽 Gatekeeping context undermined credibility (what the cryptocurrency scammer was jailed for “isn’t important” but, like, why? Either tell us the whole story or don’t mention it if it’s not relevant).
🔽 Clunky wording and poor phrasing that make the content hard to decipher at times. This is especially present in quotes where the author kept in grey words and repetition that might not be jarring in speech but is awfully hard to follow when written out verbatim.
🔽 It was jarring when we’re presented compelling evidence that social media is harmful and the questionable nature of influencers and coaches and then the author goes on to both engage with and advocate for both. I noticed a lot of conflicting and contradictory points throughout (for example, in one section we’re told social media and influencers aren’t going anywhere but the epilogue opens with loads of stats about how social media is dying).
🔽 As above, I think this book goes off on a lot of tangents, so much so that by the end, this isn’t a book about advertising at all. But, while we’re presented analyses on post-secondary ed, cults, religion, social media, the author only skates over the data harvesting element of why social media is dangerous. This is kinda why I was interested in reading the book! Doesn’t dig into how TikTok is basically spyware or the ridiculous amount of data it’s hoovering up. (Link)
🔽 I hated blaming remote working for “fewer opportunities for human interaction”. Haven’t we exhausted this dog whistle, yet? 🙄
🔽 Ends on a paltry note saying it’s “unrealistic” as ask people to stay off phones and social media and positing that all we need is more face to face contact. That just felt so staggeringly reductive to the complexity of the issues outlined in the book

There’s a lot of great content in these pages but I think it could benefit from further editing to improve its flow and cohesion. I also think it might be worth revisiting the theme and the tagline “How marketers use the same tactics as cults” because I’m not sure that’s representative of the contents. Paring back the sensationalism might help the content come across more objectively and convincingly.

But, we desperately need more people advocating about the issues presented in this book. For her commitment to shading light on how insidious digital marketing and social media are, I’m very grateful to Einstein! I’m also really grateful I don’t use social media.

I was privileged to have my request to review this book accepted by Prometheus Books on NetGalley.