chooses

laughs in specifically addictive design patterns.

would you blame an addict for being addicted?

the problem is corporations. always is. always has been.

the question you have raised is about moral responsibility - who is more responsible for the shitty behavior of the influencer, the influencer doing their behavior, or the consumer who subscribes and consumes their content?

I don’t think there is any question that the consumer’s views and subscriptions provide the basis of the success or failure of an influencer - and in that sense, what consumers tend to view controls what influencers succeed and fail.

But consumers are not choosing to view content in a completely neutral context, i.e. they aren’t looking at influencer A or B on their merits or behavior alone, instead there are all kinds of ways that consumers are directed to view some content and not other content: SEO manipulation, the algorithm, etc. all change what consumers even see and interact with.

So no, I don’t think it’s the consumer primarily responsible for driving traffic to one kind of influencer or another.

And regardless, I think it’s the influencer who is most morally responsible for their behavior regardless of the audience that might motivate them.

Finally, I think you have ignored the most important factor in deciding who succeeds or fails: the corporate platform and how it prioritizes one kind of content over another. Neither the influencer nor the consumer are primarily in control of where attention is placed, the platform which manipulates and controls what content shows up in search and recommendation feeds are primarily in control.