Platform lethargy: Relational work perspective on influencer precarity

Abstract

This article examines how influencers establish agency amidst precarious working conditions both on and off platforms. Findings from over 50 in-depth interviews show that influencers in Slovenia do not gain agency through platform-centred practices as described in existing literature. Influencers use platform features with minimal effort across the entire cycle of cultural production, which includes content creation, distribution, and monetisation—a phenomenon referred to as ‘platform lethargy’. Instead, influencers gain agency through diverse income streams and the support of Instagram husbands and family members. Precarity is not alleviated by using intimacy as a tool in practices of relational labour with audiences, but by relational work that connects actual intimate relationships with economic transactions. This study sheds light on the integration of social media platforms into a pre-existing hustling culture and is relevant for the de-westernisation of research on platformised creative work.