I think Generation Like is an accurate depiction of how most kids and young adults utilize social media outlets. It’s a bit trivial for someone to rely and depend on how many likes or views their posts or videos generate just to validate themselves. It’s understandable that companies would want to reach out to individuals who have generated a high amount of followers, likes, and subscribers, but this eventually transforms the individual’s social media platforms into tools to build the individual’s personal brand as well as the company’s brand. Instead of using it as a source to express themselves or post things they want to show people and not to profit by showing off the goods that the company sponsored them with, it’s more like a marketing/advertising tool for companies. It’s as if the company took over the user’s social media accounts for their own benefit.

Generation Like has shown that it’s pretty much a win-win situation for both the individual and the company that’s sponsoring that individual. In return for showcasing the company’s goods to their social media accounts, they receive free gear, cash or other forms of payment. There’s really no loser unless the individual’s followers decide to unfollow or not like the user’s posts/videos because their product reviews are deceiving. For example, the individual can just be saying nice things about a product to keep getting sponsored, when in actuality that product isn’t great quality. The individual would be losing the audience that they probably took a while to generate. Teens/young adults are being exploited and so are their personal social media platforms. I think they’re aware of their exploitation, but so long as they benefit in some way, they’re probably fine with it.