the business of intellectual recommendations

Introduction:

• Alongside a rise in AI 'slop', so has their been a rise in a new type of creator, the intellectual, the philosophical.
• A high-performing sub-genre of that content is recommendations (book recs, article recs, event recs)
• Pseudo-consumptio
• The algorithm

Recommendations built the influencer economy.

Going offline - as a trend

• Exploring why

Repackaging content

• "I recently read a substack"
• Art is based on art.

The performance of creating

• Everything's performative

Content as a proxy for consuming

• Begs the question is video as a teacher

Alongside the rise in AI-generated 'slop' has been the rise of the intellectual influencer.

Within that sphere, a particular sub-genre has caught my attention: recommendations and recommenders.

Since the dawn of influencers, recommendations has been pinnacle.

These people often use someone else's work as their basis,

"I recently read this substack"

In people's desire to reclaim their intellect

I'm curious as to how much is pseudo-consumption