We’ve all been there. Sucked into another doomscroll, living the highlight reel of hundreds of people in just as many minutes. During my last unplanned venture on Instagram reels, I was plied with so many consecutive University of Edinburgh student vlogs that I began to question just how much my phone really knew about me. Be it “a day in my life,” or “come study with me” until the ice melts, candle burns out or sun sets, thousands of students across the UK are monetising the student lifestyle. Videos made by students here in Edinburgh regularly reach hundreds of thousands of people. So what is it that draws viewers to these videos? And why does everyone suddenly want to be a student content creator?
In my final few months of school, ‘study with me’ videos provided a much-needed source of inspiration and motivation to get through exam season. Watching someone else be productive always seemed to give me the boost I needed to tick tasks off of an ever-growing to do list. It’s like peer-pressure, but available at any time of the day or night — from last minute cramming sessions to revising mountains of flashcards. So, for someone like me, who struggled to find the motivation for revision after a long day, social media content created by, and for, students really did help.
And, I’m not alone.
It seems now, as student life-based content is more popular than ever before, a growing number of students in Edinburgh are riding this wave. It’s easy to understand why. As a content creator, you’re self-employed, and can enjoy the privilege of working exactly as many hours as you want, without sacrificing your social life or academic commitments. With such a large proportion of the student community in Edinburgh working part-time jobs, with little to no control over shift patterns, it’s no surprise that so many jump at the opportunity for such flexibility.
When discussing this with fourth year students, some of the key draws of this lifestyle were indeed decided to be the freedom of working for yourself, with complete creative control and no overbearing managers; but by far the most popular response was the potential to earn far more than you would at the standard minimum wage job. However, monetisation is not guaranteed; for most of these aspiring content creators, the work is unpaid. So why then, do so many students decide to pursue it?
“No risk, no reward,” says one fourth year. “It’s unlikely that you’ll make it big, but if you do, you can make a lot of money.” For some, it’s a hobby: a creative outlet with which they can preserve and look back at their life at university — some of their happiest memories. Those of us soon to graduate and enter the seeming abyss of the job market will recognise that the chance to develop skills and experiences to add to the CV is not something to be dismissed out-of-hand.
However, several of the students I interviewed also perceived being a student content creator as too risky, and said that they would never pursue it as a career. “If you didn’t get many views on a video that you worked hard on, and didn’t make any money from it, you still need to be able to pay rent and bills. I couldn’t live with that uncertainty.” A hobby then, or another part-time job, seems to be the consensus amongst these students.
Whether a hobby or a career, I have no doubt that we will be benefitting from the talents of Edinburgh’s student content creators for many years to come. Personally, I’m most looking forward to the burnt orange of autumn leaves in the Meadows and hot chocolates from Uplands Roast once again gracing my screen.
Photo by Laura Chouette on Unsplash
