Aja Barber

[hazelnot]

I mean, social media is exactly that: social. Some people can and have monetised it and if you want to jump on that boat, fine, go for it. But very few influencers are paid by their followers, they earn from brand endorsements. Patreon and Substack are the obvious exception; there you can have customers vs. followers. Instagram is a totally different platform; it's wild to think people should only follow you there if they're paying for content elsewhere? Unless you're black, obviously. This only applies to white followers. Because that makes perfect sense.

I could wax lyrical on the madness of this for hours but it's pretty simple really: if you don't want a platform, don't have one. If Instagram isn't your vibe, leave. If it's a necessary evil to drive traffic to your subscription platform and therefore you do want Instagram, treat it like the marketing tool you're using it as and behave accordingly. Belittling followers and trying to gaslight them into feeling like bad people for not paying you for content they clearly either can't afford or don't find valuable enough to pay for is not the ticket. They're clearly not your customers anyway, and surely lots who are currently customers will be turned off by this attitude?

Feels counterproductive to me but go off sis.

 

[CocoCottesmore]

I mean, social media is exactly that: social. Some people can and have monetised it and if you want to jump on that boat, fine, go for it. But very few influencers are paid by their followers, they earn from brand endorsements. Patreon and Substack are the obvious exception; there you can have customers vs. followers. Instagram is a totally different platform; it's wild to think people should only follow you there if they're paying for content elsewhere? Unless you're black, obviously. This only applies to white followers. Because that makes perfect sense.

I could wax lyrical on the madness of this for hours but it's pretty simple really: if you don't want a platform, don't have one. If Instagram isn't your vibe, leave. If it's a necessary evil to drive traffic to your subscription platform and therefore you do want Instagram, treat it like the marketing tool you're using it as and behave accordingly. Belittling followers and trying to gaslight them into feeling like bad people for not paying you for content they clearly either can't afford or don't find valuable enough to pay for is not the ticket. They're clearly not your customers anyway, and surely lots who are currently customers will be turned off by this attitude?

Feels counterproductive to me but go off sis.

Thank you! This is exactly what I wanted to say but my week has been too long and I'm too tired. But yes , this is exactly it.

 

[PineappleQueen19]

Her poor cats, I hope they are ok

On the documentary - firstly I am not surprised the filmmakers did not want to work with her. Secondly if they did the same thing to Brett what does it have to do with Aja being a black woman? She can’t get out of her own way.

TW: in the SS there is a mention of suicide

 

[wmg1995]

Her poor cats, I hope they are ok

On the documentary - firstly I am not surprised the filmmakers did not want to work with her. Secondly if they did the same thing to Brett what does it have to do with Aja being a black woman? She can’t get out of her own way.

TW: in the SS there is a mention of suicide

Completely off topic - but one of the respondents in I think the third picture is someone called 'sistahyiddishkeit' - their page is SO fascinating and also a total trainwreck. Makes sense they are supporting Aja!

 

[Lilac Wine]

Basically, they read her book and were interested in working with her, then after meeting her they ran a mile as they could quite rightly see she is deranged, and now she thinks they owe her because they had one conversation with her.

 

[Esteelouder]

Her poor cats, I hope they are ok

On the documentary - firstly I am not surprised the filmmakers did not want to work with her. Secondly if they did the same thing to Brett what does it have to do with Aja being a black woman? She can’t get out of her own way.

TW: in the SS there is a mention of suicide

The ‘email’ proves duck all. But if these conversations did happen are Grain Media not just choosing who they work with? Does she not choose who she works with after she has conversations and gets a vibe? Is it not similar to the people she tells to unfollow her because they don’t pay for her work - did she want paying just for speaking to someone and then allegedly using a book anyone can buy? Oh Aja you are a twisted person. ‘It could lead to five figure speaking gigs’. She’s insane!!!

 

[Fish & Chips]

I think it’s a fine line on managing the expectations of the ‘expert’ / person being engaged with. I do think people give a lot away when it comes to initial exploration meetings with production teams and agencies when they are conducting research and building a picture / story line. That’s what research is! To avoid these types of situations there should be some sort of fixed consultation fee i.e. a day rate and basic contract as part of the process. It happens a lot in creative industries.
Aja must know this…
Her attitude in general is quite shocking when it comes to her audience.
---
I would also ask for recognition in the credits. But as Estee Louder says above, they are just deciding who they work with.

 

[urghmummybloggers]

As someone who isn’t whit, they didn’t want to work with you Aja because you’re a rude hole, not because you’re black.

Honestly next level unhinged behaviour, whoever is left in her life needs to take her phone off her and tell her to go touch grass. Complains about social media, removes themselves off it then complains they no longer get paid work. I can’t make sense of it.

If she felt like she genuinely contributed to the production, take them to court, or even better, you should have arranged a contract before hand for your time.

 

[PineappleQueen19]

tit must have gone seriously sideways for them to not even invite her to the premiere? She seems totally blind to how she comes across

 

[hazelnot]

I see she's still going hard on the "good, unfollow me, I don't want followers anyway, followers are useless. Unless you're paying me you can GTFO" tangent.

I'm struggling to think of an industry where this logic works and can be applied the way she wants? Lots of the most avid readers rely on libraries for books. An author's biggest fan might never have paid them a cent.

 

[BillieR]

I see she's still going hard on the "good, unfollow me, I don't want followers anyway, followers are useless. Unless you're paying me you can GTFO" tangent.

How does she plan on gaining new patrons?

 

[Mokie]

Does anyone know how many patreons she has?

 

[Lilac Wine]

How does she plan on gaining new patrons?

Obviously there is no logic to her rants, but this seems to be the main point she is missing. There will always be churn with subscriptions. So even if she had all the paid subscribers she thinks she ‘deserves’, some will always drop off and she will never get new subscribers without free followers. That’s just how subscription models work. It’s not complicated. She is a delusional

 

[hazelnot]

Obviously there is no logic to her rants, but this seems to be the main point she is missing. There will always be churn with subscriptions. So even if she had all the paid subscribers she thinks she ‘deserves’, some will always drop off and she will never get new subscribers without free followers. That’s just how subscription models work. It’s not complicated. She is a delusional

Thissss. She's really fixated on Instagram followers owing her money elsewhere, but they're different platforms. People follow you on Instagram because they want to follow you on Instagram. Some will follow you elsewhere, but many don't - even when the other platform/s are free!

 

[Jockmcgraw]

She said in this post 'only 1%' of the readership' is subscribed. It seems slightly funny phrasing - I'm not sure if that's 1% of followers or if she's basing it off of an engagement analytic, but if she means followers she'll be making a very good income already, surely?

 

[hazelnot]

Another note: "I don't want more followers, they don't help me" - sorry are you helping yourself or the planet? I thought your motivations were largely altruistic? Somebody following you might learn a great deal, change their habits and encourage those around them to do the same, which might not help you personally but sure helps what you're supposedly trying to achieve.

Or is it all actually about head pats and wealth?

Tell on yourself harder.

 

[ThisIsMyDragName]

I stopped following her (before she ordered me to on account of the fact I’m not a paying subscriber) but she sounds not ok. I know she’s always been prone to rants but this all sounds a bit extreme.

 

[brownstone]

I wonder why they didn't hire her to be on screen? I can't think of any reason at all

/s

 

[BillieR]

I haven't read her book but her writing on social media is quite often pretty bad. That's another reason I wouldn't pay for her patreon

 

[PineappleQueen19]

No wonder she has so much time to throw tantrums on various social media platforms