Influencer marketing as labour: between the public and private divide

Abstract

The labour law perspective divides social media influencers into two groupings. First, social media influencers exist in law as commercial entities themselves, beyond the remit of employment law regulations. Second, social media has subtly infiltrated the orthodox workplace setting, with the by-product of employers deploying their workers as influencers within their own social networks. The distinction between an independent commercial entity and a worker or employee (as a category variously captured by employment regulation) remains contested terrain. While this topic travels into that debate, this chapter predominantly examines how social media influencers reveal information technology's impact on labour law.