Just my personal opinion on the topic of “influencers,” whom Google describes as “individuals with large or highly engaged social media followings who hold considerable sway in specific industries such as beauty, fashion, fitness, travel, and food.”
We used to call them “critics,” but then social media came along and some people figured they could make money if they amassed enough followers on platforms like YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook and Snapchat. Somebody—I don’t know whom—had the bright idea to dub them “influencers” and, voila!, a new career path was born. I actually heard a five-year old girl say on television that when she grew up, she wanted to be an influencer.
About a month ago there was a big media to-do about a local restaurant influencer, Karla, who wrote on TikTok about how offended she’d been by a restaurant owner, who she said disrespected her. Her TikTok went viral (21 million views), and within a week the restaurant was forced to close, the victim of a vicious online attack by thousands of angry diners. The restaurant’s Google rating plunged and its Yelp score fell off the cliff.
When I read all the news stories I felt bad for the restaurant owner and really pissed off at Karla. Because her personal feelings had been offended (apparently the owner wasn’t as respectful to her, the influencer, as she believed her exalted position merited), she made the decision to ruin him—and she did.
The reason this story resonated with me was because, in pre-influencer days, I was one of the most important wine critics in California, which is to say, in the U.S. A good review from me could empty Costco shelves (or so I was told by Costco’s wine buyer), while a poor review could prove devastating to a small family winery struggling to pay the bills.
I was well aware of my power and took it seriously. I hated giving a bad review because I knew how harmful it could be to the owners, whom in many cases I knew and liked. In one or two cases over the decades I actually decided not to publish a scathing review for that very reason. I had no appetite for hurting anyone. When you’re put into that position you have to be humble and mindful of what you write. I certainly never adopted any kind of attitude of superiority or projecting an aura of power, or expected anyone to kowtow to me. I’d lucked out in getting a good job, at a particular moment in history when wine critics had assembled vast influence in America; I knew it was a fluke and wouldn’t last, so I never became a victim of its dark side.
Karla, I think, did. By the summer of 2025, influencers were all the rage, and a lot of them took themselves far too seriously. They never realized that they would be—as Andy Warhol observed—famous for 15 minutes, and then fade back into obscurity. Instead, they behaved like self-entitled jackasses, expecting to be wined and dined and limoued around town, and have the red carpet rolled out for them—simply because they had 100,000 followers on X. Karla should have been grateful for every free meal, for every gracious host who welcomed her into his restaurant, instead of reacting so negatively because her delicate feelings were hurt.
This influencer phenomenon, in my opinion, reflects directly on our political situation in the Bay Area. We have a lot of young people who think they’re God’s gift to the world because of the virtuous refinement of their feelings and the acuity of their thoughts. They’re the ones who put Black Lives Matter signs in their windows and condemn hard-working people who move into Oakland as evil gentrifiers. They’re the holier-than-thou crowd who will vote for a Pamela Price or Carroll Fife reflexively because they’re against the White power structure of which—let’s be honest—most of them are beneficiaries. The very idea of being an influencer implies that your impressions of things are better than anyone else’s, and that the world should be grateful you’re willing to share those impressions with it.
When I was a wine critic, I always kept one thought in the front of my mind: Don’t let this go to your head. I had my opinions, of course, and I was paid to write about them, and I certainly was a good wine taster and writer. But I was always a little embarrassed at having such power. I knew I was just Steve, with all my flaws and weaknesses. In fact, I knew just about all the other important wine critics (it’s a small world), and most of them felt the same way I did. They tried to be humble and respectful of those with whose careers they were tinkering.
I fear that these days these influencers have let it go to their heads. Social media has made somebodies out of nobodies. My advice, as one who’s had more power and fame than 99.9% of them ever will, is to be humble. Sit down. Be humble. Sit down. Be humble.
Steve Heimoff