YouTube personality Felix “PewDiePie” Kjellberg has been unceremoniously dropped by both Disney and YouTube for a series of anti-Semitic stunts that began back in August of last year. Perhaps his most high-profile gag, where a pair of admittedly unwitting accomplices held up a sign that said “death to all Jews,” was accomplished with the help of an Israeli startup called Fiverr.
So what is Fiverr, exactly?
Fiverr promotes itself as the go-to destination for online freelance services. It’s part of the growing “gig economy,” which includes services like Uber and AirBnB. But instead of making money off your car or your spare bedroom on weekends, participants auction off their time and expertise for as little as $5.
The service is a bit of a darling in venture capital circles, and received $60 million in financing in 2015. But there’s also been a bit of a backlash.
A lot of ink has been spilled about how the gig economy drives down wages, removes protections from workers and in some cases can lead to exploitation. Just last month Wired interviewed an Uber driver named Fasil Teka. While he is treated like an employee, he receives “none of the benefits and protections of a traditional job, like the ability to negotiate fare prices through union representation or collect unemployment if Uber drops him.”
Be that as it may, many in developing countries see Fiverr as a way to make a living wage. That’s what Fiverr Funny Guys, a pair of entrepreneurs in India, use the service for. And that’s why getting banned from the service after being asked to participate in an anti-Semitic video for the world’s biggest YouTube star was so damaging to them.
Kjellberg later personally intervened on behalf of Fiverr Funny Guys, helping them to be reinstated on the service.
Another Fiverr transaction has also received attention recently, in this case thanks to our own President Donald Trump.
Mashable reports that a 15 year-old girl from Singapore received a contract from the Trump campaign to turn a slideshow into a video presentation. The task took her just a few hours and likely earned her no less than $100. But many thought it was unusual to see a candidate running on a nationalist, pro-jobs platform resort to using cheap foreign labor for anything, let alone a “Students for Trump” campaign video.
“Her motivation was not at all political,” Mashable wrote after interviewing her father. “She just wanted to pay on her own for dental braces.”
So, understand that even as the internet allows wealthy nations to export money to less wealthy nations in exchange for their time and expertise, there are clear risks associated with the gig economy.
Those risks, as Kjellberg found out, go both ways.
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7sbvLsp6opl6YvK57kWlocGdiZH51e5BtbWptYWl%2FcMPHmqtmoaNis6rCxKupZqiVrLGqsc%2BinGaZnqm2br%2FEpqCtoaOi