🔗 Share this article

One Side: Beth

Sometimes she films me while I’m eating. I’ll see myself on her social media – it feels like a jumpscare.

My best friend of 10 years, Marielle, labels herself the “content queen”. It can be amusing for a bit, but it weighs on our friendship.

She is an extrovert, there's a constant urge the need to record everything all the time. When we eat out, her motto is, “The camera eats first,” and snaps pictures with the flash on, which induces embarrassment. It's unpleasant when strangers see her performing for the camera – I experience secondhand embarrassment. Another annoyance is because meals lose their warmth.

She isn’t exactly an online personality yet, but Marielle is aspiring to become one. She makes video blogs about city life, a day in her life, and her styling career. The material is quality, credit where it's due, but I don’t want to be involved. On occasion I'm captured while dining, or just accompanying her. Later, I appear on her Instagram later, and it comes like a surprise: I’ll have bare-faced, making a strange expression or be captured while eating. It’s uncomfortable.

Marielle also anticipates that I will to record her at inconvenient times. Sometimes I'm in conversation to another person, or we're simply hanging out in the street. I feel like our friendship has transformed into me being her unpaid videographer. She has the means to employ someone if she wanted high-quality content. When I brought up my discomfort about the situation, she brushed it off. She’s taken me to several industry functions, which was nice, but that doesn’t make up for all the energy I spend helping her make content.

I’m grateful that Marielle has supported me with my design career, but I don’t want our friendship to become just a ledger of exchanges. I don’t feel she’s fake or inauthentic, but sometimes I feel that if recording starts, we will begin acting in a way that presents a favorable image for her vlog.

Her directive is, “Alright, smile for the camera!” and film me smiling with another. It’s so silly. I need her to understand that our decade-long friendship still has limits. I love spending time with her, but I also desire to experience it without being recorded, edited, or shared for an audience. I’m not a prop for her online persona.

The Other Side: The Content Creator's View

I want Beth to see that the creations we make together can get us an opportunity.

I love creating videos. It’s not just a pastime; it’s part of who I am. Producing content and documenting experiences online allows me to express myself and connect with people in new ways.

I don’t see myself as a professional creator yet, but it’s smart to generate income from your interests. I admire people on social platforms who pull off that style of informal, self-made content creation.

Content creation is my interpretation of engaging with life: noticing the nuances, sharing them with an audience that values the craft behind it. It's never my aim to make my friend uneasy. Taking her to industry events was my way of sharing opportunities, providing her a chance to experience behind-the-scenes moments that could help her professional path too. That isn't blackmail, it's simply being pragmatic.

I would take her to these events even if she refused to assist me, but I want her to see what the content we make together can achieve: a foot in the door. I understand not everyone enjoys being filmed, but often spontaneity is what makes material authentic. Appearing on video occasionally is an inherent aspect of being my companion. I'd remove anything she requested, but she has never asked yet.

I don't demand anyone to be my personal videographer, but friends help each other in small ways. My assumption was recording a clip here or there would be enjoyable for her. Creativity flourishes in partnership, and having my friend around makes endeavors energetic and enjoyable. I don't compel her to participate in anything, and I would never deliberately embarrass her. But creating content jointly sometimes is part of how I record our time together.

I value our friendship deeply and want to avoid making videos to drive a wedge between us. I am ready to find middle ground: like asking before filming, and avoiding shots that might make her uncomfortable.

This is not about control, it's regarding sharing my world while still respecting hers. Clearly content creation is not a replacement for genuine friendship: it's merely part of how I live my life and I desire her to be included in a way that’s enjoyable for each of us.

The Jury: Public Sentiment

Is it right for her to stop recording herself and Beth when they are out together?

There’s nothing more uncomfortable than having a friend point a camera at you. I get that it's her passion, but I don’t make friends come to my work. Perhaps she can find influencer friends to create content with. With the dark, looming future of technology, human connections are the only thing we have – don’t waste them!
A respondent, 25

When pursuing something professionally, it's unfair to expect your friends for assistance every time, even if they have helped previously. If Marielle loves creating, that doesn’t mean everyone around her is willing material. She must to respect her friend's personal space.
Ankit, 26

Marielle might love producing videos and displaying her life online, but it isn't for everybody. It’s nice she has assisted Beth’s career, but she must to listen to what Beth wants.
A commenter, 27

It seems like you care about each other, so cling to that and ensure it’s the priority in your friendship. Create some real memories, where genuine feelings are stored, not digital scrapbooks. In fact, public figures who seem to share their worlds actually have more secrecy than it appears.
One opinion, 53

She seems to be neither present nor authentic when she’s with Beth – she's on the job. Both seem unsure as to where the line is. The answer lies not in trying to change one another, but in each establishing defined limits around what feels acceptable to them and seeing if there is an mutually agreeable compromise.
A final view, 71

Your Turn to Be the Judge

In an online poll: is Marielle exploiting their friendship?