P. T. Barnum has discovered influencers.
He is furious.
Not because they're dishonest.
Not because they're shallow.
Not because they turn private life into public spectacle, manufacture controversy for attention, or recommend products they discovered approximately eleven minutes before filming the advertisement.
Barnum is furious because he was born in 1810.
“You mean to tell me,” he says, staring at the phone, “that this machine allows any person to command the attention of millions?”
Yes.
“Instantaneously?”
Yes.
“And the spectators carry it voluntarily?”
Yes.
“In their pockets?”
Correct.
Barnum slowly sits down.
“I wasted my life building museums.”
The Greatest Show on Earth
Phineas Taylor Barnum understood something fundamental about America:
People like to look.
At celebrities.
At oddities.
At scandals.
At things they have been told they absolutely must see.
Barnum built an empire out of attention.
In 1841, he purchased Scudder's American Museum in New York and transformed it into an astonishing combination of museum, theater, menagerie, lecture hall, curiosity cabinet, and carnival.
There were animals.
Performers.
Wax figures.
Exhibits.
Hoaxes.
Oddities.
Hundreds of thousands of objects.
Barnum understood that the attraction itself was only part of the business.
The real product was:
You have to see this.
Now he watches a twenty-two-year-old open a box containing skin cream.
Four million views.
Barnum is physically ill.
The Personal Brand
Someone explains personal branding.
Barnum recovers immediately.
This he understands.
“You transform the individual into the attraction.”
Exactly.
“And then the attraction advertises other attractions.”
Basically.
“And the public develops an emotional attachment to the attraction?”
Yes.
“And therefore trusts its commercial recommendations?”
Correct.
Barnum smiles.
“My God.”
He has seen the future.
Barnum was one of America's great manufacturers of celebrity.
He promoted General Tom Thumb—Charles Stratton—into an international sensation.
He brought the celebrated Swedish singer Jenny Lind to America and generated enormous excitement before much of the public had ever heard her sing.
Barnum didn't merely advertise performances.
He manufactured events.
People wanted to attend partly because everyone else wanted to attend.
Now we call this engagement.
Barnum called it Tuesday.
Authenticity
Then Barnum learns the most important rule of influencing:
Be authentic.
He laughs for nearly a minute.
“No, truly.”
Seriously.
Followers want authenticity.
“What does that mean?”
They want to feel that they're seeing the real person.
Barnum nods.
“And therefore the performance must appear not to be a performance.”
Exactly.
He wipes away a tear.
“This century is magnificent.”
He watches an influencer film a casual morning routine.
She wakes up.
Stretches.
Makes coffee.
Looks thoughtfully out the window.
Except the camera was already inside the bedroom.
Barnum points.
“Who placed the camera there?”
She did.
“So she awakened, arranged the apparatus, returned to bed, pretended to awaken again, and presented the resulting performance as her ordinary morning?”
Yes.
Barnum stands.
“Madam, I salute you.”
Sponsored Content
Next comes the money.
An influencer begins:
You guys have been asking about my skincare routine…
Barnum interrupts.
“Have they?”
Probably not.
Excellent.
She explains that she has been using a particular product and absolutely loves it.
Then appears:
#ad
Barnum is confused.
“You disclose that you have been paid?”
Yes.
“Why?”
Federal law.
He considers this a deeply unreasonable restriction upon commerce.
Then he learns how much successful influencers can earn from a single sponsored post.
Silence.
“How much?”
We repeat it.
Barnum stares at the wall.
Jenny Lind required theaters.
Musicians.
Tickets.
Newspaper advertisements.
Travel.
Contracts.
An entire promotional apparatus.
This woman held up shampoo for thirty seconds.
Barnum begins calculating how much money he would have made with Instagram in 1850.
We take away the calculator.
The Humbug
Barnum is frequently credited with saying:
“There's a sucker born every minute.”
He probably didn't.
This annoys him.
He preferred another word for the promotional deceptions and playful frauds associated with his career:
Humbug.
Barnum defended humbug when audiences received amusement in exchange for their money.
A good humbug created curiosity.
It made people wonder.
It got them through the door.
This makes him particularly interested in clickbait.
YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT HAPPENED NEXT.
Barnum clicks.
Nothing happens.
He is impressed.
DOCTORS HATE THIS ONE SIMPLE TRICK.
Click.
Advertisement.
Barnum nods approvingly.
I QUIT SOCIAL MEDIA. HERE'S WHY.
The person has posted six times since announcing this.
Barnum leans back.
“The humbug is thriving.”
Rage Bait
Then we show him rage bait.
Someone intentionally says something ridiculous.
People become furious.
They comment.
They share.
They argue.
The algorithm sees engagement and shows the content to more people.
Barnum understands immediately.
“Outrage increases distribution.”
Yes.
“And distribution increases revenue.”
Sometimes.
“So one's enemies advertise one's product.”
Exactly.
Barnum looks almost offended.
“Why did nobody tell me this?”
We remind him that he spent much of his career generating controversy precisely because controversy attracted attention.
He thinks about it.
Fair.
The Wellness Influencer
Then Barnum finds wellness TikTok.
This is where even he becomes uncomfortable.
A man is explaining that ordinary drinking water is insufficiently hydrated.
A woman claims a supplement will remove unspecified toxins.
Someone else has discovered that civilization has been eating breakfast incorrectly.
There are powders.
Oils.
Patches.
Drops.
Detoxes.
Cleanses.
Courses.
Barnum watches silently.
Finally:
“Are these claims true?”
Some are better supported than others.
“Do the customers know?”
Hopefully.
Barnum frowns.
This matters.
His defense of humbug depended upon entertainment. A spectacle could be exaggerated without necessarily harming the spectator.
Selling questionable health claims is different.
Barnum understands the distinction immediately.
“Never cheat a customer,” he wrote in his advice literature.
The showman has unexpectedly discovered ethics.
Even Barnum has standards.
The algorithm does not.
Then Barnum learns about virality.
No one can guarantee it.
Nobody fully understands why some things explode.
Millions of people suddenly see something.
Then everyone imitates it.
Barnum becomes obsessed.
He posts a video.
Three hundred views.
Again.
Seventy-eight.
Again.
Twelve.
P. T. Barnum, one of the greatest promoters in American history, cannot get traction.
He is furious.
Then he accidentally films himself yelling at the algorithm.
WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS INFERNAL MACHINE?
Eight million views.
Barnum goes viral.
He stares at the numbers.
He has never felt more alive.
The Algorithm
But eventually Barnum notices something strange.
He had spent his career deciding what spectacle to promote.
Newspaper editors decided what to print.
Theater managers decided what to book.
Audiences decided what tickets to purchase.
But here there is another participant.
The algorithm.
“What does it want?”
Engagement.
“What sort?”
Any sort.
Joy?
Sure.
Anger?
Absolutely.
Fear?
Very effective.
Envy?
Excellent.
Barnum frowns.
The machine doesn't care whether people enjoy the show.
It cares whether they continue watching.
For perhaps the first time, P. T. Barnum has encountered a showman more shameless than P. T. Barnum.
And it isn't even human.
The Greatest Show on Earth
Barnum eventually admits that social media is astonishing.
Anyone can become a performer.
Anyone can find an audience.
Artists can bypass gatekeepers.
Small businesses can reach millions.
Unknown people can become famous overnight.
Barnum loves all of this.
But he also recognizes what has happened.
His nineteenth-century spectacles had boundaries.
You bought a ticket.
You entered the museum.
You saw the show.
Then you left.
The modern show follows you home.
It wakes beside you.
It sits at breakfast.
It rides to work.
It waits beside the bed.
And millions of performers compete every second for one tiny piece of your attention.
Barnum spent his career trying to get people through the door.
The door is gone.
The circus is everywhere.
P. T. Barnum Is Live
By the end of the week, Barnum has adapted.
Of course he has.
He has 2.8 million followers.
His bio reads:
SHOWMAN | ENTREPRENEUR | HUMBUG ENTHUSIAST
He sells a course:
MASTERING ATTENTION: THE BARNUM METHOD
$499.
There is an early-bird discount that has been available continuously for eleven months.
He posts motivational clips.
He has merchandise.
He has a newsletter.
He has launched a podcast.
He is negotiating an energy-drink sponsorship.
Then he turns on the camera.
P. T. BARNUM IS LIVE.
Forty thousand people appear.
Then sixty thousand.
Then a hundred thousand.
Barnum looks into the lens.
For once, he is speechless.
No theater.
No museum.
No posters.
No ticket booth.
No newspaper advertisements.
Just Barnum and the entire planet.
Finally he smiles.
“Ladies and gentlemen…”
There it is.
The old instinct.
“…you are about to witness something never before seen.”
We have absolutely no idea what he's talking about.
Neither does he.
But 180,000 people are watching now.
And that, P. T. Barnum understands, is the point.