Bite this

Behold ‘The Influencer’ - a self-appointed critic who scams free meals for ‘reviews’ on social media.

Review: noun; a critical article or report on a book, play, restaurant, recital, or the like ...

"Hi there! My name is Bree Facile. I'm a lifestyle blogger. I am making a trip to your town next week for some events and reviews and would love to pop in for a meal! In exchange for a review and exposure, we would love to have a hosted meal. Please let me know if you would like to get on board!"

That's a genuine piece of correspondence, btw, although the name has been changed. "Hosted" is the euphemism du jour for "free". Are we both smelling the same rat?

Here's how it works in the world of The Influencer. You get in touch with a restaurant and tell it you are "influential". You can prove this: you have X Instagram and Twitter followers, and God knows how many Facebook "friends".

You think of yourself as a "communicator". In fact you're nothing more than a hustler, selling services for chardonnay instead of cash. You say this: "Give me and my friends a free meal and I will use my SM [social media] audience to promote your place. I'll call these posts 'reviews'."

Languages evolve, of course.

Maybe word meanings morph with time, too. In the digital age, "review" has come to mean something new. I've always thought it meant: approach something with an open mind, no commercial affiliations, pay your way, publish. Such an analogue approach.

No, in the age of The Influencer, the definition has been redrafted as ... Review: noun; words and images published quid pro quo; sycophancy masquerading as independent opinion, with a mutual understanding that it's published in exchange for free meals.

Now, if you want to be an influencer in the food sphere, you need to publish something. You need a forum to share your opinions and images, or at least the opinions you form on the back of a free lunch for you and three friends. You start a blog, but when you realise that writing isn't necessarily easy, or that you are not suited to the challenge of producing words, you kill the blog off quietly and concentrate on Instagram, which is a piece of cake. Free cake, of course.

Once you have enough "followers" - who, by the way, can be purchased - you start sending those oily freebie requests. You actually think of yourself as "a reviewer". Sadly, you get bites.

The problem is that these people are doing to legitimate reviewers what paedophile priests have done to the vast majority of clergy.

I don't care who "reviews" restaurants, in what forum, as long as it's done legitimately. And for the hustlers, as long as they make disclosures on what they have been "paid" for their silly words and pics.

To not do so is probably illegal. And not just for The Influencer.

According to the ACCC, bloggers must clearly disclose any commercial relationship with any business that rewards them for their endorsement. Also, businesses should monitor the conduct of bloggers to whom they have provided free product; a business may be responsible for any misleading or deceptive conduct carried out by a blogger rewarded to endorse its products.

Now that, Mr Restaurant Proprietor dabbling with a bit of SM promotion, is food for thought.