Contents – Summer-Autumn 2025

Rita, Szabó-Gödri – Gergely, Gosztonyi:

Influencers at the intersection of law and ethics

This paper examines the legal frameworks regulating influencers both in Hungary and internationally. With the rise of social media and influencer marketing, the legal and ethical aspects of influencers’ activities have become increasingly important. While there is no unified legislation specifically governing influencers in Hungary, the Hungarian Competition Authority and other regulatory agencies have issued multiple guidelines to ensure transparency in advertising practices. This study compares Hungarian regulatory approaches with practices in other European countries. Its findings suggest that the role of influencers continues to expand, necessitating the dynamic development of legal frameworks and the refinement of regulations to enhance transparency and consumer protection.

Keywords: AVMS, DSA, Hungarian Competition Authority, influencer, National Media and Infocommunications Authority, regulation, opinion leader, social media

Andok, Mónika – Szilvia, Dornics:

Academic Influencers

Drawing on the scholarly literature on science communication and social media influencers, we outline the theoretical framework underpinning our empirical investigation in this study. Our findings, based on in-depth interviews with eight academic influencers, suggest that one of their primary motivations is the commitment to disseminate quality knowledge and to enhance the societal visibility of their respective fields. Personal qualities and professional credibility appear to contribute to the success of their online presence than technological proficiency does.

Keywords: academic influencer, motivation, science communication, social media, typology

Flóra Dóra, Csatári:

Celebrity and Authenticity

In the age of social media, when athletes can cultivate their self-brand through continuous online presence, publishing a book-length autobiography may seem like a surprising choice. This study argues, however, that sports autobiography offers a unique opportunity to build a personal brand, control public narratives, and shape enduring forms of celebrity. The analysis is structured around three key dimensions: first, it examines the transformation of the public sphere and media space through the lens of parasocial intimacy. Second, it explores how a narrative that is often edited and mediated can still be perceived as authentic. Finally, it argues that publishing a sports autobiography as a communicative act carries both prestige and permanence, serving as a monument to an athletic career in contrast to the immediacy of social media, while preserving the mystique of stardom.

Keywords: autobiography, celebrity studies, parasocial intimacy, personal brand, sports media

Míra, Mohr – Mária, Törőcsik:

Marketing Strategies of Food Influencers on Social Media

Companies are allocating an increasing proportion of their marketing communication budgets to influenc- ers, highlighting their importance in reaching target audiences. Fierce competition arises among influenc- ers to capture attention, leading them to employ various topics, techniques, and incentive methods while following different strategies. This study examines the marketing strategies that food influencers adopt to stabilise and expand their presence on social media and the reception thereof. The data were collected via Sotrender.com, an application designed to measure social media performance. This paper compares the findings of research conducted over two periods. In total, it analyses 301 days of observations and aims to explore the content creation practices of gastro influencers and the patterns that emerge from these by analysing Instagram profiles with a focus on how influencers strive to become more efficient brands. It in- vestigates the impact of gastro influencers’ content strategies on follower engagement rates. Additionally, it examines how a content strategy based on emotional connection affects influencers’ performance.

Keywords: food influencers, Instagram, marketing strategy, media efficiency analysis, personal branding

Orsolya, Nagy:

Blurry Lines

The boundaries between the producer and the consumer have been increasingly blurred for decades; the emergence of the prosumer is not a novelty in the world of media studies. However, while there is relatively great academic interest in the receiver or fan who becomes an author, there is less discussion of the integration of fan content creation strategies in authorial communication and the relationship between authorial and audience interpretations and canons. This paper analyses the contents responsible for the promotion of the concept album EPIC: The Musical written and published by Jorge Miguel Rivera-Herrans and shows how the (self-)analytical contents made public by the author and the classic fan interpretation practices relate to each other. Furthermore, it examines how the contents that influence interpretation interact with fan content creation and how the latter contributes to the creation of popularising or ex- planatory authorial content. A key aspect of the research is the influential role of the author as a celebri- ty upon audiences’ interpretive work.

Keywords: authorship, fan culture, hybridisation, media convergence, popular culture

Krisztina, Máthé – Anna, Keszeg:

The Influencers of Ethical Fashion Consumption

The crisis of growth-based fashion consumption, previously considered standard, has brought the issues of sustainability and ethical consumption to the forefront, with influencers playing a major role in this shift. These influencers use the same marketing tools as the traditional companies that promote consumption do, yet their message encourages the minimisation of consumption and promotes thoughtful and responsible decisions. This study examines the strategies of influencers promoting ethical fashion consumption and the emotional attitudes associated with them. It identifies four categories of influencers: those promoting handcrafted products, those focusing on sustainability, those encouraging local consumption, and those advocating for non-consumption. It offers a qualitative content analysis of the social media content of active Hungarian influencers in these categories. Its findings highlight the contradictions within their messages and point to the potential emergence of new, alternative, consumption patterns.

Keywords: community building, craftsmanship, ethical consumption, locality, sustainability

Petra, Egri – Maksa, Gyula:

Impersonally Personal Fashion Content

The emergence of digital influencers (CGI influencers) has precipitated a paradigm shift in the brand recognition industry, engendering a transformation in the manner how fashion brands communicate with their prospective clients via social media. The social media platform Instagram, in particular, has been found to facilitate the establishment of a sense of “personhood and immediacy.” However, the advent of artificial intelligence has led to the creation of non-human profile avatars, transforming advertising opportunities for fashion brands and engendering a new personality for the audiences. These CGI fashion avatars have been observed in a variety of real-life scenarios, seemingly indistinguishable from reality, including travel, cinemagoing, manicures, and advocacy for environmental causes. They are depicted alongside real-looking individuals and photographs, further enhancing their perceived realism. In this paper, we investigate the five most prominent CGI fashion influencers (@lilmiquela, @shudu.gram, @magazineluiza, @noonoouri, and @fit.aitana) through qualitative content analysis, examining their character and the visual content of their channels. The focal point of our inquiry lies in the manner how the visual content and posts of CGI influencers transform the prevailing paradigm of fashion creation and our collective attitudes towards fashion.

Keywords: CGI influencer, digital fashion, fashion influencer, Instagram, luxury fashion

Ádám, Guld:

Gladiators of Late Modernity on the Small Screen

The 2023 season of “Star Box”, aired on RTL televisiobn, achieved outstanding success in terms of viewership. According to audience data, the show outperformed all its competitors in its time slot and achieved exceptional results particularly among the 18–59 years age group, securing the top position. When considering the entire population, it ranked third on the weekly programme charts. This raises the question of what tools the show used to achieve such remarkable results. The aim of this study is to analyse the show’s appeal through the lenses of genre history, cultural studies, and communication and media theory approaches. It uncovers the market logic behind the production of the show and examines the audience’s evolving attitudes toward the programme. Its central premise is that “Star Box” can be understood in the context of the attention economy as a deliberately high-stimulus manipulative format. It achieves maximum impact by combining star and celebrity culture with tabloid media violence, presented in the form of a pseudo-sporting event.„„

Keywords: attention economy, celebrity boxing, genre history, media violence, tabloid

Attila Zoltán, Kenyeres – Zoltán, Szűts:

Is the Virtual Less Authentic?

This paper examines the credibility of human and virtual social media influencers on the basis of international publications indexed in the SCOPUS database presenting relevant empirical research and published between 2020 and 2025. The vast majority of the 73 studies that meet the criteria and are included in the analysis suggest that human influencers are either clearly or rather more credible than their virtual counterparts. However, another significant group of publications argues that it is impossible to make a clear distinction between human and virtual influencers on the basis of their credibility, because the perceived credibility of influencers is determined by the product/service, the context, the preferences and personal characteristics of the recipient as well as other features. Thus, in some circumstances, the human influencer is more credible, while in others the virtual is. These circumstances are also discussed in this paper.

Keywords: human influencer, perceived authenticity, perceived effectiveness, social media, virtual influencer

Máté, Gorka-Focht:

From Movie Stars to Influencers

Film marketing emerged when cinema was born and came to play an ever increasing role as film production turned into a large-scale industry. The willingness of the studio system to take financial risks and its high revenue expectations gave rise to star culture, with the rising stars serving as long-standing guarantees of success. In the contemporary context, experience-centred approaches have become increasingly prominent, often preceding the actual act of viewing. The content overload generated by streaming platforms imposed new challenges on film marketing, which must strive to distinguish films in an oversaturated market. As a result, the strategic design of audience experience has become a central component of both pre-release and post-release film communication. In this framework, particular emphasis is placed on the transition from inaccessible and passive stars into actively engaged influencers who, through their contributions via social media, have become key elements of audience engagement and film promotion.

Keywords: audience experience, film communication, film marketing, influencer, star culture