IIt started, like so many things, with a drama in the WhatsApp group. It was 2021, and a loose coalition of my friends and acquaintances were bridging the ongoing lockdowns with a spectacularly malicious online game called illusionwhere deceit and betrayal are part of the gameplay.
Only this time, people had gone too far and someone was so angry that he left the group. To win him back, my friends came up with a questionable plan: They wanted Nigel Farage, of all people, to record an ironic apology video in which he would ask their departed comrade to rejoin the group.
Thanks to Cameo, which Farage had recently signed up to, this was a piece of cake: for around £100, Farage recorded a 60-second video clip in less than 24 hours and delivered it via the app. And the trick worked: thanks to Cameo and a rather baffled reading of a series of inside jokes that Farage didn’t understand, peace was restored to the friend group.
This was one of many uses of Cameo, a service that lets anyone request a custom video from a celebrity or influencer for one of their friends and have it delivered within 24 hours. The site was a surprise success during the Covid lockdowns, raising $1 billion in investment in 2021.
But since then, difficult times have begun. The videos are still being produced, there is still a… eclectic A mix of celebrity and influencer (more on that later), but it seems like he has a hard time paying even relatively small bills.
Last month, Business Insider reported on a settlement Cameo reached with 30 U.S. states after the company was found to have violated Federal Trade Commission rules on celebrity advertising.
Cameo was fined $600,000 – theoretically a modest amount for a billion-dollar company – but had demonstrated in court documents that it had no ability to pay that amount, settling instead for just $100,000 (split between 30 different states). So what went wrong?
In day-to-day life, the site still seems to be working as it always has, offering anyone looking for a custom video a selection of actors, comedians and influencers who can create their videos. British names include actress Miriam Margolyes (£134 for a video), ex-footballer John Terry (£197), singer Gareth Gates (£47) and presenter and environmentalist Ben Fogle (£71).
US names include Lance Bass from ‘NSync’ (£235), Dean Norris, who played DEA agent Hank Schrader in breaking Bad (£193) and former advocate of the US version of The office Kevin Malone, AKA Brian Baumgartner (£154), or “Meredith the Drunk”, Kate Flannery (£150).
While each app enjoys its own fan base and, in some cases, even a cult following, Cameo has struggled to attract or retain A-list celebrities or influencers with large followings. One reason for this is that using the app for big names comes with significant reputational risks. Some people have written videos attempting to get famous people to utter racist or other slurs, and they have even used them for more sinister purposes.
Last year, a “Russian-aligned group” commissioned and spliced together a series of videos recorded on Cameo and similar services to make it look like various U.S. celebrities were calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a corrupt drug addict while believing they were helping to stage an intervention.
The disinformation campaign included cameos by actor Elijah Wood and boxer and convicted rapist Mike Tyson, both of whom have since stopped their cameos, as well as Norris and Flannery, who remain active on the site.
Cameo takes 30% of the creator’s fee for processing the sale, transaction fees, and hosting and sending the videos. The largest creators seem to have decided to forego this potential revenue stream – either because it requires creating many individual videos that aren’t made public or because of the risks – but smaller creators say it’s a useful and effortless revenue stream with few downsides.
“I turn it off quite often, which closes the booking window when I’m busy, and you can choose which ones you want to do,” says a standup comedian who prefers to remain anonymous. “I have no negative experiences using the app.”
Another potential turn-off for bigger names is that Cameo is associated with fringe figures or failed politicians. Nigel Farage has appeared on Cameo since 2021 and is one of Britain’s most polarizing political figures (he failed to get into Parliament on his first seven attempts).
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In the US, disgraced former Republican congressman George Santos (over $99) reportedly now earns more (£78) on Cameo than he did as an elected representative, and Mike Flynn – a vote-avoiding, far-right Christian nationalist and former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DFAI) who briefly served as Donald Trump’s National Security Advisor – has also been a regular guest on Cameo.
There is also the problem that Cameo is more likely to attract new customers than repeat customers or subscribers. illusion For example, in the three years since the Farage incident, one WhatsApp group has not upset anyone enough to require another Cameo video.
These are just some of the issues affecting Cameo’s valuation, explains technology analyst Joseph Teasdale of Enders Analysis.
“Cameo was a pandemic phenomenon. Celebrities could record selfie videos even when they couldn’t play stadium shows or act in movies. On the demand side, a video from Cameo was a great experience gift when other options were limited. Now celebrities and consumers have better things to do than record and watch personalized videos,” he says.
“If your selling point is that your suppliers are famous and desirable, you run into a problem: they are the ones with the highest profile, they are the ones who attract users, so they get to reap most of the value generated. These are not anonymous TikTok creators who can be replaced if they leave because they don’t like the terms; Cameo lives or dies by the big names it attracts to the platform.”
These big names seem to be sticking to the major platforms – TikTok, YouTube, Instagram – where the broad audience is and where recurring revenue can be generated through advertising and monthly subscriptions rather than one-off novelty videos for individual subscribers.
This inevitably limits Cameo to smaller creators, influencers, and B- or C-list celebrities who are happy for the extra cash and are willing to spend it on original or ironic video productions. For those with a bit of time on their hands and no fear that their videos could be used to damage their brand, it’s a welcome service – but not one that will ever make Cameo’s founders or investors as rich as they hope.
However, one of the site’s stars remains loyal and active. Despite being elected MP for Clacton and violent far-right unrest occurring across the UK, Nigel Farage apparently found time to accommodate his Cameo requests: at the time of writing, the site showed that his last completed video was filmed at 10.30pm on Tuesday.
