Visibility is a currency that pays the bills, just not ours...
Likes, views, etc.. these are THE metrics in their ecosystem.
I genuinely believe that they genuinely believe it is doing us a favor. But it just does not. Social medias are flooded with weekly releases from major brands and all "reviews" nowadays say the same thing "The best pedal I hvae ever played.".
The don't realize people click, move on, forget, because the attention span averages at 2 secs, and they mostly like their video because it's them, not the product, because the content of the video does not make it stand out from anything else around - not by lack of quality in the video, all are just equally good, the millions of them.
But yeah, I feel like some of them are just fishing, hoping to grab some free gear to flip, some, genuinely think they are your savior and shooting a ten seconds video of them noodling - without ever going into the details of what the pedal is - will make you rich.
But then again, supply and demand, I gave a lot away at the beginnings believing that would convert into orders, never did. Now we try to be more careful but it is STILL tempting, and for me, probably will always be, to have someone making cool sounds with something you built.
Feed the beast and it'll grow...
Rant mode off - Anything custom now, I come upfront with a rough quote just for working hours and say I'll charge them half their own hourly rate, most dreamers never reply when you tell them it will cost you 100h of your time
