Michigan State University researchers are spending your tax dollars to figure out how computer-generated influencers can better manipulate your purchasing decisions — even when you know they aren't real.
The study, co-authored by MSU Associate Professor Juan Mundel, examines why consumers can be persuaded into buying products pushed by AI influencers. These aren't people. They're brand-built digital puppets with fabricated names, invented personalities, and millions of social media followers — and the research is essentially a how-to guide for making them more effective at separating you from your money.
The business behind AI influencers is massive. Brands spent $39 billion on influencer marketing globally last year, and that figure is climbing. The corporations behind this spending aren't funding research to understand the ethical implications of fake spokespeople — they want to know what works. MSU is delivering the answer on the public dime.
WDIV ClickOnDetroit covered the study as a straightforward consumer-interest story, framing it as an exploration of "connections" between people and AI influencers. The outlet gave Mundel a friendly platform to share "highlights" from his research without pressing on who benefits when a public university helps Silicon Valley sharpen its tools of persuasion. The core question — why should taxpayers subsidize research that helps corporations program their consent? — went unasked.
The Guardian, for its part, didn't cover the MSU study at all. Its relevant reporting on the same date focused on a separate national survey about physical and sexual violence in America, led by researchers at Tulane University and UC San Diego. That study found 52% of U.S. adults have experienced physical violence and 49% have experienced sexual violence in their lifetimes. Worthwhile research with a clear public health justification — which raises the contrast in sharp relief. One study serves the public. The other serves the corporate machine that wants to automate your choices.
The real influencer threat isn't foreign bots or disinformation campaigns. It's the corporate-industrial complex building fake people to sell you things, and the public universities helping them do it better. Every dollar spent figuring out how to make an AI pitch more convincing is a dollar that could have gone to research that actually serves Americans.
The open question: When a public university helps brands build better digital liars, who exactly is the customer — and who's the product?
