Three months ago, Haliey Welch was just another girl, out clubbing with her friends in Nashville, Tennessee. Today, she sits at 2 million followers on Instagram and another million watches of her initial podcast episode.

The catalyst for her overnight rise to stardom? Stumbling upon a vox pop, one of those on-the-street interviews where tons of people are asked the same question, and using her southern drawl to exclaim about fellatio.

After initially hiding in her house out of embarrassment, Welch began to embrace her newfound fame, and eventually signed a deal with Betr, social media tycoon Jake Paul’s media company, to produce a podcast. She is continuing the trend of influencers who don’t have anything of value to say, thinking they deserve a platform to preach to the masses. The first episode debuted on Sept. 10 and featured comedian Whitney Cummings.

Welch appeared as a guest on “Off the Vine with Kaitlyn Bristowe,” which debuted two days afterward, on Sept. 12. Bristowe came into the media spotlight after being a contestant on the 19th season of “The Bachelor,” followed by being featured in the 11th season of “The Bachelorette.”

Bristowe asked Welch if she wanted to lean into the “Hawk Tuah” or if she would rather separate herself from the catchphrase. Welch emphatically replied she would “want to do something to get away from it.”

Despite these claims, her own podcast would be named “Talk Tuah with Haliey Welch.” The podcast miraculously generated 821,000 average views in the first three episodes.

One of the promises Welch makes in the podcast’s YouTube bio is to have “celebrities from all walks of life” in each of her episodes, yet she has already failed at doing so. Despite only hosting three episodes, only two of the three include celebrities— Cummings and Bristowe. The other episode included three of her friends as the focal point and Welch’s grandmother, who despite being tagged as the feature in the thumbnail saw just 15 minutes of screentime.

The point of podcasts is to make the listener think and be intrigued by the topics the hosts are diving into. However, “Talk Tuah” lacks any kind of substance when it comes to the conversations that are included in the podcast. Out of the three episodes, there has been only one conversation that hasn’t included grotesque language with no punchline.

There was only one conversation not containing grotesque language; when Welch and Cummings discussed fostering pets and animal shelters. Other than that, Welch and her guests talk about the infamous “Hawk Tuah” incident and other sexual conversations that ultimately go nowhere.

The best way to describe listening to this podcast is: Imagine your friend that you sort of know invites you over to hang out with a bunch of their friends whom you never met before. Then when you get to the house you kind of just sit on the couch in awkwardness while the people you just met get overly personal and talk about subjects of which you have no context nor prior knowledge.

Sounds like fun? No. It’s a situation that anyone would try and avoid.

They ramble on and on, changing the subject so many times to the point where if you zone out for just a moment, you’ll have no choice but to rewind it to see how the conversation somehow jumped ship in 15 seconds.

While the contents of this podcast may interest people, the quality of the production certainly won’t.

The first two episodes struggled heavily with camera angles and lighting. The first episode has the camera abruptly moving around the room to capture the other two guests, who are sitting in the dark corner of the room. In the second episode, the production team struggled trying to visually emphasize the sponsor of the episode.

Toward the end of the second episode, the production value truly went off the rails. It is unclear if the girls’ shock when Welch’s grandmother arrives is real, but if that was planned, it shows poorly. The shots of “Granny” are dimly lit, poorly composed as they have another camera and Granny’s car within the frame, and are just plain jarring when the rural street behind her has random cars driving by. To add onto that, the audio suffers when the cars pass as Granny is not given a microphone, so the ambient noise of the street is put straight into the listener’s ear.

Welch is not the first person to gain overnight internet fame, and she surely will not be the last. In a few months, when the impact shock subsides, this podcast will slip out of the public view.

Today’s media landscape has made it possible for uninteresting people with no talent to be thrust into the spotlight. With all of these social media platforms, it’s never been easier to gain a following. It’s not Welch’s fault, however. She is not the first, nor will she be the last person to shamelessly surf the wave of virality when given the chance. The criticism should not lie with the player in this case, it should lie with the game.

It’s the short-form content era we live in that creates the constant pipeline of social media zombies, who are unoriginal and regurgitate the same malarkey over and over again. Whether you’re bringing the boom, doing Fortnite dances with your backpack on, catching me outside, flexing wads of cash in our faces as a nine-year-old, or in this case, boasting about your “oral abilities,” everyone tries to cash in on a viral hit.

Listen, if you saw the original “Hawk Tuah” video and chuckled, that’s fine. People across the internet thought it was a funny clip. So be it. The problem lies when those who are in these viral clips, attempt to hang on to every last bit of their 15 minutes of fame.

It’s pathetic.

There is no reason that Welch, or any other one-hit wonder should have a podcast or even a platform. Today’s internet culture encourages people to desperately cling to their fame, turning what should be a brief, funny moment into a prolonged and often forced attempt at stardom. This desperation leads to an undignified scramble for relevance. In actuality, there is more grace in enjoying the short-lived attention and returning to normal life rather than stretching fame unnecessarily.

But people’s motivations in these scenarios always point back to “How famous can I get?” It’s easy to understand this modern-day obsession, but it doesn’t make it right. Those who are willing to sacrifice their privacy, family time, and dignity for a little bit of clout embody what is ultimately wrong with today’s digital world.

Originality is hard to come by today. All of these want to be celebrities echo the same garbage over and over again. It all feels so forced. Which is exactly what you’ll feel when you’re listening to “Talk Tuah”— that this is forced.

Not everybody needs a following. Not everybody needs to be in the spotlight 24/7. Not everybody needs a podcast, especially those who have no thought-provoking substance to be contributed. It doesn’t even have to be thought-provoking. Let’s go with mildly listenable to start.

Listening to a podcast when you’re cooking dinner, cleaning your room or going on a walk is a great way to make everyday activities more enjoyable while learning something new or staying entertained. However, if you decide to turn on some “Talk Tuah” while on your morning jog, you’ll be tempted to turn around and walk back “Tuah” house.