Probably opening a can of worms here but...

I understand and appreciate the relevance of licences, hurdles and entry barriers in any valuable trade that involves people trusting one another and that has an impact on their lives. But I also believe that leaving individuals to decide what content to consume and improving the distribution of information can be two separate things in this conversation.

Talking about the “vast majority who can be easily influenced” and whatnot, what’s their intent in the first place? Is the content getting to them? Are they going after the content? Both? How far are they willing to look for the next big make-a-quick-buck/10x-stock-promise/become-a-millionaire-in-weeks idea? We wouldn’t have answers, just guesses, but I like to start from this point.

This is NOT to say that explicitly telling someone to buy or sell ANY kind of asset shouldn’t require knowledge wrapped in xTime of study, dedication and experience (a regulated licence to stay on the topic). To others’ points on what constitutes financial advice, as I’m sure we’ve all seen, a lot of, if not most finfluencers will open and/or close with something along the lines of:

“This video/post/audio/podcast/blog/newsletter is not financial(personal) advice; please consult your financial advisor to associate the risks… you should never take advice from a YouTube video/podcast blablabla…”

If regulators were to find a way to stay on top of who’s doing or not doing (improbable) this properly/as per their guidelines/with clear wording in big bold letters, what’s to say that’s not enough when it comes to internet content? Again.. what’s the average joe or even a more experienced investor's intent in the first place?

And yes, to practice medicine you do need a licence but if I - or a relative/loved one - have a serious health issue I’ll consult more than one doctor to get more than one opinion unless it’s a life or death situation that doesn’t give me enough time to do that. Yes, you need a licence to practice law but if I have a serious legal issue I’ll absolutely consult multiple lawyers before signing a piece of paper unless I’m already in jail and don’t have that card up my sleeve. PS: I’ve been screwed over by an educated, licensed lawyer in a Martin Place office with the harbour bridge and water views who cost me thousands and years of a headache I can’t go back in time to recover and I’m sure I’m not the only one.

I hope I’m getting my point across here but that should say something or at least it does to me. I have never done a background check on pilots but that’s not a bad idea actually haha. Blind-like trust based on unconscious beliefs and statistics, maybe? Not having the OPTION to choose a pilot to fly with, maybe? I’m a licensed professional myself in the industry I work in and I’ve seen both sides of it - the issuer and the unlicensed individual. In a perfect world, it should just be an obvious choice.

I like to take a broader look at the issue at hand. ASIC makes a move on finfluencers. Ok. What about every other market? What about finfluencers from the Americas, Europe and Asia to mention a few with large internet access? Will the average joe ignore them? With a smartphone and a few clicks away from making a copy trade/US stock with no minimum purchase/ETFs with $0 brokerage. Again, what’s the average joe intent? Or mine or yours? How is ASIC going to deal with this?

I like my freedom to choose what to watch and read, where and when, filter through what I think is great or rubbish rather than someone else and if it’s the case, make my own decisions. It comes with a cost: my responsibility.

That’s why I’m here. That’s why I happily paid hard-earned money for a premium subscription at Strawman. Not for personal financial advice - that’s not the offer anyway - but for what I believe is quality content I can filter through and being part of a club of investors. That is my intent.

That’s not to say that I’m not privileged with the luxury of accessing hundreds of lifetimes long content to learn from/self educate. I don’t want to deviate the focus but before the privilege, I remember what was like to be born in an undeveloped (can’t say 3rd world anymore) country with 220+ million people, ingrained corruption up to the eyeballs, living there for more than half of my life with indescribable wealth discrepancy, governed by licensed man. Personally, that doesn’t mean much to me. I much rather have the unfair, disproportional licence fees together with the gazillion other said to be “protection sums of money” going towards basic financial education in schools that no one gets. No direct comparisons, just a side story that shapes my values. It’s not a perfect world so the choices aren’t obvious. Options are important. Regulation is important but above all else, with the PEOPLE's best interest at heart.

With that in mind, I try not to lie to myself that people won’t find their ways around loops all of types to 1. look for ways to earn money quickly (regardless of the reasons or needs) and 2. others will find a way to deliver that.

I hope this didn’t come across as a rant or pessimism. It’s just an angle, a different perspective. Not the right or wrong one, and it should not be taken as financial advice (laughing emoji). If you made it to the end, congrats. I hope I didn’t bore you to death.

To me, in today's society, scepticism is a survival skill and trust is the most scarce resource in the jungle.

I think stuck between a rock and a hard place

Whilst I agree that there is some great free content out there along with the rubbish how does the average joe legitimately distinguish between them or even tell if any "advice/information" they are receiving is conflicted or not

I don't think the "it should be their own decision what information they chose to consume and from there make a more informed decision on what to do with it" will fly - ASIC's aim here is to try and protect those who can't protect themselves. It's why the whole "retail investor" protections exist - so that all those people who may be easily influenced/gullible/suckered/etc (which lets face it is probably the vast majority of people) ideally have some protections

Looks like there's a host of ASX youtubers closing their channel after the recent crackdown from ASIC.

AFR Article Here (if you're using chrome click the X up the top left before it fully loads to prevent the paywall popup)

Invest for the Future - Final Post & Brief Overview of the situation Here

I can appreciate what ASIC are trying to do as there is a lot of pump and dump garbage out there but there is also a great source of knowledge out there which benefits individual investors. It should be their own decision what information they chose to consume and from their make a more informed decision on what to do with it. This just feels like it will broaden the wealth inequality and make it harder to self educate yourself in the space.

Pretty disappointing to see such a wide net cast by ASIC.

Interested to hear others thoughts.