Lame, Khaby

Impact on the world

Laid off from a factory job assembling car filters near Turin, Italy, in March 2020, Lame began posting short videos and, within 17 months, became the first Europe-based creator to reach 100 million TikTok followers; in June 2022 he surpassed Charli D'Amelio to become the platform's most-followed account worldwide, a position he still held as of 2026 with over 160 million followers built entirely on wordless, deadpan reaction videos rather than dance trends or elaborate production. His appeal — described by observers as an “authenticity over production” approach reminiscent of silent-film comedians like Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton — attracted brand partnerships with Hugo Boss, Binance, and State Farm, and in January 2026 he sold his company and the rights to a digitally licensable version of his identity for approximately $975 million to Rich Sparkle, a Hong Kong-listed company, in a transaction that treats an influencer's persona as a separable, AI-generated commercial asset for the first time at this scale.

Life & background

Born Khabane Serigne Lame on March 9, 2000, in Dakar, Senegal, Lame moved with his family to Italy at age one, growing up in public housing in Chivasso, near Turin, one of four siblings; he was sent to study at a Quranic school (madrasa) near Dakar for a period as a teenager and became a hafiz, having memorized the Quran in its entirety. Before his social media career, he worked as a CNC machine operator in a nearby factory until being laid off in March 2020, at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. He has since appeared in films including a voice role in the Italian dub of “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” served as a judge on Italia's Got Talent since 2023, and became a character in the video game Fortnite; he remains a practicing Muslim and has said he turns down brand deals connected to alcohol or tobacco given his large audience of young followers.

Sources

1. The Conversation; Forbes; RNZ