🌀 chaotic check-in
Instagram accidentally gave everyone trust issues when the entire creator economy collectively decided something was definitely wrong.
Spoiler: nothing happened. Just vibes and paranoia.
Hollywood is finally learning what YouTube creators figured out in 2012.
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Let's get into it.
today's menu
🫖 trending tea
Instagram Says Everyone Can Relax
Instagram just dropped a feature that actually helps your content get seen. You can now add clickable buttons to your videos. The goal? Keep people watching more of your posts, deliver more value, and boost real engagement.
Meta just signed a content deal with Wikimedia to power its AI projects, meaning future AI answers across Meta products will be trained on verified and encyclopedic data.
Nothing was hacked. After weekend panic and creator paranoia, Instagram confirmed there was no data breach, no compromised accounts, and no secret chaos happening behind the scenes.
Reels recommendations are getting smarter (finally).
Meta revealed it’s upgraded how Reels are recommended by combining user surveys with machine learning, leading to major jumps in relevance.
Instagram is giving users more control over their feed.
Instagram rolled out an algorithm control option to all English-speaking users, letting people actively shape what they see instead of being held hostage by the For You page.
TikTok Secures Its Future in the US
TikTok closed a deal to keep operating in the US by splitting its American business from its global operations after years of ban threats and political pressure. The app’s algorithm has been licensed to the new US entity and will now be trained only on US data, secured by Oracle. TikTok stays online, but American users should expect the feed to change.
TikTok is officially phasing out its Custom Identity option for advertisers, signaling a shift away from hyper-personalized brand visuals toward more standardized, platform-first ad formats. Translation: TikTok wants ads to look native, not like they were dragged in from a brand guideline PDF.
TikTok added more AI-powered tools to help Shop merchants create listings, optimize content, and move faster from product to purchase without burning hours on setup. The platform is making it very clear: commerce creators who don’t use AI will simply get outpaced.
TikTok released TikTok Next 2026, its official trend forecast for marketers, outlining where culture, creators, commerce, and content formats are heading next year.
On top of earlier updates, TikTok introduced a new AI assistant designed to guide merchants through product setup, content decisions, and performance improvements. TikTok Shop is becoming a fully AI-supported sales engine.
Creator Search Insights just got easier to find. TikTok quietly moved Creator Search Insights into Creation & Business Tools, making it faster for creators and brands to spot what people are actively searching for.
YouTube Testing New Feeds
YouTube is no longer just about video, image carousels are creeping into Shorts.
The platform is testing photo‑only carousel posts inside the Shorts feed, letting creators upload up to 10 images that viewers can scroll through right alongside regular Shorts clips.
YouTube updated its monetisation rules: under the YouTube Partner Program creators now must disclose if AI was used in their videos or if content was significantly altered with AI to stay eligible for ad revenue – it’s all about authenticity and clearer expectations for monetization.
YouTube rolled out Expressive Captions, which use AI to show tone stuff like sighs, gasps, volume changes, and background noises in English captions so viewers get way more context.
YouTube turned 20 and got its brand identity glow-up. The platform unveiled a unified global marketing identity that brings motion, culture, and the platform’s content energy into one cohesive creative system – designed to sync Shorts, Music, Premium and more into a single “alive” entertainment brand.
Influencer Economy Moves
Brands are rethinking how they partner on YouTube, using structured approaches like targeted audience discovery, performance‑based pay, and social commerce integration to hit millions of impressions and real clicks.
Christmas 2025 ad performance showed consumers spending carefully – grocers and value-forward campaigns dominated, while familiarity and emotional storytelling beat out flashy product pushes. Ads that leaned into nostalgia and simple storytelling scored highest with audiences even in a tight budget climate.
Retail brands are using creators to cut through digital fatigue. At NRF’s Big Show execs from Mejuri, Beyond Yoga and others said influencer content, from everyday customers to niche storytellers, helps brands break through oversaturated feeds and build communities that actually care.
Retailers leaning into TikTok Shop highlight creator‑centric content, affiliate programs and authentic engagement as the secret sauce for driving conversion and audience trust and marketers are rapidly pivoting strategy accordingly.
ChatGPT is being Googled harder than the socials. ChatGPT’s global search interest surpassed YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and TikTok between late 2024 and April 2025, showing just how massive demand for AI, or curiosity about it, has become.
✨ main character moment
How YouTube Creators Became Hollywood's Biggest Threat
When Matt Damon and Ben Affleck sat down with Joe Rogan to promote their Netflix film The Rip, they revealed something Hollywood has been quietly grappling with for years: the platform now dictates the product.
Netflix's notes to the acclaimed filmmakers were blunt: put action in the first 5 minutes, repeat the plot multiple times because viewers are distracted, and design for fragmented attention spans. This is about fundamentally changing how stories are told.
What Changed
Traditional filmmaking followed a predictable structure:
build tension slowly
place major action sequences strategically across three acts
save the biggest spectacle for the finale.
Directors obsessed over visual composition and lighting, assuming audiences would give their full attention in darkened theaters.
Streaming flipped this on its head. Now filmmakers face a different reality:
The average viewer is multitasking, lights are on, phones are out, and the competition is one click away.
As Affleck explained:
Netflix wants big action sequences in the first 5 minutes to hook viewers immediately.
Plot points get reiterated 3 or 4 times because people are scrolling while watching.
Directors even joke about meticulously lighting scenes that will ultimately be viewed on phone screens.
The shift mirrors what happened when television emerged. Theater attendance declined, but theaters didn't disappear. They adapted. Now streaming is forcing another adaptation, this time focused on capturing and maintaining fragmented attention.
The Creator Advantage
Hollywood treats this as revelation. Digital creators saw it coming a decade ago.
When YouTube shifted from prioritizing views to watch time in 2012, creators had to master retention immediately or disappear. They learned to hook viewers in the first second, deliver value quickly, and assume partial attention.
Netflix's co-CEO made the strategy explicit:
They want to work with the best creators on the planet, wherever they come from. Platform experience matters more than traditional credentials.
What This Means for Brands
If Netflix is rewriting scripts based on how distracted viewers are, your brand content needs the same reality check.
The same retention principles that forced Hollywood to adapt apply to brand content and influencer partnerships. Viewers are multitasking, scrolling, and ready to bounce within seconds. The difference is that brands have been slower to adapt than even traditional studios.
Consider what this means for your influencer marketing strategy:
The creator's platform literacy is now your competitive advantage. When you partner with creators who've spent years mastering retention curves or hooks, you're not just buying their audience, you're buying their algorithmic expertise.
Traditional production values matter less than you think. Affleck jokes about directors meticulously lighting scenes that get watched on phones. Brands make the same mistake, spending on high-production commercials that perform worse than creator-led content shot on iPhones. The medium shapes what works.
Front-load value, not branding. Just like Netflix wants action in the first 5 minutes, your brand message needs to deliver value immediately. Creators understand this instinctively. They hook viewers first, then integrate brand messaging naturally. Traditional advertising does the opposite and wonders why completion rates are terrible.
The winning brands are the ones partnering with creators who already figured out how attention works on each platform. Netflix learned this lesson. The question is whether you'll learn it before your competitors do.
P.S.
WE’RE LAUNCHING SOMETHING NEW! (AND IT’S BIG).
We’re officially pulling back the curtain on Brand Influence, our new live masterclass series where real brands show you exactly how they’re scaling with creator content.
We are opening the doors to our newsletter community first. By registering today, you’re securing one of the limited seats for Session #1: How Pura Vida Moranga launched on TikTok from scratch.
The Session Highlights:
The 90-Day Danger Zone: Why most brands fail on TikTok early on.
The Creator Approach: How Alex found the right partners from day one.
The Content Winners: What actually converted (and what was a waste of time).
The JoinBrands Framework: The exact steps used to scale.
Live Q&A: Your specific hurdles, solved in real-time.
Register now to get the official date and calendar invite sent straight to your inbox before the general public.