Good morning. TikTok announced this week that they’d start splitting revenue with the platform’s top 4% of creators. Should we start a petition to make it 100%?

–Hannah Doyle

Simone Giertz Launches a Product Design Company

Earlier this week the Swedish inventor and long-time YouTuber unveiled the first releases from her new product design company, Yetch. The brand name is a phonetic spelling of her last name Giertz, illustrating how it is pronounced.

Giertz has been building on YouTube for seven years, making robots, machines, and inventions ranging from useful to silly, like a desk chair and dog bed hybrid, a soup robot, and even a Tesla truck. She has 2.6 million followers and averages 1 million views per month.

Yetch’s first products reflect the range of inventions on her channel, including a cheeky all-white puzzle with one piece missing, a light-up calendar she initially crowd-funded to make, and a screwdriver ring that actually fits a phillips screw head.

“There’s a huge difference between making one of something and 1,000 of something,” Giertz said in a recent video. “Manufacturing a product is really hard especially when you’re doing it independently.” She frequently partners with LEGO and Kiwi Co., hosts a class with Studio, and does speaking appearances through CAA.

Giertz and her team of seven have been working on the first slate of products for 2–5 years and plan to slowly expand, with more items in the Yetch store being actual products made on the channel. Sales will go towards developing future products.

Our Take

Giertz has said from the start that she wants to be an inventor for the long haul—starting this product design company is a step towards that goal, where she can build and sell her wacky and useful ideas long after she stops making YouTube videos. We could see Yetch partnering with Urban Outfitters or even Ikea in the future.

Emma Chamberlain Reps Vogue at the Met Gala

The vlogger and podcaster interviewed guests on the red carpet for the second year in a row. Her videos brought in upwards of 1.3 million views and held three spots on YouTube's trending page the day following the event–including a viral video with Jack Harlow. Searches for Emma Chamberlain also spiked on Google during the event.

In preparation for hosting, she went through table reads and outlined talking points for each subject.

Emma also interviewed first-time YouTube guest Marques Brownlee, who attended with other creators like Mark Rober and Léna Situations.

Our Take

We’ve witnessed Emma’s evolution from high school vlogger to Cartier ambassador, earning recognition that seldom requires the descriptor of creator or YouTuber. Her journey shows what more artist careers will look like in the future–not being limited to the platform from which they got their start but being recognized for the cultural influence they wield in their own right.

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Sykkuno Leaves Twitch for YouTube

The Minecraft streamer known for his reserved and wholesome demeanor signed to YouTube Gaming this week.

With 4 million followers on Twitch, Sykkuno claimed to be the 28th highest earning creator on the platform. He explained that Twitch’s initial offer was low, though they eventually matched YouTube’s price. But a misspelling of his name in an official statement from the platform became the final straw that landed him with YouTube.

Our Take

From Valkyrae to Ludwig and now Sykkuno, Twitch is continuing to lose top talent to YouTube Gaming. By not paying out their creators or showing them as much care, they might save a couple million but the strategy is unlikely to pay off in the long haul. We expect aspiring streamers to follow their favorite creators and take to Youtube.

🔥 Press Worthy

• Ninja is hiring for a YouTube editor.

• Ludwig opens a waitlist for his browser extension.

• Mighty Networks is the best place to build your own community app or website.*

• YouTube Gaming launches live redirects.

• Streamer Wildcat starts a personal channel.

• Remi Bader is launching a collection with Revolve.

*This is sponsored advertising content.

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