Good morning. Did you catch our special send yesterday? In tandem with our New Wave project, we've made a limited run of physical newspapers that (for now) will only be available at Colin and Samir's live episode of Creator Support later today at VidCon. Keep reading for a sneak peek.

Two years into The Publish Press, we're just getting started. To all of our readers, sponsors, and team members, we appreciate all of your support.

And to all of the creators we cover, if you didn't press publish, there'd be no Publish Press—so thank you.

— Hannah Doyle & Nate Graber-Lipperman

P.S. We’ve got a new look. Hit reply and let us know what you think.

Ex-FaZe Clan Member Turner “Tfue” Tenney Quits Streaming

25-year-old former Fortnite pro and ex-FaZe Clan member Turner “Tfue” Tenney is quitting streaming indefinitely, citing exhaustion from streaming six- to eight-hour days.

“I feel like earlier in my gaming career I used gaming to escape from reality, and now I use reality to escape from work. I just feel kinda trapped sometimes, you know?” Tenney said in his goodbye video, which has been received with support from peers like CouRage and Clix.

Context: Tenney has been creating content since he was eight years old and streaming since the early 2010s, building up 23 million followers across Twitch and YouTube. He’s now one of the most popular streamers in the Fortnite genre.

• Tenney joined FaZe Clan in 2018 but left the following year. He said he felt taken advantage of, claiming the group took 80% of his streaming income.

• Tenney has also been a Twitch partner for eight years.

Zoom out: Exhaustion is widespread in the streamer community, where creators have frequently complained about the long hours it takes to reach partner status on Twitch. Some creators, like Hasan Piker and BLASTPremiere, have to stream a few hundred hours a week to maintain their status and audiences on the platform.

On the Ground at VidCon: 3 Takeaways

Yesterday kicked off an exciting few days at what has become Coachella for the creator world. We’ll share more in-depth coverage and exclusive interviews Monday, but here are our initial impressions from Day 1 at VidCon:

• The Expo Hall had a clear winner. Out of all of the brand activations and merch stands, one line stretched around the Anaheim Convention Center’s ground floor: The Dream Team’s merch booth, featuring new apparel from Minecraft creators Dream, Sapnap, and GeorgeNotFound.

• TikTok hosted an activation centered around wellness and limited screen time. Before entry, creators had to answer a two-question survey: how much do they trust the platform, and do they think TikTok is the best platform for creators?

• YouTube is pushing new features. The company returned as VidCon’s presenting sponsor in a big way, placing a YouTube Shopping “Drop Shop” activation—featuring new products from creators like Aliya Janell and ZHC—in the middle of the Expo Hall. Plus: A/B thumbnail testing is finally arriving next year, YouTube revealed to our very own Colin and Samir onstage.

Sponsored by .Store

What We Learned from Our Conversations with The Press Community

Earlier this month, we were able to host our first ‘Coffee with Creators’—thanks to our friends at .Store.

Held near our HQ in Venice, Colin and Samir hosted creators from all corners of the internet who joined us on a Saturday morning.

A common theme across the conversations: the challenges creators face as their businesses grow. When scaling from solely making videos to ventures like launching merch, your brand extends beyond just your content. That growth is meaningful, but it comes with more responsibility and considerations.

Colin and Samir shared insights from their experience launching our merch brand, PressPublish.store—how they thought about presenting the brand and how they prioritize authenticity and autonomy.

Our partner, .Store, supports creators in exactly this. Through their program built exclusively for creators, Creators.Store helps you enrich your online merch brand name and ditch the lengthy unmemorable URLs for a clean and simple store name. Like Samir said at the event, “Your domain is part of your branding. You say it aloud in your videos, it goes on screen—give it the attention it deserves.”

To learn more about the event and our partnership with .Store, go here.

TikTok COO Steps Down

TikTok Chief Operating Officer V Pappas (the most senior U.S. employee at the company) is stepping down after five years in the role, she announced in an open letter on Thursday.

“Given all of the successes reached at TikTok, I finally feel the time is right to move on and refocus on my entrepreneurial passions,” Pappas wrote.

Worth noting: Pappas’ exit comes at a tenuous time for TikTok. In May, the state of Montana banned the platform—just two months after the Biden administration called for parent company Bytedance to sell TikTok.

🔥 Press Worthy

• Streamer Cloakzy ends Twitch contract and hosts first stream on YouTube.

• Ryan Trahan is making another Penny Series starting July 1.

• YouTube TV rolls out a multiview feature for non-sports content.

• Is Minecraft setting up the next generation of American workers for success?

• Here's a look into our conversation with Eline Vera—singer, YouTuber, and Fiverr influencer.*

• Rolling Stone spoke with former fans of Colleen Ballinger following allegations of misconduct.

• Colin and Samir asked YouTube’s Head of Culture and Trends about how the platform is evolving.

_{*This is sponsored advertising content.}

📚️ Thank You For Pressing Publish

The content we’re looking forward to reading, watching, and listening to this weekend.

• Read: Liza Koshy tells Who What Wear why we haven’t seen her on YouTube lately and what comes next for her career, including her turn in the new Transformers movie.

• Watch: Tejas Hullur “time travels” to tell his younger self not to join a crypto content house.

• Listen: Chicken Shop Date host Amelia Dimoldenberg talks with “Jiggle Jiggle” collaborator Louis Theroux on how going viral affects mental health.

🗞️ Here’s a look at Publish’s first newspaper. You can grab one at VidCon later today, and keep an eye out here in the newsletter if you can’t make it to Anaheim this afternoon.

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