Good morning. Twitter.com can’t come to the phone right now. Why? Because it’s dead. The platform has officially swapped URLs, as Elon Musk posted that “All core systems are now on X.com.”

— Hannah Doyle & Nate Graber-Lipperman

Why These Travel Creators Pivoted From Family Content

Carmen Sognonvi, the creator behind the Top Flight Family travel channel, recently addressed the 180 on her content—fewer longform videos, less traveling, and most notably, less family content featuring her husband, Serge, and daughters, Sean and Ella. 

Context: The Sognonvi family has been making travel content on YouTube for eight years (three of which they were traveling full-time and homeschooling) and amassed over 1 million followers across social channels. 

But it was time for a change. Sognonvi’s children entered middle school and high school, making it difficult to travel for most of the year and maintain normal routines and family dynamics.

“When you’re making content with family, someone has to be the director to some extent and it just changes the dynamic of family relationships,” Sognonvi told us. “Some people make it work but for us, I just didn’t want to do that anymore.”

So they started a new routine. Carmen will now be the solo face of the channel and create content about creator education with the help of a part-time assistant. 

Sognonvi braced for a potential loss in views and partnerships, but she’s found that most brands and subscribers have embraced the solo show.

• “Growth isn’t everything. It’s really important to figure out your business model and figure out how to sustain it,” Sognonvi told us.

• Most of Sognonvi’s business comes from deals with brands like LEGO and Villatel, creator education content, affiliate links, and AdSense.

Going forward, Sognonvi is going to focus Top Flight on parenting, beauty, and lifestyle. 

“Being a creator as long as I have, there’s been multiple peaks and plateaus along the way,” Sognonvi said. “I’m excited to see more journeys like mine of how creators pivot and figure out how to do this in a long-term way that still makes sense and feels authentic to their lives.”

Inside Cody Ko and Noel Miller’s Growing Podcast Network

TMG Studios, the podcast network co-founded by comedy creators Cody Ko and Noel Miller, announced the addition of three shows yesterday. The move brings the company’s current content slate to nine podcasts with over 300 million combined downloads.

Context: TMG launched in October 2021 following the success of Ko and Miller’s Tiny Meat Gang Podcast. The company mainly focuses on developing up-and-coming comedy podcasts. They told Variety in 2022 that they’re interested less in short-term profit and more in building long-term intellectual property.

Enter: Emergency Intercom, TMG’s latest podcast acquisition.

• Comedy creators Enya Umanzor and Drew Phillips bring the show’s 340,000 subscribers on YouTube (and their 8,700 members on Patreon) with them.

• TMG in turn brings a production team of 18 full-time employees.

Rounding out the new shows are Cream Crew—a podcast hosted by animation creators Flashgitz and MeatCanyon that will stay independent but work with TMG’s ad sales team—and a new series from Miller called Company Lot.

Big picture: Up-and-comers have increasingly gravitated toward media companies started by veteran creators—like Alix Earle and Madeline Argy joining Alex Cooper’s Unwell Network last year.

“[TMG] understands our vision and it’s amazing working with a group of people that have experienced the industry from the ground up,” Umanzor and Phillips said in a statement.

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A Creator’s Recipe for Getting Unstuck

Feeling stuck in the search for your next big idea?

Whether you’ve got 100 or 1,000,000 subscribers, generating video ideas might be one of the most challenging parts of the entire creative process.

So how can you make it easier?

As an accomplished film/photography creator with over 600K YouTube subs, Chris Hau has a few suggestions. He whittled down 50 bits of creative advice into a deck of cards called Unblock—sold exclusively through his Shopify store.

Want to hear a few of his favorites? Then visit Shopify to learn more.

P.S. Chris is selling another run of Unblock right now and the sale ends in just a few hours.

Highlights from YouTube’s 2024 Brandcast Presentation

YouTube hosted its annual Brandcast event in New York City on Wednesday, pitching top advertisers to spend more on creator content.

Key stats from the presentation:

• Every day, viewers watch more than 1 billion hours of YouTube content on TV screens. The company revealed this stat before announcing updates to its advertising technology on TVs, including longer, non-skippable ads (similar to traditional streaming platforms).

• A new program called Select Creator Takeovers is expanding. The program allows advertisers to exclusively sponsor all ad slots on a creator’s channel. 75% of YouTube Select impressions have come from TV screens since the pilot began at the end of 2023.

• YouTube topped competitors in an important metric: return on ad spend (ROAS). According to a Nielsen study, the platform drives higher ROAS than traditional TV, paid social, and other online video.

🔥 Press Worthy

• FaZe Clan spins out a new company called FaZe Media.

• Hot Ones and other YouTube talk shows are on the ballot to earn Emmy nominations.

• ICYMI: Colin and Samir went live on Discord to answer your questions about building a creator-led merch brand. Watch the session here.*

• Danny Duncan’s energy shot brand, Matador Energy, is now at Circle K. 

• Newsletter writers Hunter Harris and Peyton Dix are starting a podcast called Lemme Say This.

• TikTok is testing hour-long uploads.

_{*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: Do we really need more creators? GQ columnist Chris Black poses the question while exploring whether a creative career is for everyone.

• Watch: Doug DeMuro and the Cars and Bids team competed to find the most expensive car IRL in under an hour.

• Listen: On her new album Hit Me Hard and Soft, Billie Eilish is “bold, brilliant and somewhat brighter” than her previous records, per NME. 

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