Good morning. Yesterday marked one year since OpenAI released ChatGPT to the public, and what an eventful 365 days it’s been. If the influx of robot-written Sports Illustrated stories, increasingly accurate Terminator memes, and leadership struggles are any indication, we’re in for a wild 2024 in AI.
A New Model for YouTube Collaboration
The team at Answer in Progress, Sabrina Cruz (top), Melissa Fernandes (middle), and Taha Khan (bottom) tell us how they balance the chaos of publishing, time differences, and creative challenges / Answer in Progress
Maybe three isn’t a crowd.
Answer in Progress (AIP), the education YouTube channel run by creators Sabrina Cruz, Melissa Fernandes, and Taha Khan, is like the PBS of YouTube—entertaining explainer videos that dive into topics like why there are so many pasta shapes, how to memorize Pi, and the history of the YouTube algorithm.
But AIP is different: They all work remotely (Cruz and Fernandes in Toronto and Khan in London). Each creator uploads their own explainers from their respective locations to the same shared channel.
Answer in Progress told us about their unique workflow:
Once a week, they have an on-camera call to discuss admin, production, and ideation. Everything else is asynchronous. Cruz takes on the editor-in-chief role, Khan does financial and operations strategy, and Fernandes handles day-to-day operations with accountants and contract workers.
The money: They each get a base salary plus a bonus for the amount of videos uploaded. They split AdSense: The creator who makes the video keeps 50% of the AdSense earnings for that video. AIP takes the other half to pay for salary and other business expenses like accountants, lawyers, contractors, and Adobe products.
“Despite the fact that there are three different people basically running their own shows [on AIP], the thing that really ties it all together is one philosophy that we all share in running the channel,” Cruz told us.
Another bonus of their workflow? Because each AIP member produces their own videos, the other members are free to take on different roles when they’re not up to bat.
“It means that I can be a guest on a video where I don’t have to worry too much about the research or logistics and I can just have fun because I know that one of the other two are dealing with it,” Khan said.
“In the past two years, we realized we were not having as much fun. So we started building systems that caught the grittiness of it all,” Cruz added. “Now we feel like we’re on a fun rollercoaster…maybe 2024 is the year of the fun rollercoaster.”
Theorist Media Licenses YouTube Content to Streaming Platforms
Theorist Media, the group behind channels Game Theory, Film Theory, Food Theory, and Style Theory, sign a TV deal / Illustration by Moy Zhong
“YouTube is the new TV.”
We’ve talked about this paradigm shift for creators a ton. But what does it actually look like in practice?
Enter: Theorist Media. Matthew and Stephanie Patrick’s YouTube production studio signed a deal with television distribution company FilmRise this week, Tubefilter reported.
FilmRise takes creators’ content libraries, reformats their videos specifically for TV viewing, and licenses them to streaming platforms such as Hulu and Roku.
Which got us thinking: The Patricks aren’t the only creators matching viewers’ increasing appetite to watch YouTube from their living rooms…
Sam and Colby and TheWhyFiles also license their content through FilmRise, which positions itself as the “go-to destination for distributing…cutting-edge digital entertainment to streaming platforms,” FilmRise SVP of Acquisitions Max Einhorn told Tubefilter.
A curated, ad-supported feed of Rhett and Link’s Mythical shows—including Good Mythical Morning (GMM) and Mythical Kitchen—launched on Amazon’s Freevee streaming platform last month.
And roughly 30% of The Colin and Samir Show viewers now watch the show on TVs.
From the studio: While talking about this story during a meeting yesterday, a member of our team said he watches new episodes of GMM on his TV every night after work.
“It’s my Tonight Show,” he explained.
Elon Musk Told X Advertisers to ‘GFY.’ What Happens Now?
Creators weigh in on Elon Musk’s outburst toward X advertisers / Photography by Daniel Oberhaus / CC BY 2.0 DEED
X (formerly Twitter) owner Elon Musk told major brands that have pulled ad spend from X over concerns about harmful content to “go f*ck yourself” onstage at the DealBook business conference on Wednesday.
So what happens to X now? Several creators weighed in…
Hank Green doesn’t believe advertisers are leaving to make a statement, but rather because they’re being brand-conscious on a platform they think is volatile. “Why spend a bunch of money doing something that might actually be /hurting/ you?” he wrote.
Kevin Espiritu thinks it’s on Musk to “10x” advertisers’ bang for their buck. “The business reality of cheap and effective impressions [will] claw business back vs just yelling at everyone,” Espiritu posted.
Thinking out loud: Will a decrease in X advertising revenue stop creators from posting? Or will a user exodus only happen if creators’ peers and followers stop showing up on the platform?
🔥 Press Worthy
Actor and creator Abigail Thorn is set to debut Dracula’s Ex-Girlfriend short film on Nebula in early summer 2024.
Prank creator JiDion deletes old videos, explains why he’s transitioning into more religious-based content.
Alex Cooper’s media company, Trending, hires a former Meta exec as chief content officer of television.
Kaitlyn “Amouranth” Siragusa explains why she’s investing in farmland—and how she’s hoping to overtake Bill Gates in total acreage.
Creator management group Whalar teamed up with Nielsen to analyze how marketers can achieve a higher ROI on creator-led campaigns.
The TikTok ban in Montana has been labeled “paternalistic” by a federal judge and blocked before it could take effect.
📚 Thank You For Pressing Publish
The content we’re looking forward to reading, watching, and listening to this weekend.
Read: From lashgate to the Djerf Avenue scandal, The Cut’s Danielle Cohen breaks down all the drama that went down on TikTok this year.
Watch: Since when was cheating allowed on game shows? Turns out, pretty much since their inception, as Vox’s Phil Edwards explains.
Listen: Does Big Tech belong in Hollywood? For The Town, Matt Belloni and Recode Media’s Peter Kafka discuss the pull YouTube and TikTok currently have over the entertainment industry.
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