Ghoul morning. It’s officially spooky season, and we’re planning our Halloween costumes here at Publish HQ. Can someone please tell Samir that “unc” isn’t actually a costume?

— Hannah Doyle & Syd Cohen

Turn 100,000 creators into brand owners—that’s the goal of OWM, a new platform that matches brands with creators in exchange for equity.

Why equity? To move creators from one-off sponsorships to owner stakes, OWM founder Jeff Frommer told us. 

“Having an athlete on the cap table was huge a few years ago—but if they’re not talking about your brand who cares?” Frommer said. “That’s why I think creators are different from celebrities or athletes—they’re native storytellers and every founder has a story they need to tell.”

Here’s how it works: 

OWM built standardized financial docs for brands and creators, similar to Y Combinator’s Safe Financing Documents for startups.

“Equity is this weird amorphous thing that doesn’t feel like I own anything. So we wanted to make sure that if you have to do one post a month for 12 months to earn 1% of someone’s business, then you should have a place where you can track that,” Frommer said.

Zoom out: The global influencer marketing industry is projected to surpass $31 billion in 2025. As it balloons, Frommer sees a future in which creators diversify their incomes beyond just their own content or creator-led businesses.

“You can’t be a cofounder of 10 brands, but you can be an ambassador of 10, you can be the advisor of five. You can start to diversify your portfolio and try to hit a home run,” Frommer said. “Because if one day TikTok goes away, you lose all your following, you have no ownership in anything, no future stake.”

“We want Tilly to be the next Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman, that’s the aim of what we’re doing,” Eline Van der Velden, CEO of AI company Particle6, told Broadcast International.

Last week, Van der Velden unveiled Particle6’s newest venture: an AI talent studio and its newest AI “actress,” Tilly Norwood. The goal of this AI character is cross-platform use, from traditional film and television to social media.

Backlash was swift. Here’s what creators and organizations are saying →

Looking ahead: Creators are no strangers to competing against AI for views. With AI-generated content at an all-time high and platforms introducing AI-centered feeds, characters like Tilly Norwood will continue to pose a challenge to human creators.

“I see it as an efficiency threat,” Hill said. “This is something that is not necessarily viable as a form of art, but is viable as a threat to art to say, ‘Well if you won’t do it, we have a way to do it cheaper and faster.’”

Sponsored by CTB

Podcasting powerhouse Mel Robbins called it “the single best conversation” she’s ever recorded.

The guest? Emma Grede, co-founder of SKIMS, CEO of Good American, and now one of Shark Tank’s top sharks.

She joined Mel for a vulnerable deep dive about grit, identity, and self-belief. And in only a month, the episode has close to 800,000 views (and counting).

Behind the scenes, helping Mel land her favorite episode to date? Central Talent Booking.

With 25+ years of industry experience, CTB helps creators like you land guests that move culture and spark real engagement.

Want guests that deliver impact and views? Then partner with CTB today.

Sephora recently launched “My Sephora Storefront,” an affiliate program for beauty creators to promote shoppable storefronts directly through Sephora’s website.

Behind the program: Affiliate marketing did $18.4 billion in global revenue last year (a number that’s projected to nearly double by 2031, according to Cognitive Market Research). Already, Sephora has tapped into creators with the Sephora Squad, its application-based creator program with over 250 creators like MaKayla MaShelle and Jenee Naylor. 

Creators accepted to the My Sephora Storefront program will get customizable digital storefronts, back-end analytics, commission on sales, and more.

Big picture: Trust is enormous in the beauty creator niche—83% of surveyed Gen Z women shop beauty from creator recommendations online. As TikTok Shop grows quickly (with over $1.8 billion in beauty sales in a year), large beauty retailers like Sephora are trying to bring creator power to their own sites.

Hey, y’all—Syd here! Fun fact about me: Before starting at The Publish Press, I was a freelance writer/researcher for commentary YouTubers. You may know me from videos including “You need a very high IQ to understand Pickle Rick” or “The Dark Truth About Bananas.” 

And I love this content. It’s what made me fall in love with YouTube—so when my good friend Andy King tapped me to help him write YouTube Happy Hour (his live variety game show), how could I resist?

After writing, rehearsing, and planning for months, Andy packed over 100 die-hard commentary YouTube fans into NYC’s City Winery last week and forced his fellow creators to play various sadistic games. And my role? 1) Run the sound and 2) do whatever I want, as long as I didn’t tell him about it beforehand. So, obviously, I commissioned a composer to help me write a Broadway-style song about getting revenge on my YouTube overlords (sorry, Colin and Samir).

This night of chaos was a heartwarming reminder that online community (no matter how niche) is everywhere—and it’s our duty to bring people together whenever we can.