Good morning. After 10 years on YouTube, the Trending page is coming to a close. In the next two weeks, YouTube is removing it in favor of charts for different video genres like podcasts, movie trailers, and music videos.

We’ll miss seeing The Deal Guy chart every Prime Day and Unspeakable any time he makes a larger-than-life build. It’s the end of an era, but the beginning of a new dream for us: land on the music video charts.

— Hannah Doyle & Syd Cohen

YouTube video essayist Maggie Mae Fish is launching her first scripted show, Amy’s Dead-End Dreamhouse, on creator-run streaming service Nebula this Sunday.

What’s the show about? It’s a kids show for adults—a dark comedy where a talking TV and microwave (played by Bill Corbett from sci-fi TV series Mystery Science Theater 3000) assist Amy (played by Fish, who also co-wrote and co-directed the series) in tackling challenges from managing anxiety to finding a job. 

The show’s six 20- to 30-minute episodes feature musical guests and cameos from Hollywood comedians like Paul F. Tompkins and Katya Zamolodchikova. 

And it’s exclusive to Nebula. Why? Nebula, where Fish has published her content for two years, offers creators like Fish an attractive 50/50 revenue share. “Nebula was a great opportunity to help with the revenue stream. We can have clips on Nebula that we can’t do on YouTube. We do film analysis—so there are some films that show [body parts] that we can’t show online, and that’s been great for us,” Fish said.

What does success look like on Nebula? More subscribers.

“[Nebula] subscriber count is the bottom line—if it makes money then we can make another season. Our personal goals are to get more work off of it—Maggie as an actor and writer, me as a director,” Reese said. “We have a view count metric and a follower metric but that's not something we worry too much about."

“In many ways, we still feel like we're learning how to walk. So hopefully next year we get to start running,” Zach Kornfeld, co-founder of The Try Guys, told us.

The Try Guys’ streaming service, 2nd Try, just marked its first anniversary in May. Founders Kornfeld and Keith Habersberger (who are the sole investors in the company, with no outside financiers besides paying subscribers) shared with us their biggest learnings, one year in →

On their slate of content: Since launch, 2nd Try has added 13 original series, with five more set to launch before the end of the year.

On connecting with new audiences: Three weeks ago, 2nd Try launched a free tier offering subs one free video per month—a move to 1) reach new audiences and 2) incentivize new members to subscribe to the paid tier. 

“It's not about taking a really old video and making it free,” Habersberger told us. “It's more about taking the video that's right for what else is going on on the platform at that same time.” 

The Try Guys also offer their subscription content as a YouTube membership—a move designed to connect with the portion of their audience that doesn’t want to leave YouTube to watch exclusive videos.

Looking ahead: “When I look at this year, I can tell you 50 things that I think we could be doing better,” Kornfeld said. “So to know that the best is yet to come really excites us.”

Big picture: Streaming platforms have become a popular strategy for creators frustrated by the algorithm, but there’s still friction for audiences. Services from creator groups like Dropout and Corridor Crew have operated for up to seven years—and sometimes it just takes time. See: Dropout, which launched independent streaming in 2018 and had one of its highest performing months ever last year.

Over the past week, X has made some significant changes. Here’s the rundown:

Elon Musk tweaked X’s AI chatbot. On July 4, X owner Elon Musk posted that the platform had made significant changes to Grok, X’s AI assistant. One of the chatbot’s directives? To “not shy away from making claims which are politically incorrect, as long as they are well substantiated.”  

The result: X users immediately noticed an increase in racially-charged and antisemitic rhetoric posted by Grok.

CEO Linda Yaccarino stepped down. On Wednesday, after two years on Musk’s team, Yaccarino stepped down as CEO. She didn’t share a reason for her departure, but many X users speculate it has something to do with the troubling posts from Grok. MrBeast volunteered to “fill the roll.” Following up on his tweet from three years ago, he tweeted “Is now my time?”

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