ICYMI: TikTok Takes Over VidCon Edition
Here's what happened on social media this week, June 18
Welcome and thanks for reading my curated list of trending social content and key platform updates!
💻 Roadmap
🎥 TikTok is taking over as VidCon’s title sponsor. That’s a BFD considering YouTube had been the primary sponsor of the digital video creator conference since 2013.
Variety broke the news this week, revealing that TikTok had signed on as the title sponsor for VidCon US 2021, at the Anaheim Convention Center Oct. 21-24. “YouTube said it will still be in the mix among the secondary sponsors, but the change marks a shift in the event — and more broadly, the creator economy — to embrace multiple platforms.”
Tickets go on sale June 22.
✅ Adam Mosseri granted an interview to Karen X (a creator you should be following across Instagram and TikTok!) and shared the two main factors in getting verified on Instagram, namely:
Are you being impersonated?
Has the press written about you?
👭 Instagram is testing a version of Close Friends they’ve renamed Selected Followers, which will allow you to choose a different audience for each story you share.
🔗 I got interviewed about the link in bio business trend — here’s the tl;dr: It’s a risky business for third-party tools building anything to compensate for missing Facebook or Instagram features since at some point the platforms could just come out with their own solutions. But Instagram doesn’t want to send you off site so I think it’s more likely they’ll try to build every reason for creators to stay (including the upcoming affiliate program!) rather than make it easier for you to link out to another platform.
🎤 There’s an audio battle brewing (among all the other big tech feuds) to own the podcast space. In the past week alone:
Spotify launched its Clubhouse competitor: Spotify Greenroom. One potentially game-changing feature is that it allows users to record their Greenroom chats and upload them to Spotify as podcasts.
Apple launched Apple Podcast Subscriptions, which allows listeners to support their favorite podcasts and skip ads. Pricing for each subscription is set by publishers and creators, with a minimum price of 49 cents per month.
Facebook announced it would launch its podcast platform next week. Users will be able to listen to podcasts directly on Facebook pages and episodes will show up under a new “Podcasts” tab that will roll out to a limited test group of page owners.
“If Pinterest were to live on while Instagram and Twitter burned to the ground, I wouldn’t hate it.” This brilliant quote of the week from Embedded’s Kate Lindsay.
👆 Click Thru
🚫 Thank you to Skylar Astin (the Pitch Perfect guy) for being the only person so far to point out how many wholesome family TikToks are using this very NSFW song. Just wait until these child influencers grow up and record reaction videos saying the song hits differently now that they understand Busta Rhymes’ lyrics. We’re seeing a content loop in action!
📈 Two memes trended this week: “deleting my dating apps” and “Padme and Anakin.” This one is at the intersection of both worlds.
🍉 Chris Meloni also trended as the personification of Watermelon Sugar.
🦹🏻♂️ This week, the Internet found out Batman isn’t allowed to go down on women via a tweet. Fandoms freaked out and even Val Kilmer (Batman circa 1995) weighed in. On the plus side, the push back may help people talk about what a healthy sex life looks like?
📫 It was apology week on social media. Chrissy Teigen apologized across Twitter, Instagram and Medium for bullying. And then got called out for more trolling, which she may or may not have been responsible for.
Meanwhile, Lin Manuel Miranda apologized on Twitter for the lack of Afro Latino representation in his latest movie In the Heights.
📲 Adult Swim recently got the type of publicity and UGC (user generated content) that money can’t buy. If someone asks you why their campaign hasn’t gone viral in the same way, tell them it takes about 20 years and 20,000 videos (that’s how long it took since the company created its own video bumps to the time Supvano created the first TikTok homage.)
🤷🏻♀️ David Dobrick’s back. That’s it, that’s the bullet point.
📝 There are some good creator takeaways in this Insider piece about a BTS influencer who tried to branch out. It’s behind a paywall but the basic premise Brian Patrick Byrne puts forward is:
The money you make through ad revenue is wildly inconsistent
Make sure people want to pay for what you're providing. As an entrepreneur this is doing your market research!
You don't often get to switch your niche midstream. This speaks to two truisms: People followed you for a reason and they don’t like change. It’s really hard to get around this so make sure you love what you do from the beginning.
The bigger you get, the more backlash you get. Don’t read the mean comments.
😤 I want to take the time to point out some terrible advice shared on Twitter that encouraged young people to work weekends. Don’t do this. Even if it’s your own company — you do not have a sustainable business model if the only way to stay afloat is to work around the clock. And if you’re a recent graduate who is not in a management position, you will never again have so little responsibility. Please enjoy it. Clock out at 5 p.m. and do NOT think about work again until the next morning.
