Chapter 1: What challenges are creators facing in the current social media landscape?
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I remember a time when a teenager could post a dancing video and wake up in the morning and be globally famous. A small town figure could make a few scrappy vids and be an internet celebrity overnight. But those days, they might be ending. The algorithm may no longer produce content creator superstars like it used to. The internet's new rule? Get weirdly specific with your content or get ignored.
So is online fame officially out of stock? That is the great question we are going to answer here with Sydney Bradley and Dan Waitley, both reporters at Business Insider. Dan, welcome to the program.
Chapter 2: How did algorithms previously help creators gain fame?
Thanks for having me. And Sydney, welcome back. You were on the show earlier. Thanks again for being here.
Thanks again for having me.
So like these huge creators like Mr. Beast, what enabled them to become so popular in the first place before we get into what might be changing?
So folks like Mr. Beast, Charlie D'Amelio, Kabilame, they rose to fame on social media at this moment when algorithms were really putting a few big creators on everyone's feeds. And it helped create this new generation of basically superstars. And that's no longer true.
What did the algorithm do to enable them to become so popular in the first place? Like how were they discovered, so to speak?
Initially, the TikTok for you page was basically like a talent show. So everyone would log on and they would see a feed of videos. And if you were lucky enough to get showcased there, you could become super famous. But there were just a lot fewer creators on the app who were prominent. And what shifted more recently is everyone's For You pages, their feeds are a lot more personalized.
So the videos you see are tailored to your interests. If you are interested in knitting content, you see people knitting. If you love basketball, you see people shooting hoops. So it's really changed the sort of types of content that people see and the content bubbles that we're all in.
Does this mean we're not going to see these kind of like general superstars like we used to see coming up? I don't know, five, six, seven years ago?
Stars are going to look a little different. So maybe it'll be someone in a certain niche being the person to follow if you want to watch knitting content or the person who is one of the biggest fashion influencers. But being the everything creator is almost just as hard for a social media platform to be the everything platform for everyone. There's so many things happening.
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Chapter 3: What has changed in the way social media algorithms work today?
I would say it wasn't like we suddenly stopped seeing these mega stars. But I do think that in the last couple years, we've seen a push toward personalization. A lot of that is because every social platform is kind of trying to be TikTok now. Instagram used to be this place where you could build an audience, a following, you know, score brand deals.
And now the most popular thing, I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, Sydney, is Instagram Reels. People are mostly watching videos on Instagram. We also see similar trends happening on YouTube. YouTube Shorts, I believe, gets 200 billion views a day. And so the rise of short form video really, I think, is the sort of pivot point in terms of these types of stars growing.
these kind of megastars disappearing. And it's not that TikTok wasn't making megastars. It's just that there are so many people now making videos that it's way easier to create the sort of personalized feeds for users.
Even social media platforms that I remember being heavily text-based, like Reddit. If I scroll through Reddit, I'm seeing TikTok-like content these days. If my big dream was to be a short-form video content creator and be hugely successful at it, what advice would you give me today if I was starting like right now?
I think advice that I hear a lot from creators as well is figure out what your niche can be. And if something that you really care about or have a lot of experience in that you can roll with that and run with it. Something that makes you stand out and can build a community around is definitely something you want to focus on as a creator right now.
Community building and community tools that help you also monetize that community are a big part of the creator economy now. That's why we've seen Substack have this moment as well of being able to Make a group chat with your newsletter. Find different ways to reach your audience outside of the massive algorithms of sort of playing that slot machine of hoping you reach someone.
You have more ownership. You have the community.
Are we seeing like top content creators that exist today being basically locked into where they are, like a sort of digital aristocracy? Like they were there in the beginning. The algorithm promoted them when the algorithm wasn't quite this way. They're now the top 1% and other people can't break into it. Like in some sense, is there no class mobility in online creators these days?
No. Yeah, we are seeing the top 1% stay the top 1%. The top 10 most subscribed to YouTubers this year are the same as that list last year. And on TikTok, we're also seeing not a lot of mobility in terms of the top folks who are followed on that app. And so yeah, if you made it big early, like you're set. And a lot of those creators are acting more like traditional celebrities now.
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Chapter 4: Why is niche content becoming more important for creators?
But some people are making a lot of money, some people are making not enough money. And I think that's a big thing to keep an eye on.
Well, if you want to find out more about this topic, you can read Sydney Bradley and Dan Waitley's piece. The piece is called Hitting the Social Media Jackpot is Harder Than Ever and it's Changing the Creator Economy. They are both reporters at Business Insider. That's where you can read the article. Dan, thanks for being here. Thanks for having me. And Sydney, thank you again for being back.
Absolutely. My pleasure.