Are We Entering an Anti-Influencer Era? The Creator Economy Is Changing Fast

0:00Asaprocky DM. So there was a graphic designer that got a DM from Asaprocky saying, hey man, love your work, would love to work together, send me your pricing. He took a picture of that DM, a screenshot and posted it on his socials. He didn't close the deal. He didn't do nothing. Okay. Asaprocky commented on that post. This is a really poor judgment on your part. I'm not interested in working together. It looks like we won't be working together. Right. Content creators are not all yet business people. A business person wouldn't have made that decision. The lines are blurred between a personal brand and professional reputation.

0:32You have to guard it and you have to use discretion when it comes to what you share and what you keep. Are we entering an anti-influencer moment? There is a cohort of influencers that just kind of forgot etiquette and forgot common sense in a way. So anything is content at all times. Welcome to another episode of the Creator Method Podcast. Today we are sitting down with the one and only Valeria Lipovetsky, my wife. You knew that was coming. You knew that was coming. But also, I'm always here now. So like, why are you... You're not always here. Oh, okay. You do this once every four to six weeks.

1:10I'm very excited to be here. We have a lot to cover. Your I'm very excited to be here is so like anticlimactic the way you said that. I am excited to be here. We have a lot to cover because we're talking about creator news, creator economy. and man things move fast over here i feel like just as an aside you are probably you're probably living your life more on camera and recording and talking than not i think more of your time is spent on camera now than not i actually am proud to say although it's not the most beneficial for the business that it's been the opposite in the past couple of uh of months past couple of months yeah that's fair that's fair well we were away we just got back from the hamptons that was a lot of fun.

1:51Yeah. Yeah. So, okay. We're jumping into it. So today we are looking at the last month in content creation and creator economy news headlines. We dug deep and we're going to just jump. Do you want to just jump right into it? I want to jump into it. We're going to cover some news and headlines, but I also want to cover a couple of like case studies and conversations that are happening because aside from just talking about the news of the industry, I also want to talk about the discourse that is going online regarding certain experiences, certain moves that different creators do. So we're going to break that down.

2:26But go ahead. All right. August 7th, Business Insider. Mr. Beast's pitch deck reveal how the creator's business ambitions have changed over time. So court documents that were exposed shows years of Mr. Beast's business plan. He has had ideas including fintech, mobile service, subscriptions, a mobile service. Imagine like a Mr. Beast cell phone service. Subscriptions, obviously, theme parks, creator platforms, and so on and so forth. Currently, his company centers on his media, on his consumer products, and on software that he's developing as a business. He's trying to create businesses that don't depend entirely on Jimmy being on camera.

3:08So the question is, should every successful creator ultimately be trying to build something that can survive without them? This is a question for you because that is what we're trying to do with you. So what do you think? I mean, I think the question is should every creator? No, I don't think every creator should try to build that. But yes, ideally, you definitely want to build something where you can step away from it and it's still working and making money for you. Right. That's the case, I think, in any business, whether you're in the creator economy or not. Yeah, I guess so. I mean, look, the question is, should every successful creator be trying to build something that can survive without them?

3:47I think in order to have a durable business, in general, you should be thinking about what happens if you need to stop working. Can you build something of value that will continue to generate revenue for you and your family without you being there all the time? yeah and you know however however when you look at traditional celebrities before social media and you look at oprah i often use her as an example her the intellectual property that she's created continues to generate revenue even when she's not working so i believe that that's where it's going i believe where it's going is eventually creators intellectual property will have value even like james dean james dean's been deceased forever and apparently you know his estate still makes millions of dollars off of his personal brand listen this is not a new model have you ever seen the drawing uh from the disney archives from 1957 no it's actually remarkable and it's literally speaks to the same concept of like you're taking your kind of meet your value so for them it was the creative talent of studio and then i'm going to show you the visual and we're pop it but and they basically created this whole plan of like what can we build out of this intellectual property that can start running as its own thing and they created this insane system it's kind of what beast was doing right and i think that's that was from 1957 is the same formula we're all trying to do in one way or another yeah but this is this is remarkable but with disney it wasn't a personal brand it was the characters it was like the mickey it was a brand right they had like their you know influencers it was the mickey mouse and all that stuff and they really built on top of that so the strategy is not that different and i think that it's important to remember um if you're a creator that wants to build this mega thing you're not doing something that never done before just looks a little bit different but actually going back to the way you know someone like Walt Disney did or other big franchises they built.

5:51They use the same formula. Well, in general, I believe that there should be some form of diversification of the business model for each creator in order to create something which becomes an actual sustainable business. And there's two ways to look at it. You can try to create a sustainable business that you can then sell your intellectual property or it's a business that at least functions and generates revenue without you having to be there. Like a good example of this is creators who, let's say, create fashion brands with their name. Yeah. Right? It's their name. And now what I'm seeing more and more often is they're selling that company, meaning they're selling their name.

6:26So it is transferable. So the personal brand is transferable and it can be sold. But you know what? We're talking about now the creators that are trying to build something big. but have you heard about the new kind of class that has been created it's called the creator middle class it's becoming a real thing tell me about it so there's this fresh reporting about a growing middle class of creators who aren't mega influencers but are making meaningful income through like tiktok and reels and commerce and it's the whole conversation is like is the creator economy finally becoming a normal middle class profession well i think it always has been well i think that for us when we talk about it we're always talk about these like really big no not necessarily i think you're just not in those conversations that i'm talking about like is that like for for me for example when i look at let's say our member base yeah when i see our members we have members who make you know they make six figures low six figures some make mid six figures high six figures seven figures but i'm i'm a big believer that anybody and that anyone can be a content creator and they can at least replace meaningful employment income yeah and beyond so it says what happens when being a creator becomes less about becoming famous and more like being a trades person right but i already i believe it's always been that way so this is where maybe you and i have a different opinion i don't believe this is an emergent thing no like i know i know many creators who they make a very good living being a creator with you know tens of thousands sometimes like you know low hundreds of thousands of followers with good engagement in a particular subject matter, and they do well.

8:04So I don't necessarily think this is a new thing. I don't think that up until recently, it's only been people who don't make any money at all or people who only make millions. I guess for me, my algorithm is feeding me a lot of the people that come on and they really want to build this massive personal brand, which I guess aligns with what we're trying to do. But I think everybody should try to get. Yes. Everybody should be trying to get the maximum scale. But also, I think there's different definitions of success in this business. And this is why it was interesting to me. It's like, oh, middle class kind of layer to this profession.

8:43You don't have to. Maybe you don't want to for different reasons. I mean, with with you and I, when we started in this business, like I was very I was very careful to check in with you to say, like, if we're doing this, if you and I are putting both our full time effort. Meaning if I'm putting down my full-time effort into this with you, then this is the goal. Like the goal is going to be as high as possible and to become a personal brand with as much scale as possible. If you would have come back to me and say, look, like, no, I prefer to have balance in my life. I don't want to have this big responsibility.

9:14I want to spend more time like with our kids. I don't want to hire other people to help with the kids. I want to do that myself. And I only want to work, you know, five, seven, eight hours a day, five days a week. I don't want more than that. then I would have said okay cool like you can do that on your own like yeah I can help when I can but we went all in yeah but what's interesting we're talking about the middle class but have you heard about YouTube kind of raising the bar on monetization which I'm curious if that's going to start changing the way people create and how they create so the whole conversation is YouTube's new monetization direction is basically there's more requirements for someone to start monetizing so it's not just like before it was oh just post content and you can make money now they becoming much more uh intentional who they're giving monetization to so the bar is becoming higher which i think will take down the amount of i think it might have something to do with um kind of high frequency easy to create content like a lot of the ai slot right so i believe that they should be raising the bar because if it's as simple as and there were guys i mean i would see them on they they kind of went away they called it a youtube automation this was like this huge thing i remember that trend yeah it was like there was like a couple of guys who they were selling a course on how to create very um kind of like low lift yeah because but they were trying to be sneaky about it so here's my theory on what youtube is doing so they were trying to what they would do is they would get very short clips and they would they would put the clips together with some transition effects yeah and like a voice script on top of it right and so they would do that it's fairly easy to make you can hire you know people in other countries to make to make it very easily for you um and then you can put it up because it it just kind of went in under the radar with YouTube's policy.

11:09YouTube says you have to have, you can't just copy clips over, like you can't just, you know, like copy and paste, but you can provide what they call sufficient editorial editorialization, like in order to edit it in a way. And so they would just fly in right under that line. And they were just creating these videos at scale. So what ended up happening, YouTube had a massive amount of this just like low, low production content. And myself, as you know, I had a website, not a website, I had a YouTube channel that we got to 4.6 million followers. But we actually put a lot of effort. We did, we wrote scripts before AI.

11:44So we actually wrote the scripts. I had like a team of people. We then had a voiceover artist. We then had like a team making actual original animation along before AI. And we scaled it to 4.6 million, you know, subscribers. And we got monetization there. but yeah I think they're raising the bar because it's just so easy to create content now especially with AI well I just wondered that are we entering the professionalization of the creator economy I think I think there's always been a I think there's always been a okay so when when you say that there's always been a cohort of the creator economy of creators that were professional even 10 years ago right when we started there's always been that that section of people who have done it professionally as a business we were early adapters applying real business systems to it I don't necessarily think it's the professionalization of the platform I just think the cohort of professional content creators is becoming larger as a percentage of the total of the total amount of people who are creating content yeah because it's important to note not everyone who calls themselves a creator is going to have a creator business there's a big distinction yeah I mean there's a there are a lot of hobbyist propel fitness water with gatorade electrolytes zero sugar and vitamins propel hydrates better than water to help you get the most out of your workout and get back to your best self what propels you propel with gatorade electrolytes but i believe even a hobbyist has i would say that you know 99 of hobbyists have the dream that one day it might pipe it might pop off just like an amateur musician right an amateur a person who sings you know at the local whatever at the at the local bar on amateur night they have a dream that maybe they'll they'll be discovered by someone and they'll become a star well i just hope they're not going to take down the seven hours of fireplace video those are literal fire because i think they're making like a million dollars a year i think they're making a ton of money and it's such a genius thing to do that and it's like zero effort okay okay next headline i want to talk about We're also, we're still on Mr.

13:53Beast. So Business Insider published court documents. Mr. Beast was charging about$2.5 million for a sponsorship. So this surfaced in a Mr. Beast burger litigation. He was charging around$2.5 million for a 30 to 45 second sponsorship integration. One creator can now command Super Bowl-esque media economics. So brands are paying for trust plus distribution, not simply production. So the question is, can any creator actually be worth$2.5 million for 45 seconds? Yeah. Why are you so like anticlimactic about this? Because I think that for certain brands, they know that that's the target audience that they want to hit.

14:39This is the person that represents them. This is something that will be beneficial. So for some brands, yeah,$2.5 is like it's a great use of money. For others, they'll be like, no. Yeah, I think that obviously the Super Bowl is a legacy spot, right? I mean, that ad spot specifically has been around for a long time. It's very coveted. But also, like, how beneficial is it realistically? There's a lot of, well, hold on a sec, hold on, hold on, hold on. There's a lot of prestige associated with that. That's a different thing. That being said, the sheer volume of attention, Mr. Beast probably on a single video is actually getting more people viewing it than the Super Bowl, which is insane.

15:14but the economics around these placements they're not just about how many people see it it's who the people are and it's the context and so 2.5 million for 45 seconds i would guess that the super bowl ad for the same amount of time is still considerably more expensive so i don't think this is unreasonable that's what i'm saying i think yeah looking at looking at the demographics of the people that he's reaching especially the context in which he's reaching them it's a very deep touch these are people who are very loyal to him and so yeah i think it's i think it's definitely worth it and it's encouraging to me because it shows me that if you look at the very top which mr beast represents the very top if brands are now understanding that they can pay multi millions of dollars for a 45 second ad spot with a creator that's going to trickle down to the entire creator economy where right now when you look at a creator let's say they get a million views per video you know right now it's all over the place right now the rate at which the rate that a content creator can charge for that is really based on their ability to negotiate with a brand and how badly the brand wants it there's no set pricing whereas I believe it's gonna become more about set pricing and I believe that people who have you know thousands or tens of thousands of followers they're going to be paid in a more fair and equitable way I believe that's coming i want to um share the wise words of fat joe yes today's price is not today's price and i think that's also the nature of this economy in general yes i agree okay do we want to talk about something really interesting this is not news do we want to talk about something interesting i mean i've got more headlines here but if you want to talk i want to i want to move away from the headlines are you implying that what we've been talking about up until now no i think it's I think it's interesting, but I want to actually shift a little bit to talk about some behavior that's been going on online, which is interesting.

17:14And I think it has a larger human psychology aspect to it. So the Aesop Rocky DM. Remember? I brought it up to you. You did bring that to my attention, yeah. Which I thought was very interesting because I, as a creator myself... You want to tell them what the Aesop Rocky DM is? Yes, the Aesop... Thank you so much. I sometimes like I heard myself saying it, but I think it was just in my head. Because you talked to me about it and you showed it to me. Yes, it's just in my head. So for those who didn't hear, the A$AP Rocky DM. So there was a graphic designer that got a DM from A$AP Rocky saying, hey man, love your work.

17:48Would love to work together. Send me your pricing. Meaning A$AP Rocky needed some graphic design work. Correct. So he sent this DM, direct message to the graphic designer. It was a private exchange. Then the designer became really excited and he took a picture of that DM, a screenshot, and posted it on his socials. Obviously, he was like, you know, when they tell you don't work hard, dreams do come true, blah, blah, blah. He didn't close the deal. He didn't do nothing. Okay. He was just super excited and I get it. So he posted it. And then A$AP Rocky basically commented on that post being like, this is a really poor judgment on your part.

18:27Like, unfortunately, I'm not interested in working together. It looks like we won't be working together. Right. Which honestly. He said something like this isn't classy. This isn't classy. So to me, I think that that is something that is going on with creators online, with creatives that are on social media. I feel like there's a lack of this judgment when it comes to these things. Yeah. So what I believe it to be is, I believe it to be something that's existed since the beginning of this industry, is that content creators are not yet, they're not all yet business people. So a business person wouldn't have made that decision.

19:07So a content creator who he monetizes, he or she monetizes through their graphic design services, they may not be yet an astute business person. because a business person would have taken that. They would have closed that deal. They would have formed a relationship with ASAP Rocky because they may or may not have met ASAP Rocky in person. And then at that meeting, assuming that ASAP Rocky was happy with the service, build a little bit of rapport. It doesn't take much. And then say, hey, Mr. Rocky, would you mind if we took a picture together? Mr. Rocky. I don't know. What do you call somebody named ASAP Rocky?

19:42Mr. ASAP? I don't know. No, no. ASAP's his first name. His friends call him ASAP. I don't think it's any of his names, by the way. No, it's Mr. Rocky. If I met him, I would say, hello, Mr. Rocky. It's nice to meet you. Okay. Anyways, my point is, is that if the creator in this case, who is providing the graphic design services, would have just exercised a little bit of kind of, you know, logic, business logic, they would have met with Asep Rocky, built a report, and seen if it's okay to make that request. I just think that right now what's going on is that because we're so immersed in the social media world, we constantly chase the social proof and everything is content.

20:22And I don't even know if he's maybe like it's about his business knowledge or if he's like a trained business person or not. Sometimes maybe you're just the lines are blurred between a personal brand and professional reputation. You know what I mean? Like I think it's very easy for a creative to just be like, oh, this is proof that, you know, I'm doing something amazing. Let me share because it's going to have such like a nice motivating aspect to the post. I don't think it was malicious. I don't think this graphic designer did it maliciously. And by the way, he did a video response and he's like, I fucked up.

20:56I'm sorry. Yeah. Did he really? Yeah. Yeah. And he's like, I learned my lesson. Like I was just so excited and I thought that it's going to inspire other people. And you know what? That's just not the right thing to do would have been first securing the job. I agree. So that was very interesting. But I think that it also showcases how it's so important to remember, although being a creator is important, and obviously social media gives you so much, validates your work and where you're at, it's still important to remember business reputation and what you're building outside of social media. You have to guard it, and you have to use discretion when it comes to what you share and what you keep.

21:40you know so that was very very interesting and then i want to hop to the next case study because i think that was also very interesting okay no influencer signs have you seen it you told me about this no influencer signs tell me more about oh my god that was a whole thing so there's this store in nantucket that put nantucket nantucket um actually no that's not no that's that's a different accent right well that's how it sounds to me nantucket store they put a sign of no influencers because they got really annoyed with people coming in because they have these like novelty tchotchkes there and they got annoyed with people coming in shooting content uh you know using it as a backdrop shooting their day in the live videos and then leaving not buying anything so to to them they're like we don't need you here like if you are not coming in as customers we don't need your nobody even asked like i don't need your this exposure please don't come here and it became like a whole conversation is are we entering an anti-influencer moment because again we're not what is interesting is that people are the lines are getting blurred like we talked about the graphic designer that posted that video i think that there is a cohort of influencers maybe even the younger ones that just kind of like forgot etiquette and forgot just common sense in a way so anything is content at all times anywhere and And you don't really take into consideration your environment.

23:10So I think that's the bigger kind of story here. So I think there's a little more to it than that. So I can understand why that store owner in Nantucket would be upset if people are coming into the store, filming, using the backdrop. Because maybe there was like a novel. Maybe it was like it was a novelty, whatever decor that they had. Yeah. And then leaving. Now, if the creators were tagging that, whatever it was. They were tagging. He's still, he's like, I don't want it. Nobody asked me if I wanted it. I don't want it. They were tagging and the store owner still didn't like it? Yeah, because it was disturbing the business.

23:49Really? Yeah. In what way? Because again, customers come in. I don't want to be in someone's background or, you know. So in America, there's obviously the First Amendment. And in the First Amendment, one of the things that you can do is you're allowed to film in public. in public if you're going into a store that's private property so in reality where i think this needs to be established and i believe where the new etiquette should be and not just etiquette it's just a law you are not supposed to you're not allowed to film where there's any expectation of privacy so if you are on public if you're on private property you can't simply just start filming right so when you're in public property then by all means now if these people if the influencers would have been in front of the store there's really nothing that the store owner can do because as long as they're on a public sidewalk they're allowed to exercise their right to film if they go inside i just don't know were they inside but i think that's the thing i don't think there needs to be laws i think people need to use common sense no i'm saying laws around this you can't rely on people to have common sense but that's the world i want to live in you can want to live in that it's just not the world that exists i just feel like we should you know that conversation developed into a whole other thing because this other uh big influencer page something i don't remember her name but she was like this is misogynist because misogynist yeah because influence what does gender because influence there's always something because influencers uh in general being an influencer is mostly like a female kind of profession it's majority females so it's like it's kind of goes against to me that was already ridiculous she's already reaching she's trying to get views whoever this page person yeah but um but i do agree and i understand the whole conversation and the thought process for this store of being like i don't i don't want this and i actually think that there's it's becoming luxury positioning for venues and places to start requesting not to film anything in them like i when i went to a concert where they made us put the phone in a bag and it's locked what concert you go to that made them do that erica badu okay loved it loved it i left and i'm like i was there i was present i enjoyed i don't know yeah but my point is i don't think she cares anymore about growing her career no but there's but they are now actually like even when i was at coldplay he would he would a few times mention like guys put down your phones like enjoy be in the moment like enjoy the music and that's and that's and that's that's that's more of like a marketing kind of you know tactic but i was just i was just a j cole and j cole was very well documented after i left that concert in new york yeah when i went with ben i would see it all over the place like i would see it all over social media no of course and that's it's great but i'm saying now the ability to go to spaces and to know that nobody can film anything there's now it's actually like a luxury it's a plus there's not that many of them like i don't i'm not seeing signs saying no filming no influencers no filming i'm not seeing any of that well that's what that's why this whole story became so big because of that specific sign but i think that both stories are really about access right the asap situation is i have access to you therefore i can turn that access into content and the non-tucket situation is like you have access to my space, but that doesn't mean you can turn it into content.

27:07So there's things happening right now. Are there going to be some influencer laws coming into place? I don't know. It's not about info. Again, it's, this is just, this is simply like not filming in public. No, today it's not about influencer because everybody has a phone and everybody's documenting something. Yeah. So that's kind of where, uh, where it's at. Also, I want to bring in an emerging CPM conversation. cost per thousand cars per what's cpm cost per thousand yeah what is the m for because it's thousands t it's i think it's like latin or something melee melee means thousand i believe okay anyways m-i-l-l-e not as opposed to million melee so now there's certain um there's a new model emerging of creators being paid for attention so actually for views it's not for right selling or it's not their followers yeah do you think that's a good thing yeah of course i think so too uh oh to me i have a bit of a uh kind of a my take on getting paid for conversion is I don't really believe it's fair to content creators because what happens is if you're only getting paid on that last click conversion, you're not getting paid for all of the people who will convert either later on or who went directly to a website.

28:36They're saying attention, not conversion. It's a little different. Yeah, I think it's close.

28:54Iterate electrolytes. I like it because it's closer to the attention. So like, look, it's a funnel, right? There's a customer goes on a journey in a funnel, right? They first become aware of something, then they build an affinity to something and then they convert, right? So to only pay a creator on the conversion when they're creating value in the middle of the funnel and at the top of the funnel, I don't believe is an equitable and fair way to pay a content creator. I don't believe that's, by that logic, then big companies should, the person making the most amount of money, the person who's making the most amount of money in big companies should be the cashier by that logic.

29:29So I don't necessarily agree with that. CPM is better, in my opinion, because then you're getting paid more on kind of the merit of your content, because if your content is good, it will get more distribution on the platforms. So I think that's better, but it also depends on the rate. Right. Because, you know, yesterday when I had a conversation with Diana Cohen, who is the founder of Crown Affair. She was on your podcast. She was on Not Alone. She was sharing that the data shows that it takes 16 touch points before somebody converts. That makes sense. Right? So to your point, to demand conversion from influencers, especially for one touch point, is insane.

30:14So then why should the creators be giving away those touch points for free? Right. I like it. I like the CPM conversation. I think it depends on their rates. That's what she told you yesterday? When on the podcast, she was telling you about that? No, this is something that I saw. And I was like, that makes sense. Because what she said, that should be the norm. Well, the funny thing is, is that when you place ads on Meta, you can pay either by, when you're doing media buys on many platforms, on display advertising, you can pay per thousand impressions. You can also do a CPA on a cost per acquisition.

30:49You can do CPL cost per lead. so you have the flexibility as an advertiser to choose how you want to pay for your media right when it comes to performance marketing that's kind of you're just paying when you make a sale yeah um so there should be more options like that but look in reality there are they're just not formalized when people come to you when someone like yourself who is a creator at scale when people come to you and advertisers come to you they're not paying for conversion they understand that they're paying for reach but more than reach they're paying for brand alignment So there's a lot of factors that go into it.

31:22And furthermore, I think every CPM, if, if they're being, if, if advertisers are paying creators based on CPM, that CPM has to be, there has to be a varying rate because somebody, let's say with 2 million followers, let's say somebody with the same amount of followers as you and someone who gets the same amount of views as you, if they've been doing this for six months, let's say they blew up, they went super viral versus you who've been doing it for 10 years i'm not going to say which one i think is valued more or less but there is a there's a they're not the same the quality of the each view and each touch point is different so the price should be reflective of that it's just a hard thing to peg yeah yeah let's talk about ai slop i want to talk about ai slop again what do you mean again i barely talked about it oh we spoke about ai slop last time business insider on july 31st said the headline from From Substack to YouTube, here are the social platforms cracking down on AI slop.

32:19So YouTube, TikTok, Meta, Pinterest, Substack, and Snap are pushing back on mass AI content. Platforms that have spent years making creation easier now have too much content. So think about that, right? Well, that's what the YouTube monetization conversation connects to. I know, I know, I know. But it's different because on social, specifically on Instagram, Instagram has been doing everything to make editing easier, to make content creation easier. So they have the edits app, even within Instagram, they have all these editing tools where you can now create content on the fly. You don't have to give it to professional editor.

32:52You don't have to do any of that. YouTube, just going into my notes here, YouTube says AI can, it can be used creatively, but mass produce repetitive content is the problem. So when I think of the correct way to sufficiently editorialize using AI, I think of Chloe versus history, which I love Chloe versus history. You know, I watch like I'm hooked on her content. I watch it with the kids. I watch it with you. Well, her. Yes. Her. She's it's the character that he created. Yeah. And then he's done interviews and he's this man. I think he's in like in a small town in the United Kingdom. And it's and it's great what he's done there.

33:26So to me, that's not slop because the amount of effort that he's putting into the scripts, to everything, even if the scripts are. But this is what I'm saying, where YouTube is trying to create those, you know, those kind of barriers to entry is professionalizing. What do you mean professionalizing? Well, for someone like him, he created, yeah, it's AI, but he created a business, like he created something out of it, you know, like he's building towards. Yeah. Right. So this is where it's like, there's go, I think that because there's so much content now, because it was so easy to enter the space, all these platforms are going to create their own versions of trying to now create more quality.

34:08They have to dial it back. Yeah. Because what will end up happening is your feed will just all be AI. And look, we've all seen it. You and me and everybody who's listening to this or watching this, we've all seen it. You go into your feed, maybe a couple of months ago, everything was AI, AI, AI, low quality AI. You're still seeing some of it. The reason you're seeing less of it now is because the platforms, they've put like detectors on it. They're trying to scale it down because they understand if they just let this go rampant, then it'll destroy their platforms. So really the question is, if anybody can generate 1 ,000 beautiful videos tomorrow, what becomes valuable then?

34:44I mean, it's hard to say because I would say authenticity and I would say taste. But I actually think you can create that with AI as well. So are all content, are all like real human beings as talent and content creators, are they all doomed? I don't think so. So I think now it's really about creativity and kind of doing really focusing on your craft and not just about sheer volume, like building a universe for whatever your brand is. I think that's where it's special. So I recently made a reel about this because I have an opinion on it. So the way I see it is that the real value, now that the playing field has been leveled in terms of the editing, just the sheer creation of new content, new videos, you can create anything, you can become any character you want, all of that, the playing field has been completely leveled.

35:38Everybody has the same advantages when it comes to editing and writing and all of that. So really what I see the real advantage being is being two things. It's being your lived experience, right? And it's being your ability to articulate your lived experience. So what I'm excited about with AI is that AI allows us to not have to spend so much time doing all this kind of like grunt work, like, you know, all the edits and everything like that. Like, we can now go out and instead of doing that, and this has been my dream for you in our business is for you, I've been always trying to take away tasks that we can hire for, for you to go and live more, for you to go and experience more.

36:15and then to get better at articulating what you're seeing. So I don't believe AI can replace that. I believe that real creators, like real actual human beings, real human beings need to go out, experience the world, take it in, figure out how to articulate it, and then put it out. They can use AI to help them with the storytelling, to help them articulate it, but the source needs to come from lived experience because all AI can do, AI can just look back. It can look back at the sum of human history, but it can't look forward right it can it can hypothesize but there's it's very different than actual someone living it i actually the more because i've been obviously using ai more and more just like learning to understand how to use it and i've now i see how it has its limitations it has its limitations to your point to provide like color and and humanity you don't mean actual color no like color subject matter color yes and subject matter and like humanity and really interesting original point of views it can't really provide that if you're just using it as a tell me what to do you know as an aside so you saw that thing that drake just did right with uh the dating thing yeah with all these women okay i could never do that i could never do that but he said something that was really funny there was this woman who came out and her name is uh chloe yummy that i had never heard of her before and now i've heard of her because she was apparently she's like a toronto institutional character institutional character institution an institution like prison instead no i don't know i know what you're trying to say but it's cute you try what i'm saying is is i didn't know she was from toronto when she came on he said to her he looked at me he goes oh i thought you were ai and the whole point was that that and the host of kyle from nelk boys he said that's such a big compliment like today that's the compliment i thought you were AI meaning she was like I guess in his eyes so beautiful and perfect that's so interesting that she wasn't real yeah it's so interesting because I think that's not a compliment at all well I mean I don't know maybe coming from Drake it's a compliment I don't know you don't think so no I'm not aside from that conversation if somebody say oh I thought you were AI I wouldn't take it as a compliment I would but maybe it's because I think it's right sorry you wouldn't take it as a compliment because the type of content you create but if your content was all about your aesthetic correct like you're you know like you're the way that your body was shaped every little detail you were striving for like this perfect aesthetic yes and then somebody said i thought you were ai that's a compliment yeah for you that would not be a compliment yeah interesting because you're actually trying to go and live an experience and articulate it which is what i'm talking about um i want to move on to the next headline which was a little more clinical but I want to get to it because I think it's affordable.

39:03Digiday, the publication Digiday on August 6th wrote, why brands like Gap and Staples are inviting their employees to be creators. So brands are actively turning employees into creators. Oh, that's my favorite thing. That's your favorite thing? I love it. Out of everything, this is your favorite thing? I love that content. So companies already employ people with expertise and credibility. The face of the brand doesn't necessarily need to be a traditional influencer, which is interesting. So now you have a brand instead of a brand going outward. No, in addition to a brand going outward and saying, hey, you influencer, creator, come and be the face of my brand.

39:40They are drafting essentially employees from within that can make companies feel more human. So look, I think it's the correct way to do it. I don't, I don't, what were you going to say? No, I'm just saying there was for the longest time in the workforce world, there was this whole conversation around uh personality hire and now it's there's actually a room for it like it's no longer just like a funny thing people say it's actually a personality hire because they represent the company online well really the question the question here is should the ceo of almost every company today be a creator no okay tell me why because if they don't have personality they don't need to be in front of the camera i prefer to see the people and again i don't think it's about where you are placed in the hierarchy of the company.

40:30I think it's about finding the personality that can connect with people, be fun, create interesting stories. Like if it's not the CEO, it's not the CEO. Like I don't care if it's the CEO that's speaking to me. I actually maybe will connect better to, you know, the person that sells that product in the store, making it like fun and interesting and interactive. So what I think is that, especially with larger corporations, larger corporations have C-suites, right? I've talked to many people in C-suites and they're super smart people like to be a C-suite let's say have a publicly traded company with billions of dollars there's a lot to talk about like I have a lot of value I find it extremely interesting and entertaining to sit to have dinner to be in business meetings with people who are C-suite executives of you know super big companies and so they have a lot of value that they can offer yeah and so for them to be integrated somehow into the campaign itself to bring their personality forward, I think personally is a good idea because of the context by which that, you know, like I am the CMO of so-and-so, you know, huge company, right?

41:36To bring that into a campaign, to have those people collaborate with actual professional creators, I believe is a great marketing, you know, is a great marketing exercise. And I think it depends also what is the goal that they're trying to create with their social content. Like Duolingo is a great example. They didn't involve, they created a doll that then created content that made them, like put them on the map. And now everybody knows it, you know, it's like such a massive. So I just think that there's a lot of questions to ask before deciding who are we bringing in. Actually, a great somebody that does it really well is it's, I think it's Glamour magazine.

42:15one of the magazines what they've done is they created this reality show where they're bringing in uh interns which are different characters like on social media and then they're interacting with the office so they're interacting with the editors they're interacting with like real people that are on the team but they are the one like the whole um saga is like around them in that space it's like a little mini series it's like a little right episodical so again it depends what you're trying to create it depends like who you're propel fitness water with gatorade electrolytes zero sugar and vitamins propel hydrates better than water to help you get the most out of your workout and get back to your best self what propels you propel with gatorade electrolytes speaking to and uh i think that there's room definitely to involve a lot of different people remember colonel sanders like you see i would have loved to do like to see watch a mini series you just ignored my oh with many Sanders or Colonel Sanders Colonel Sanders a miniseries well he started he started Kentucky Fried Chicken when I think when he was in his 70s or 80s right but he was like he's such that to this day the logo I think is his face it's not a chicken it's him he's the OG influencer he's the OG influencer he's the OG influencer and on that note I'm telling you this is not a new profession it's not a new profession it's evolved it's variations of the same thing but yeah it's definitely an evolution and with with distribution being so readily available to everyone right now on these social platforms it really has evolved again you know we talk about jimmy of you know mr beast and and you know and other creators and yourself there's definitely a ton of opportunity and there's a lot going on and this is such a dynamic industry the whole creator economy and all these headlines and so we'll be coming in and doing headlines and then the other stuff that you insert into the conversations outside of the headlines the interesting stuff yeah i think you can i think that i think your stuff is juicier i'm happy that you brought up the asap rocky thing because i you and i talked about it and i didn't put it in here you know what i want to mention that to me when we're talking about the creator economy as a whole there's a lot of because to me what creator economy is it's a lot of human psychology so i love listening and seeing the discourse online when it comes to the interactions that creators have with the world with you know different brands and how that kind it turns out so i will be the source of that don't you worry well guys thank you so much for joining us for another do we call it state of the union i don't think we called it anything oh i i just made it up anyways thank you for joining us and we will see you next time bye guys