Scalable Live: A College Degree for Creators

0:00Jasmine Enberg: Hi, everyone. This is Scalable, a weekly show about the business of the creator economy. I'm Kai Uriyev. And I'm Jasmine Enberg. Every Thursday, we take you beyond the headlines to tell you what's happening, what it means, and why it matters.

0:18Jasmine Enberg: Hello, everyone, and welcome to Scalable. We are here live tonight at Syracuse University's campus in LA as we're celebrating the launch of the university's Center for the Creator Economy. It is a major moment to have a university develop a dedicated curriculum for an industry that most people have fallen into accidentally, myself included in that. Normally, if you know the show, I'm joined by my co-host, Kaya Uriev. She's also a longtime friend. Obviously, I'm flying solo tonight, but I am joined by a panel of experts. And we are going to discuss, maybe even debate some of the biggest topics in the creator economy.

0:56Jasmine Enberg: and also talk a little bit about how we might design an academic curriculum for the creator economy. Before we do all of that, though, I wanted to do a little bit of a round robin, if that's okay. I've got five questions, and I would like each of you to answer them. So first, what is the last thing an influencer or a creator made you buy? I mean, Nix made me buy a lot of things, but my last one's weird. One of our creators swore by this Tylenol rub-on stick, and she's like, you put it on anything, you're going to feel good. I bought it, and she's right. It was great. Highly recommend if anyone has any back pain.

1:36I need to talk to you about that. I'm going to write it down afterward. She was really adamant about it working. That sounds amazing. I bought it and it literally came the next day. Mine are these pants. I'm wearing some brown pants. I bought brown pants because an influencer told me to buy them. Where are they from? But they're great pants. Aritzia or something. But yeah, she was very convincing. And I'm sold. I really like them. I think the last thing for me was a TikTok shop creator who had this foldable tripod thing that apparently I needed. I have about 25 ,000 tripods. But I needed this one because it has a magnet to it.

2:15So you can magnetize and put it anywhere. So now I have another to join the other ones that I currently have.

2:20Jasmine Enberg: Mine was also a TikTok shop purchase. I got sucked into the Metacube trend on TikTok, if anyone has seen that. And now my bathroom cabinet is way too full of Metacube products, but they do work. So I've been quite happy with that. So next question. Do follower counts matter? Yes or no? A little. I'll take it. Not in a vacuum. Yeah, I'd say it's complex, but yes and no. Yeah, I agree with all those answers. Okay, are creators journalists, yes or no? Yes. Yes. Ooh. The creator himself. I don't think all are. It's true. No, not all of them. Not all of them. But they can be. They can be. 100%. Absolutely.

3:03Yes. I just spoke two weeks ago at the YouTube-held summit for independent journalists. So YouTube definitely thinks they exist. and they and the people who are there as creators definitely think that they exist um and i think i absolutely i think independent journalism is one of the fastest growing sectors on on the

3:24Jasmine Enberg: platform i mean i agree independent journalism is one of the fastest growing sectors i'm now an independent journalist myself i'm also a trained journalist though from nyu so it is very hard for me to accept that any social media creator can be a journalist so i'm gonna have to go with no on this one. What is the difference between a creator and an influencer? Should I go first? Go ahead. I'm so sorry you're stuck in that first position. Maybe I should have gone by just holding him up as a shield over here. There's no difference, but it depends on who you talk to. You know, you can make an argument and say a creator creates and an influencer influences, which I would say is accurate, but realistically, creator economy, influencer industry, they're interchangeable.

4:05For me, I've given this one a lot of thought. And while I think that official definitions are very badly defined at this point, in my own mind, I define a creator as someone who creates content with the intent of sharing a story, educating on an issue, or creating art. And that is their primary focus. If they did not make money by doing that, they would still have the motivation to create. However, in my mind, again, I'm not coming for anybody here. In my mind, an influencer is someone who sets out specifically to create content for personal gain, either monetarily or, for lack of a better word, clout.

4:46So in my mind, I draw the distinction there. So what's the difference between a creator and an artist then? I think a creator is a subset of an artist. You can have artists in all sorts of industries or writing, painting and anything you want. Musicians. I think creators are a subset of that. I don't think everyone sets out to create art, but I think that content creation is absolutely an art form. I think I would agree for the most part. I would say all influencers are creators, but not all creators are influencers. By definition, creators are creating content with the sole purpose of, like you said, creating something that might not necessarily drive influence.

5:24but an influencer is creating content with the primary goal to drive influence. So an influencer can be a creator, but a creator can't be an influencer. And that's how I would define that for sure.

5:33Jasmine Enberg: So I would push back a little bit on both of you because when I think of a creator, I, well, I made very unofficial, but kind of academic definitions when I was back at eMarketer. And so the way that I defined a creator was this, that it's somebody who creates content primarily for digital platforms with the goal of building an audience and monetizing that audience. And that can happen in many different ways. But I think if you're just creating for the sake of creating, it's a little bit too broad of a definition because then basically anyone on social media could be considered a creator because we're all creating content, even if we're just posting a picture of ourselves.

6:07Jasmine Enberg: And then an influencer, I think of really broadly as anybody who can sway the purchase decisions or the buying loyalties of a broader population. So there's a ton of overlap, right? If a creator is convincing you to buy something, then they're also an influencer. If you have an influencer who is developing content, then they also become a creator. But, you know, not official. There are no standardized definitions. And I think, you know, that's where a lot of this discrepancy comes from. That's why it's just easier to say there's no difference. Yeah, I mean, they are used interchangeably. So it is fair, you know, and I still call influencer marketing, influencer marketing, even though now the trend is to call it creator marketing.

6:43Jasmine Enberg: But most people refer to it as influencer marketing. So that hasn't changed. Final question. On a scale of one to 10, where one is threat and 10 is opportunity, where would you put AI for creators? Five. Six. Do you need a defense? Yeah. I'd love to hear it. Well, I think that there's AI is a vast spectrum, right? One of the things that one of the things that we think about a lot in when we're like when we're speaking to members of Congress is how to actually define AI. And so there's a very there's a big difference, right, between using, you know, Google features on your phone to Photoshop out a light pole from a picture.

7:27Technically, that's AI, right? And most people would argue that that's a tool that people could just use in their everyday lives. And then there's entirely AI generated, AI created, you know, the AI slop of the world. Right. And so there's such a spectrum that I think it will be highly dependent on who's using it and for what purpose, where it falls in the scale of one to 10. How about you, Nick? So 10 being the most threat?

7:55Jasmine Enberg: 10 is opportunity and one is the biggest threat. Okay. I would put it probably at like a seven then. Primarily because it's, for me at least, it's been able to streamline the process of so many things that I think have maybe stumbled in the past. So right now it's just an effective tool for me. one of the things you mentioned right before we started the podcast was how for your business you can't imagine you know cutting an instagram reel and then you're like i have to put it up on instagram and i have to put it up on shorts and i have to put it up on tiktok right and ai is one of those sets of tools that could be used for a lot of people i think in that exact position where they're making content because they know they have to participate in content marketing It's not optional, right?

8:43It's just marketing at this point. But it's low ROI. Those platforms don't have really a path for monetization for short form content. It's just you using your very valuable time to do that, right? And if AI can take some of that lift off, then it frees you up to use your time for much better.

9:04Jasmine Enberg: So I hear you on this. And I do try to use AI to do this, especially with captions, but they're so bad. And I, you know, I take pride in my work. We talked about that, too. I mean, all of us do, right? And I want to put the best content out there. I know it's fleeting, right? And people are scrolling through their algorithm. They'll probably never come back to it again. But I know it's there. And I want it to be good. So yes, I will run it through ChatGPT to, you know, get a better caption, get a better hook, a better thumbnail. but then I still have to go in and change it, right? And to make it sound more like me and also up to the quality that I want to be putting out into the world.

9:40But as I say that,

9:42Jasmine Enberg: I will also say that I would put AI as an eight for creators. So I think it's far more of an opportunity. And I think a lot of that comes from the fact that for quite a while, we had this conversation about AI versus creators and was AI going to replace creators, especially when I was talking to the marketing community. And now the conversation really is changing and we're hearing a lot more of AI and creators and figuring out how these two actually work together. And we'll talk a little bit more about that later on. But these may have seemed like really random questions. I promise you they weren't.

10:16Jasmine Enberg: The point was really to illustrate the breadth and the depth of the creator economy because it now touches everything, whether that's marketing or technology or sports or politics or news, the list goes on. was also to show that there's a lot of different opinions about the crater economy. We don't even agree on some of the most basic things, like what is a creator to start with. Also, and please correct me if I'm wrong, but these are a lot of the topics that the curriculum at Syracuse is going to cover. So let's start there. We've all agreed to be here. So I think it's safe to say that we all agree that it is a major moment to have a university launch this curriculum for the creator economy.

10:55Jasmine Enberg: But I'm more curious as to why and what it means from each of your perspectives that students can now minor in the creator economy. And Michael, I'm sorry, I'm going to start with you again. That's totally fine. But only because you're a Syracuse alum. Yes. I think that the easy answer here is that one in every two students wants to be a creator, if not more um you know with whether it's gen z or gen alpha the overwhelming amount of of students teens kids they want to be creators that's kind of point in case right there you know it's that's where everything is headed year over year budgets are increasing the influencer economy is exploding every single day year over year so everything statistically points in that direction So that's why.

11:46Jasmine Enberg: What about you, Stephanie? Yeah. So in the many years that we've known many creators on this platform, and I'm imagining that you guys would both echo this in some way or another. We've known lots of people who have gotten into the space and really had no idea what to do when they got there. Either they experienced immediate overnight success or, you know, they built something little by little through like the, you know, sweat of their own brow kind of stuff. And they met stumbling blocks along the way that were 100 % avoidable if they had had a foundational understanding of some of the business principles going in, some of the financial principles going in, some of the legal principles going in to this industry that is rapidly growing and changing around them.

12:33And so it's not about necessarily preparing students for, you know, an industry that's going to very rapidly change and continue to very rapidly change. It's about giving them a firm foundation that they can build on to avoid so many of the pitfalls that we've seen people make for the same mistakes over and over really basic stuff, not knowing how to start a company, not understanding how to pay your taxes in this industry. It's actually a massive problem. And people want to do well, and they want to build real and legitimate businesses that contribute to a strong, positive sentiment about the creator economy, but they don't necessarily have the foundation to do that.

13:16And I think a program like this is a really important first step.

13:20Jasmine Enberg: But do you need a specific program to do that? I mean, couldn't you just take entrepreneurship classes somewhere or have a different degree in business? Yes, I think it's absolutely possible to do that. Is it likely that people will put together all of those steps completely on their own when they're 17 going on 18? I think it's fairly unlikely based on the vast majority of people that I've seen actually go through that process. And I've seen them try. Right. A lot of this industry, especially as it changes very quickly, is that you don't know what you don't know. And having a program that pulls together the basics of what everyone should know, plus, you know, having the potential for bringing in guest lecturers to update you on whatever may be new that year or that quarter, you know, right before you graduate or give you the watchouts for, you know, what is happening in the industry right now, right as you're going into it, gives people potentially a much better shot out of the gate.

14:22So again, they're not wasting their time on very low return activities when they could be focusing on really building something special or up to their full potential. What about you, Nick? Yeah, I mean, as someone who does this full time for a living, I can attest that it's a career, you know. And so for there to be a program out there that kind of sets kids up or students up to do this as a career, like, I think that's incredible. As someone who went to school for production, I studied things that put me in the right direction to be able to do this. I didn't know that I was going to be put in that direction.

15:05It wasn't until I went full time that I was like, oh, I learned these in these classes. And I just, it was a coincidence, you know, but if I think there is a program that can be a little bit more cohesive and thought out to not make a coincidence, I think that's, that's great. Right. Yeah. And I think to add to what Nick and Stephanie said as well, you know, the way I look at it is what does an influencer have that brands want to work with, that agencies want to work with? They have built in trust. What do universities have built in trust? Like creators can absolutely make programs for how to do what I do.

15:37And many have. And there are good ones and there are bad ones. But I would much rather get one from Syracuse University.

15:44Jasmine Enberg: That's very fair. So you mentioned that kids want to be creators. You mentioned that being a creator is a career path, and the data actually supports that. So the IAB, which is an ad industry body, estimates that there are now 1.5 million full-time equivalent creators in the US. So that's creators who are earning about$60 ,000 or more per year. I crunched the numbers, and that is actually more than the number of active doctors and lawyers based on the latest available data. To be fair, The latest available data is from a couple of years ago, so it's a little wonky, but still. I think the big difference is, though, law school and medical school, these have very defined curriculums.

16:24Jasmine Enberg: I think, as we've already established, the creator economy doesn't. I mean, again, we can't even agree on what it means to be a creator. And while it is a legitimate career path, there isn't a legitimate or standardized playbook or education on how to make it in this industry. And there's so many different paths to success. So, Stephanie, you've done a little consulting. I know I had said before that you've done teaching and you push back on that. So you've done a little consulting. If you could design the curriculum, what would be the most important class that you would teach? Man, no pressure, right?

17:00The most important class, and this is not to cop out of this at all, the most important class is going to depend on the person taking it. there are so many roles in the creator economy to be fair at this point at this point right it used to be that people thought of it as one person one camera that's the creator economy and it's shot in somebody's bedroom you know whatever and now there are as many roles in the creator economy as as in you know i would speculate as in the regular film industry there are camera people there are so many graphic artists there are designers and writers and researchers and you know they're just the whole gamut so when you're designing a curriculum the most important class is really going to depend on what resonates someone who wants to be a behind the scenes producer in new media or in social content creation is going to maybe resonate with a um with a financial literacy type of class centered around media whereas someone who's like i'm a star i'm going to be in front of the camera baby they're going to be you know maybe responding more to a trend spotting class that I saw on the syllabus or to something about personal branding.

18:10So I think that's going to be individual to the student. But I think when you're designing a program like this, in my mind, and I don't mean to speak out of turn, because this may have nothing to do with what anyone at Syracuse has planned, but there's basically an axis, right? There's a, at one end of the axis is media literacy. At the other end of the accurate axis is business literacy. And this is an industry where you are making creative content on platforms that are designed by engineers. And you have to have both ends of that access in order to be able to compete in that industry and to cogently understand how to function as a professional in it.

18:50And so whatever classes are in the program, they really need to center on those two anchors, in my mind. What about you, Michael?

19:01Jasmine Enberg: How would you design the curriculum? It's tough going first, right? I mean, her answer is so spot on. It depends on the student. I mean, if you are on the business side, to give an answer, I would say if you're on the business side, everything that makes up a deal, that's probably one of the most essential things, because you're going to get into all the nitty gritty details of putting the content together, to the legal to, you know, usage, exclusivity and so on. And I think all of that for the business side of things, if you're a creator, matters so much because that's how you're going to make your money is doing deals.

19:41But then there's the other side of things, the creative side, especially with, like you said, like appeasing the algorithm. We like to say, you know, feed the algorithm, but don't let it feed on you. You've still got to have some of yourself in there. But that's the other side of it is making content that captures people's attention. So, you know, what is what does that look like? And how is it still authentically you?

20:04Jasmine Enberg: What about some of the more unteachable things? I mean, Stephanie, you started to talk about this a little bit, like the people who want to be in front of the camera. I mean, there's it factor, there's star power. I mean, these are all sort of intangible things and terms we use to describe celebrities, but they also apply to the creator economy. I mean, you can build authority and you can build an audience. but you can't really teach charisma or can you? I mean, I think this is a question we throw back at you, honestly, because I think it just comes down to rinse and repeat. You know, if you, you know, you aren't, everyone isn't always just born with that it factor, but, you know, you're only going to fail if you stop trying, period.

20:42I think that anyone in this room can make it as a creator. It's just, if you give up, that's the only reason you all make it. so I would say rinse and repeat you know that it factor is in there for everyone it might not be you know I'm not going to take Nick's job and be a fashion creator by any means but you know I could talk about the influencer industry and maybe I won't want to show my face at all times but like I could still do my thing and I have an it factor so I would say you know you know you've been saying that you've been doing this now for so long and now you're in front of the camera so it's about just rinse and repeat and keep in doing until you really got it down.

21:17Jasmine Enberg: And I think the other thing that you said there, and part of the beauty of the creator economy is that it's so diverse. And so a lot of the people who may not have quote unquote, made it in the traditional media and entertainment industry can find an audience and can find a way to create content and distribute it in the creator economy. And it's opened up avenues for creatives, especially in that way. But Nick, I wanted to, and this kind of builds off of what you were talking about, because you went to school for film and TV. I did. I went to school for broadcast journalism without aging myself too much.

21:49Jasmine Enberg: What I learned at J school was built for a media era that no longer exists. Like it is not just about TV and print anymore. Now it is podcasts. I mean, I have one, it's social media, it's YouTube, and all the lines are blurring between all these different channels and mediums. So what learnings did you take from film and TV school that you use in your work as a creator? And what have you found to be different? Because I'm doing a lot of unlearning right now. Yeah. I mean, so to answer your question, actually to answer your previous question, for curriculum goes, I would do production. Primarily because that was the X factor that I had as a creator to be able to go full time.

22:30Like quantity of just cranking out content took me no time at all because I've been editing since 2008. and eight. So I had a step up on so many creators who are just learning it where I could just crank out content nonstop. So to answer the curriculum question, that would be my question or answer. As far as things that I'm unlearning, probably like, I would say after being behind the camera for a long time, I wanted to become an artist. I wanted to really, which I've heard you speak about earlier about like really making sure we have a perfect piece of content. But wrapping my head around that some content really only has a shelf life of maybe 24 hours, 48 hours, 7, 10 days, whatever it is, really changed up my process because I had to find the fine line between quantity and quality.

23:24I can't spend hours and days on an edit. I can do it. And my production would be amazing. But I just can't keep up with the algorithm in the way that a creator needs to be putting out content. So I'm not as a perfectionist as I once was. I'm not shooting everything on a$10 ,000 DSLR anymore. Sometimes I'm shooting it on my camera and that's not what I was taught. Or my iPhone. I was not taught to shoot on iPhone. I was taught to shoot on professional cameras with professional editing equipment, do lighting, do color grading, you know, sound effects, etc. But sometimes I have to dumb it down a little bit because that's just what the algorithm wants sometimes sometimes a little more

24:06Jasmine Enberg: relatability how often are you developing content or how often are you posting every day every day yeah multiple times a day or just one sometimes multiple yeah tiktok today i posted twice wow so but it really kind of changes in my like growth phase i was about two to three times a day and uh but for me that's a couple hours a day yeah i mean that is really hard for me to even imagine, honestly. Yeah. I mean, it is. I mean, for me, the unlearning really has been a couple of things. I mean, as a trained broadcast journalist, like obviously you're trained to be on TV. And a lot of times those are like five minute hits max.

24:39Jasmine Enberg: And so you're being peppered with questions. You got to get your talking points in as quickly as possible. A podcast is a conversation and you're supposed to make it seem more natural, more organic. and shifting to that has been a really big challenge for me. And then just things like thumbnails on YouTube, for example. I mean, coming from a journalism background, I'm like, that to me is clickbait. And we were told never to do that, but it works. And it's maybe not clickbait in the sense that we were taught about it. It's more of like a hook to draw attention. But that is completely antithetical to what I had learned at school.

25:17And here's the thing also, the video that you spend the most time on is not going to go viral. Never, ever. It's the one that you literally, you don't care. Yes. Every single time. One of our creators, her video that first set her off to being a content creator was she got stuck in a chirp wheel. Something that you like crack your back on. That was her start to being a creator. So it's like, you never know what's going to get you started and actually get you seen. Because it definitely wasn't that one. And that was just something funny. She posted in between everything else that she was already doing.

25:48And I think back to what Nick was saying, because I was at one of the very first VidCons. The Fine Brothers are on stage. And I'll never forget what they said, because they finished their keynote. And you were probably there. And they finished their keynote. And someone raised their hand. It was audience questions. And he's like, I've got this new video. I'm starting a channel. Here's all the things that I'm going to be doing. I've got all these questions for you. And what do you guys think? Because I want to make sure I start out really, really strong. and they were like, just post it, just post it.

26:15Stop thinking, stop thinking, just post it. You are just wasting time not posting it because that's the only thing stopping you and you are always gonna be your, like you're always gonna be the one who's hardest on yourself. The only reason you're not posting it is because you're thinking other people are going to see it and that's scary. You just gotta post it. Disconnecting from your content's huge. It's something I tell people all the time because you can't live and die with the algorithm. You can't live and die with how successful your video is going to be. It'll destroy you.

26:45Jasmine Enberg: Shira Lazar says post and ghost. And I try to live by that, but it is very hard. Shout out Shira. Shout out Shira. It's a lesson that you have to learn for sure. I think what you said really resonates with having to dumb things down, which sounds really bad. But I think an interesting framing is making it sustainable. These platforms are unlike broadcast TV that comes in seasons. or, you know, where you can go on vacation from a team of 50 people who are working on a project and you can come back and the project is still going. The problem is if you leave, everything stops. So you have to find a way to make things sustainable forever.

27:25And for us, one of the big things, which again, sounds bad, is we used to tell our editors, we had a fantastic editing team who would bend over backwards to make videos perfect. And we had to start telling them, it's not 100 you need to do 85 don't do 100 of your full potential on this video do 85 because what was happening is that people were getting like you know so artistic and so creative about it and it was brilliant and amazing but they were spending like 20 hours on like 30 seconds of content and we were like guys you can't do that because you'll they were burning out and it was not sustainable and you just have to set a pace that you can do forever so if you have to post and ghost, and that's how you make it sustainable for yourself from now until the end of time, that's what you have to do, right?

28:11Jasmine Enberg: Or you get a team, like a lot of creator companies do have now. So a lot of the things that we've talked about on stage already, we, I mean, I wouldn't have learned them without talking to you all who are in the industry. So I wanted to pivot a little bit and talk about who should be leading the classes in a creator economy curriculum, because with all respect to professors, but if they are not experts in this industry themselves, and they're learning it alongside the students, can they really teach a curriculum on the creator economy? Or should you be bringing creators or guest lecturers, like you mentioned?

28:43Jasmine Enberg: How, what would that look like for you? It should be someone who really knows the creator economy well. I think that whenever a new feature comes out, I'm the first one to jump on it because I want to know how it works and I want to use it. And it might not be the best post ever, but I'm going to try it. So I think it needs to be someone who lives, breathes and sleeps influencer. You know, ideally, they've been in the industry for quite some time. You know, I do think that, of course, anyone can teach a course that's given to you. But these are the conversations that you really learn a lot and you need someone who can actually speak to it really well.

29:16I think there's absolute truth to that. However, I think a whole program that's encompassing the whole creator economy starts off with a lot of these basic principles that we've mentioned before, right? Business, finance, accounting, some manner of law, you know, contract law is in there somewhere. And those, I think a lot of those foundational courses can be taught from people within those departments, because I mean, you'd know better than I would. But when it comes to like a lot of the contracts that most creators are dealing with, they're not the most complex in the world, they do, but they need to have some ability to read those contracts at a basic level.

29:54So it's not like you need to teach incredibly high-level law. You just need some basic law understanding. And I think a lot of those can be pulled out of departments that already exist. Same goes with pulling expertise out of film schools and production departments and stuff that already exist. The trick is in those trend spotting classes, is in those algorithm classes. Those are where the rubber kind of meets the road for this type of program and where I I think you need to lean more heavily on whether it's guest lecturers or whether it's bringing someone in for a semester who's, you know, usually in the industry, but is is, you know, co-teaching a class with an inbuilt professor to have exactly what you said, that pulse on the industry.

30:39Yeah, I would say someone who's going to be a student of this industry. The way I'm sure you consume content, the way I consume content, it's nonstop. And that's for like I have an addiction. There's no doubt in my mind that I have an addiction in social media, but I twist it to like I'm studying everything that I need to learn. So I have like a I always say I have a thumb on the pulse of what's going on in the world, what's going on in this industry, rather. And I think that needs to be somebody who understands that for sure.

31:08Jasmine Enberg: Yeah, I mean, I think of it and sorry to bring up the comparison, but Harvard Business School, for example, I mean, they brought in Alex Earle and they brought in Kim Kardashian. And, you know, there's a lot, I think, that is sort of baseline across industries and in business and finance and legal and entrepreneurship that I do think translates. But then you do need somebody to your point, Stephanie, who really has their finger on the pulse and understands how this is moving. One kind of controversial question, because like we said, this is a really big moment to have a center for the creator economy.

31:40Jasmine Enberg: But it does kind of treat it as something separate. Right. And, you know, as we know, the creator economy is now part of so many different industries. And so when you're thinking about this from, you know, an academic perspective, shouldn't we be incorporating creator economy into all different degrees, whether you're studying business, tech? Oh, God, I don't even know. Law, you know, all the different degrees that you can get, whether that's things like media literacy or developing content, because now you even have tech bros developing content as well, right? Yeah. I mean, I think that's why Syracuse University is going to have a minor in it is because it's relevant to everyone.

32:19You know, I had the honor to speak with the football team six months ago when I came in here. And it was awesome speaking to them about content. And, you know, there's so many creators that are in college that are going viral for the stuff that they're doing. And NIL deals is obviously a huge thing now. And they can make so much money and there's so much opportunity for them. So I think whether you're an actor, an athlete, an engineer, I mean, it's applicable to everyone. So I would say, honestly, I look at the creator economy almost in the same way I look at entrepreneurship. I think that, you know, everyone should highly consider taking it.

33:00And I do think that it's going to I think that the applications are going to fill up very, very quickly. I would echo all of that. I think when you look at the creator economy, it's just the economy at this point, because content marketing, again, is needed in every business, in every sector, practically. And new media is just the media landscape at this point. So when you're not making those types of differentiations anymore, I do think that this applies to so many fields. For sure. Yeah. I mean, I would subscribe to so many of their channels because I'm just intrigued and interested in so many of them.

33:35So absolutely, 100%. Yeah, it's that addiction speaking. Yeah, I mean, the way my algorithm goes from cooking to movies to... Ooh, that's a hot topic.

33:43Jasmine Enberg: Yeah, it's great. Yeah. All right. Well, I want to pivot a little bit and talk about some of the bigger trends. I want to start with entertainment because we're in LA. So what else? Last year really was the convergence for creators and for Hollywood. Netflix is still on a deal spree. It feels like they're still signing creators left and right for shows. We have creators building studios, some of them in the same neighborhoods as Disney, for example. We've had one blockbuster hit, Markiplier, recently. Where do you see this all going? I mean, again, it feels like every day there's a new deal, a new studio, a new show.

34:20Jasmine Enberg: Is this sustainable? With the right people. I mean, I think it's always going to keep happening. You know, you're going to have your Mr. Beast shows. We represent Grace Helbig. She had a show. I think that it just has to be with the right people. they're not all going to be successful. I mean, are there enough right people though? That's the other thing I'm thinking because I think for the right time, there's there, it just comes down to getting the person at the exact right time. Um, it's, it's not always going to work for everyone. And similar to every creator somehow feels like sometimes they need a brand.

34:51You don't always need a brand and you don't always need a show.

34:54Jasmine Enberg: When do you not need a brand as a creator? When do you not need a brand? When you're, when you really don't feel passionate about it. You know, if you just feel like it's the next thing that I have to do. Do you mean like a physical brand or like a personal brand? Oh, a physical brand. Yeah. But yeah, no, I think it's just it's always going to keep happening. You know, there's there's definitely going to be more creator led shows on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon and so on. It's just whether or not they're going to all be successful or not depends on the person and the show and how much autonomy they have to create something that is actually going to be good.

35:25I would echo that. I think this path has never been a, you know, line goes smoothly up to the right sort of thing. It's an it's an up down motion. I like that you referenced Grace Helbig. I think, you know, in the early days, there were some like some experiments out of the gate that may have been a wobbly start for creators outside of YouTube as a platform. And, you know, people were like, oh, these YouTubers, they don't they don't translate. They don't translate to TV. And then you had the next generation of YouTubers who came in, you know, from Vine or from other platforms. And they were already smarter and they were already more forward thinking and they were focused on a personal brand.

35:59And then you had the generation that came after that. And they were extremely entrepreneurial and they were suddenly extremely business focused. And so every single time you get a new generation of creators come in, they're smarter, they're savvier, they're more artistic or creative in some new and interesting way. And now you see these more consistent success stories. And you've had actually, YouTubers have made movies before Markiplier, right? They were just really bad. They were not good. Mr. Guitar Man had a good one, right? His was actually kind of better. But I was thinking of some others who were definitely flops, right?

36:36But now you have Marks that was arguably, you know, certainly far and away the most successful YouTuber movie ever. And it's a massive step forward. And so you have people who punch through at the right time, the right person, and they set a new baseline for everybody else. And I think we'll continue to do that again, not in a smooth way, but in a in a slow progress kind of way. Audiences have demonstrated that they don't care a lot of times what screen they're watching someone on or what platform they're watching someone on, as long as it's the right person for the right platform. and creators are now also showing that they want to diversify across platforms, especially as monetization continues to become sort of less and less stable across all of the social platforms.

37:22So they're highly incentivized to get good and get onto other platforms as well.

37:28Jasmine Enberg: I do have to say, though, it's not always entirely the creator's fault when they've had a flop on a streaming service. I mean, a lot of times, too, you see these traditional entertainment properties, whether that's streamers or something else, bring in creators and a show that's been working on YouTube and then change it. And it loses the magic of what made it work in the first place. I mean, we saw that, was it Pop the Balloon, for example, that was a huge hit and then they brought it on Netflix and it totally flopped. So, you know, just to kind of put that out there. Nick, what about you? Yeah, I mean, I think there's just so many unique people in this world.

38:03And Mike said, just the right people. Like there aren't a lot of people that I come across on a regular basis where I'm like, this is a copy and paste of someone, you know? Or this reminds me of this person. There's like little things, but I think overarching, there's just so many unique people with different backgrounds and different experiences and different stories to tell that we have just plentiful, you know? And they, like I said, they just have so much to tell. I don't think we're ever gonna run out of this. And I think it's just gonna continue to evolve as it goes on.

38:34Jasmine Enberg: So I would push back on that a little bit. I don't think this is, I don't think we're ever going to run out of creators. But I do already think we're kind of at a saturation point of the creators that are fit for, say, television or for film or TV in the way that the entertainment landscape is right now. I hope that that changes. I also think, you know, courses and curriculums like this can help change that as well as, you know, just broader understanding of the landscape. But, you know, if you're looking at some of the big creators, I mean, some of them are double dipping. Even you have Dhar Mann, who has a Samsung TV deal, as well as a Fox Entertainment deal.

39:06Jasmine Enberg: why don't you go find another creator, right? Why does it have to be the same ones getting all the same deals? But I wanted to talk a little bit more, Stephanie, about something that you said, which is, you know, these creators want to diversify into other platforms. Why do they want to be in traditional movies and films? Why do they want to be on streaming services? I mean, all we hear all the time is that YouTube is a new TV. Why not just stick it out on YouTube? A couple of reasons. One is that there are obviously YouTube is not the only platform I mean, you have TikTokers who have massive followings and Instagrammers and stuff like that.

39:39There's a highly diverse range of monetization opportunities across those. I have lots of creators who come across my feed who post, you know, I made$8 ,000 from YouTube last month and eight cents from TikTok. And the disparity is real. And as YouTube continues to evolve over time, their push towards shorts was massive. And people saw a massive haircut from their monetization, some of them in some parts of YouTube. Child safety regulations are coming big time, even more than they already are right now. Data privacy in general, I think, threatens the way that algorithms are built. You know, I'm not commenting on that either way, just saying that, you know, people understand that platforms are going to continue to rapidly change and their priorities may not forever be aligned with the priorities of the platform.

40:31You're always building your business on shifting sands. Right. And that's a high risk environment to be in. And so the more hooks that people can put in the wall, the safer they feel financially. That might mean crowdfunding something. That might mean selling a ton of merch. It might mean a lot of things. But one of those ways that they can get their brand and their personal brand diversified is by going into traditional. and that goes hand in hand with the other big reason, which is frankly, just reputational. There are people who have sort of conquered the YouTube ecosystem and are now saying, yeah, I've conquered this YouTube ecosystem and I still don't get any respect from Hollywood.

41:14When Markiplier was invited to the Oscars, they accidentally took him in through the back door instead of letting him walk the red carpet. I am not surprised to hear that. It's kind of gross, right? So the reason, you know, I think some of them have something to prove as well and want those doors to open.

41:31Jasmine Enberg: Yeah, I think it is really a stamp of approval, right? It's legitimacy. It's prestige that you don't get with YouTube. I mean, that's one reason why YouTube nabbed the rights to the Oscars starting in 2029. I mean, yes, there's obviously the business side of it with the ad dollars that they want to capture, but also because it legitimizes them as well. I had so many more questions to ask you, so we're going to have to do this again. But I do want to open it up to the room if there's any questions in the audience for our guests.

42:21One platform, not a patchwork of stitched together tools and gaps. Don't wait for the next attack. Secure and accelerate your business at rubric.com. Again, rubric.com. When you're creating content, even though it's your content and you can keep your copies of it, you're basically putting your content onto all these platforms who now own it. They kind of own you and whatever they want to do kind of determines what's going to happen. You can lose everything overnight. Let's say YouTube all of a sudden goes down, your business is done. So that's kind of like a big sticking point for me in understanding how this economy over time is going to create, you know, because like in regular business, you want to build and build and build.

43:03But here you're at the whim of these engines that are designed to ultimately not necessarily make you successful to make them successful. Yeah, I mean, I think that we know that though, and we tell our creators that and that's why it's important to always diversify and never go all in on one thing. You know, when we saw that TikTok might go down, or be banned in the United States, we were telling our creators, you're in advance, you'll probably remember this, you got to be posting everywhere else, YouTube shorts, Facebook reels, you got to start your mail, your your mail list, you got to start SMS and gathering phone numbers, you just got to do whatever you can.

43:38man, I really liked your hook analysis because you really just got to get as much out there as you can because you're totally right. If YouTube just went away tomorrow, which it won't, but if it did, you've got to be prepared for that. And I think that there would be warning signs of that happening. And if it was ever happening, we would be advising our creators on what is the best thing to do to capture your audience. And yeah, that's a great question though.

44:04Jasmine Enberg: I mean, I'll give you a very real example from how we are building Scalable is we have our podcast, which airs on YouTube. It's also on Spotify and all the other podcast platforms, but we also make it simultaneously with a newsletter. And we chose a newsletter because Kai and I are both writers. So we wanted to continue writing and that's what people know us for, but also because you own the email list. And that is a direct audience that we have ownership over, which is very different than on a platform like YouTube or TikTok. all of these channels are incredibly important. And yes, you need to diversify.

44:40Jasmine Enberg: And I will say this from experience, it is so much easier said than done. And being on all these platforms, even, you know, posting on shorts and reels and TikTok, even though you're posting the same video with essentially the same caption, like it takes a lot of time and a lot of work. And so yes, it is important to have all these different revenue streams and different platforms, but there is only so far you can go. And I think that's just kind of the reality for a lot of creators. And then the goal is, for many of them, is to make it big enough, build your business up enough that you can then launch your own distribution.

45:15Jasmine Enberg: I mean, now we're seeing Dude Perfect, for example, building their own streaming platform. You have Stephen Bartlett that is launching his own podcast network. So those are still few and far between, but that is sort of the end goal for a lot of the big creators that we're seeing. I'm delighted to know that you have a journalism background. I'm going to become a subscriber. I want to go back to the journalism question for a second, though, because this is something we've been discussing. The creator economy is largely about commerce, but journalism is very different. And it has a fiduciary responsibility to the citizenry and plays such an important role in our democracy.

45:51Jasmine Enberg: And I am wondering if left organically, if a creator economy approach to the news is going to help us with our precarious relationship to the truth. Or if there is a place at this point for an educational institution to come in, are we ready for credentialing or standards or informally or formally for news creators? This is really something, I mean, granted I'm old, but this is something that deeply concerns me as a parent of younger people who are getting a lot of their quote unquote news content from creators. I think your concerns are 1000 % founded across the board. I'm so sorry. I yeah, I can but I completely agree when it comes to I would punt it directly toward you for things like credentialing and what that process would look like.

46:44But again, there are a lot of really solid, very well educated people who have come out of journalism, much like yourself, and are now independent journalists online. And one of the things that I just spoke to a bunch of them about a couple weeks ago was the fact that they were like, I don't want to think about how much money my channel is making, because that might compromise my journalistic integrity. It's a forefront in their mind, because they're like, I've always been firewalled from the money, because I shouldn't be driven by how much money my reporting is making. So it's one of those things where the problem is real, The solution is unclear from what I can tell at the moment, but a lot of it is at the forefront of people's minds.

47:25And then there are just people who call themselves journalists who are absolutely not journalists and are just doing bad journalism.

47:31Jasmine Enberg: Yeah, that's that's the big. Yes, exactly. And I agree that you're very right to be concerned. I mean, if there's one question about the creator economy that keeps me up at night, it's it's this. And it's not just about credentialing in terms of learning, fact-checking, or making sure you're reporting objectively. And one thing that has been really concerning to me recently is this idea of accountability. Because now we're in a period of time where it's not only that facts are being debated and that people are choosing to turn to journalists or news sources where the viewpoints align with their own and we're becoming more divided as a result.

48:06Jasmine Enberg: What you're also seeing is you have powerful people, politicians, celebrities, really kind of across the board, turning to creators and podcasters instead of traditional journalists because they think that they're going to get more favorable coverage. And a lot of times they do. And so the question then becomes, if that's happening, who is asking the hard questions? and now what I'm seeing and hearing is that there's a lot of podcasters out there for example Jake Shane recently came out and said I am not a journalist do not treat me as a journalist my job is not to ask tough questions I leave that to the traditional journalist I want to make people feel comfortable I want them to come on my show have a conversation and that is it and that's fine I think there is a place for both, right?

48:56Jasmine Enberg: The problem is, if that's the only thing that's happening, I'm very concerned about where the whole news and information landscape is going. Because ultimately, I think it's great. I think the creator economy and creators talking about news, providing commentary, providing their own experiences, opens so many doors for people who may not have felt represented by mainstream media. I think alternative media plays an incredibly important role, but there does need to be a level of accountability and also a delineation between what is fact and what is opinion. And that doesn't exist. And to be fair, it doesn't really exist on traditional media the way it should anymore either.

49:37Jasmine Enberg: So I don't have an answer to your question, but you're very right to be concerned. Thank you. You asked the one question that keeps you up at night. A lot of the talk today was surrounding individual content creators. How do they survive? How do they build? How do they scale? How are they scalable? What about the multi-stakeholder folks? You have your talent managers. You have your talent agencies. You have all the other businesses and individuals in between that support this entire economy. What would you say is sort of like the magic answer to kind of supplanting their growth as well? to support the individual content creators themselves too and professionalize and businessify, I guess, if you will.

50:24Can I steal an answer that you've given a couple times today? I think it depends on the company. For us, we're a boutique for a reason. I think that boutique is cool and boutique gives you way more time to the creators that we represent. I hear all the time that people are with large agencies and suddenly their manager is not texting them back because their views dropped. It's actually the number one thing I hear from creators that want to leave companies. So I think it just depends on the company. I mean, we've had tons of people come to us who wanted to purchase Proud, but I know that if we do that, Proud's just not going to be Proud anymore.

50:59And I want to be able to maintain that. So I think it's just going to depend on each company because, you know, there's a lot of companies that are building out podcast divisions, that are building out merchandising divisions, that are buying and acquiring data and tech companies. And that's absolutely another way to do it too because you can absolutely take a cut on merchandise and a lot of companies do and will continue to do so. So I think it's just gonna depend on what the goal is. For me, when I started Proud, the goal was always just maintain happiness. I started it because I was incredibly depressed when my dad passed away and I just wanted to have a reason to work and not be upset about what I was doing.

51:41And so for me, that's always been the answer is like, am I happy? Am I doing what I'm doing because I like it and because I like the people that I'm working with? But a lot of other people will just want money and will want other things. And that's totally cool. But yeah, I think it's just going to depend on every company and what they really want to accomplish.

51:59Jasmine Enberg: I will say, though, it is a very crowded and competitive space. I think, you know, proud management has a very differentiated value proposition that will there will always be a place for boutique firms like yours because of that. But overall, we're just seeing so much consolidation within the landscape. And you have all of these big enterprises, big businesses really snapping up, whether that's, you know, talent agencies or ad agencies snapping up specialized firms. And then you have other, you know, big talent agencies like we're signed with CAA at Scalable. And that's because they now have a division for digital creators themselves.

52:38Jasmine Enberg: themselves and so it is it's just as competitive really as it is in you know the creator landscape for creators themselves i think what's an interesting shift within sort of and correct me if i'm wrong i could you know this is from the research that i've been doing but there's been a shift in terms of how what it means to be an agent and what it means to actually represent creators i think everybody is kind of in the position now where they want to cut down the number of middlemen, sorry, to use that term. And that means that agents too have to play the role of, say, manager. You know, you have to be getting brand deals.

53:15Jasmine Enberg: You also have to be representing them, sometimes handholding them in many different ways. And so I think it's kind of changed the game for agencies as well. Real attacking me? What's going on? I mean, you're totally right. And, you know, there's so many different types of managers. There are momagers, you know, who started as a mom and now suddenly their daughter is making 12 times the amount of money they made. You know, and I think that with any manager or agent, you need to be providing value. You know, if you're just responding to emails that come in, is that really helping? Maybe a little, but that's like the bare minimum that you should be doing.

53:52You know, there's outbound pitches, there's thinking ahead, there's strategy. You know, we're doing at least monthly strategy calls with all of our creators, looking at every single thing from the first couple seconds of their content to other types of verticals that they should be in to other types of creators that they should look at their content to get inspired by. So, you know, it really is going to completely depend on the manager. You just you need to have someone who really cares about you, cares about your success and knows what they're doing.

54:19Jasmine Enberg: I also have to say, I love the premise of your question. I mean, I think the creator economy as a whole, it's an ecosystem. And there are so many different stakeholders, and they all rely on each other to make this industry work, whether that's the platforms and creators, although often they're at odds or brands or agents. And I think it's incredibly important that we understand that and keep that in mind in order to continue growing this industry. There's always talk about verticals and dramas and how all different Hollywood studios are, you know getting into the game is that something that you are seeing more creators um being pushed towards are you pushing your clients to do more of that content because i feel like now everybody's on their cell phone so nobody's going to want to see anything on a widescreen everything is just going to be transferred vertically it could be any format whether it's a comedy whether it's a soap opera news like it seems like why does al thin is in you know yeah yeah yeah you should is that question just in terms of like dimensions of video I'm just saying like is is that where everybody is being pushed towards like is there even like is is anything on a widescreen just gonna be phased out at this point and is is being part of that vertical space just more important creating dramas or I think TV is back though in many ways right I mean people are watching more and more YouTube on their big screen TVs.

55:52Jasmine Enberg: So I definitely don't think horizontal is dead. In fact, everything is kind of going full circle at this point. But is your question more about micro drama specifically and like the vertical short form? Yeah, I'd be curious to hear from you all. I mean, what do you make of the micro drama trend? You so what? Yeah, I mean, one of my writer friends, he messaged me recently. He's like, should I be making a micro drama? Should I be writing one? I was like, I'd be interested to read yours. So yeah. What do we think about it? Be brutally honest. Yeah, go for it. I think it's a trend. I think it's a trend like other trends, right?

56:31I don't think it signifies a leaving of horizontal content. I think YouTube has been heavily leaning into the living room experience for years. And just now, a month ago or something, they announced a rollout of AI integration, with widescreen so you can do a deep dive on the stuff that you see on your TV screen while you're on your phone. It all sounds very ADD to me, but they're really into the living room experience. And Instagram launched a TV app too. Absolutely. Absolutely. YouTube isn't alone here. I think it's a trend. I have lots of friends who are creating vertical dramas right now. Some of it is because traditional Hollywood has not had any jobs for them for the past year and a half.

57:14And so they're like, I can create something. It just happens to be vertical. And they're sort of redoing their thinking to do that. And so maybe it's an outlet for storytellers right now who don't have other outlets in the traditional media space because the jobs aren't there, especially in this actual town right now, unfortunately. And and it's a great way to kind of push in another direction. But I think it's a trend like you saw. there were some interesting like drama, serialized drama trends for like, you know, 10 part dramatic series on YouTube back in like 2014. And for me, this is like a remix of that.

57:49I don't know if you remember those. Yeah, no, I remember. Yeah. I mean, Crocs just came out with a micro drama, which was, I watched the first episode or two, you know, 120 seconds.

57:58Jasmine Enberg: At the same time though, micro dramas made$3 billion last year outside of China where they're even more popular. So it may be a trend, but it's very lucrative, at least for now. And I think the big difference is, is those are people paying directly for either episodes or full series, which shows that there is certainly appetite for it. Content has to be good. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, thank you all so much. This has been great. And thank you all for joining us.

58:56Not a patchwork of stitched together tools and gaps. Don't wait for the next attack. Secure and accelerate your business at rubric.com. Again, rubric.com.