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It’s Wednesday, and it’s also the day when voting begins in the House of Representatives on the bill that could ban TikTok in the US. If you need to shore up your library of funny videos to watch when you can’t fall asleep, we recommend starting now.

In other news… YouTube is losing influencers, the Duplass Brothers try to bring back TV ownership, and Apollo may want to purchase Paramount.

We hope you enjoy this and all upcoming issues, but we have one request: please share your feedback. If you have any thoughts at all about our new look, format, and direction, please reply to this email. It’ll go straight to us. Do not hold back.

LATEST PODCAST EPISODE

YT: Late Night With the Devil, X: Scream VII, G: CPI report, R: “I’m Just Ken”, TT: “Inspiration”, S: “This is Nowhere”

🎥 Apollo, after months of speculation, has reportedly reached out to Paramount Global about acquiring the conglomerate — facing competition from David Ellison’s Skydance and Byron Allen. Read More → axios

📺 Rob McElhenney, creator of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, is launching More Better Industries, an umbrella for his entertainment, marketing and branding, and investment companies. Read More → variety

📱 Telegram is considering an IPO after the messaging platform hit 900 million users and is almost in profit, thanks to a booming ad business. Read More → ft

👕 Christopher Bevan, famed menswear designer, and Evrnu are releasing a hoodie made out of “Nucycle” — a textile formed entirely out of compostable, biodegradable, and recyclable cotton waste. Read More → fastcompany

🛍️ Linktree is officially getting into the affiliate marketing business with brands like Urban Outfitters and Sephora, allowing its 47 million users to open creator storefronts. Read More → tubefilter

51.5% of you voted Some in yesterday’s poll: How many of the Oscar nominees did you see before the awards show?

“It felt good to get back into seeing movies again — and in the theater!”

“There were some excellent films nominated this year!”

“I work in the entertainment industry. It’s sort of a job requirement.”

.A WORD FROM OUR FRIENDS AT CRYPTO CODE.

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The workshop will teach you how to:

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• Quickly use a ready-to-go trading blueprint — so you can start doing this stuff right away.

Hey, and if you hang till the end of the workshop, you’ll receive $10 in Bitcoin.

.SOCIAL MEDIA.

YouTube is losing its top creators

The Future. YouTube stars like MatPat, Tyler Oakley, and Lilly Singh are signing off YouTube or significantly cutting back on how much they’re posting, igniting fears of a platform exodus. If YouTube no longer seems like a viable place to start a career as a digital creator, and TikTok ends up getting banned, that could leave a hole in the market for Meta to rule social media.

Logging off
Why are some of the OG influencers leaving YouTube? It’s complicated…

• Some have burned out or aged out, citing unpredictable income streams as inconsistent with having a family and mortgage.

• Speaking of unpredictable income, many say that YouTube’s unexpected algorithm changes and the platform’s focus on short-form content has hurt their viewership or made their content obsolete.

• That’s led some to expand their efforts beyond YouTube into comedy, music, acting, and business.

• Also, the rise of expensive, stunt-based content (MrBeast) and AI-generated content has made competing for attention harder than ever.

If the days of the vlog-making, skit-filming YouTuber who ruled the 2010s are officially behind us, a new era could begin where TikTok is the main hub for creators, while YouTube is used mostly for general video-hosting (trailers, music videos, etc.)... as long as it’s still around.

• Read: Taylor Lorenz argues that the word “viral” has lost its meaning.

• Watch: Hypebeast has brought back the Business of HYPE show, and the first episode features designer Tremaine Emory discussing his work with Supreme and Marc Jacobs.

• Listen: Ted Hope, former head of film at Amazon Studios, broke down how to navigate the modern indie film business on The Screenwriting Life.

.ENTERTAINMENT.

Mark Duplass hopes to bring back TV creator ownership

The Future. The Duplass Brothers are doing for TV what he did for film — putting all the financing, production, and distribution in-house. While this model isn’t new, Duplass may pave the way for creators at any level to own the fate of their shows… and give the streamers potentially more adventurous titles to license.

Series gamble
Mark Duplass — half of the brain behind movies like Cyrus and Jeff, Who Lives at Home and shows like Room 104 and Togetherness — laid out his company’s plan for TV at SXSW.

• Duplass Brothers Productions will show the pilots of four self-financed series at the fest.

• If buyers like what they see, Duplass is looking to strike short-term licensing agreements, as opposed to selling the shows outright.

• That allows the company to keep creative control and to ensure that a show doesn’t get stuck at any one streamer and won’t ever be cancelled (a constant problem in the streaming age).

As Peak TV comes to a close, the future of the industry may be sacrificing the big, up-front payouts of streaming for the potentially more lucrative payments down the line if a show becomes a hit… as they did for TV creators during the era of syndication.

What’s old becomes new again.

If you say so...