TOGETHER WITH

It’s Friday and the first-ever text messages sent through Starlink’s “cellphone towers in space” have been revealed. The historic words: “much wow” and “such signal.”

OH, THE HORROR

Brat TV embraces its spooky side with the acquisition of Crypt TV

Brat TV is diving headfirst into one of Gen Z’s favorite genres. The digital media company—which produces shows like Chicken Girls and Attaway General—has acquired horror content producer Crypt TV.

The background: Since their respective launches in the 2010s, both Brat TV and Crypt TV have built popular digital franchises around original characters and creator-driven series.

• Brat’s Gen Z-friendly Chicken Girls series has spawned a multimedia empire spanning podcasts, books, and spin-offs, while spooky Crypt shows like The Birch have found viral success on YouTube.
  
  

• More recently, Crypt partnered with Meta to release Trick VR Treat, a film starring Vanessa Hudgens that is meant to be viewed on virtual reality devices.

The big acquisition: Although the financial details of Brat’s big acquisition have yet to be revealed, the company’s next steps are less hush-hush. As of now, Brat plans to relaunch Crypt’s digital channels as destinations for original, creator-driven series.

• Crypt CEO Jack Davis, gore master Eli Roth, and film producer Darren Brandl will continue developing projects for film and TV, while firms that have backed Crypt—which include Blumhouse Productions and Lerer Hippeau Ventures—will remain on board as part of Brat’s investor base.

Why it matters: Gen Z-focused companies are evolving alongside their audiences. As beloved Chicken Girls characters transition from high school to college and beyond, Brat TV itself is expanding into new genres and ecommerce spaces—and reshaping its relationships with creators and Gen Z audiences in the process.

🔆 SPONSORED 🔆

This revolutionary AI tool makes it possible to create viral TikToks, Reels, and Shorts in just one click

Klap makes it easy to turn any video into a viral short-form clip—and all it takes is a single click. Klap’s revolutionary AI technology automatically identifies the most interesting segments in a video and generates edited TikToks, Shorts, and Reels in seconds.

So all you have to do is hit the ‘generate’ button.

235,166 creators have already saved time with Klap by generating 933,518 clips in 52 languages. Best of all: Klap is compatible with videos across all platforms, including YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook. Here’s how it works:

1. Paste a YouTube link or upload your video file. 🔗

2. Click the ‘Generate’ button.  🪄

3. Receive a ready-to-publish HD clip in seconds. (The first video is free!) 🎉

Once your new Short is ready, you’ll have the option to download the file as-is or customize everything from the caption font to the video framing. 

Ready to generate your first short-form clip for free?

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HEADLINES IN BRIEF 📰

• Elon Musk has promised that X’s “[c]reator rewards will increase significantly this year”—a declaration that comes mere days after MrBeast declined to post on X due to low payouts. (Tubefilter)
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• Twitch isn’t the only platform experiencing layoffs. As of this week, Discord has announced job cuts affecting 17% of its workforce, or roughly 170 employees. (VentureBeat)
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• TikTok parent company Bytedance says it will “shut down” its music streaming app, Resso, and “associated operations” in India on January 31st. (TechCrunch)
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• 2023 may have been Meta’s “year of efficiency,” but that doesn’t mean it’s done with job cuts. The tech giant has reportedly “eliminated” the positions of at least 60 Instagram employees. (Engadget)

DATA • ON THE RISE 📈

This UGC artist has been making her mark on Roblox for over a decade

PolarCub has been killing it on Roblox since before she was old enough to create her own account. Back then, she was a 13-year-old thrilled to have found a sense of community among other young players. Now, she’s an accomplished UGC creator and Roblox Innovation Award winner building a community of her own on YouTube.

How it started: Just over ten years ago, PolarCub stumbled across Roblox while looking for fun games to play online. She was still in middle school, so she asked her dad to open an account for her.

• After that, the creator says, she “ended up revolving a lot of my identity and relationships around the platform because it just has a really good community experience.” PolarCub spent years playing and building games and creating thumbnails—and then Roblox debuted a user-generated content program.

How it’s going: It’s now been three years since PolarCub became a UGC artist, and her online portfolio is “blooming.” She’s created roughly 200 items for Roblox—including those designed for collabs with brands like Gucci, NARS, and Tommy Hilfiger—and has also built a community of nearly 350,000 YouTube subscribers.

What’s next: Between making Roblox games, jumping back into streaming, and developing a VTuber model, PolarClub has plenty of content planned for the future:

Find out more about PolarCub—and the hundreds of other rising creators and YouTube millionaires we’ve interviewed over the years—right here on Tubefilter.com.

WATCH THIS 📺

TikTok is obsessed with the zany travelers on this nine-month cruise

Your new favorite reality stars aren’t sunkissed playboys on Love Island or future divorcees on The Ultimatum—they’re Mike and Nancy, a couple “finding fulfillment” on a nine-month Royal Caribbean cruise.

All aboard: As TechCrunch points out, Mike and Nancy aren’t the only cruise-goers to have captured TikTok’s attention. Creator Marc Sebastian has also made his way on board, as have a whole smorgasbord of people living it up on a $60,000-$120,000 quest across the world.

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Today's newsletter is from: Emily Burton, Sam Gutelle, and Josh Cohen. Drew Baldwin helped edit, too. It's a team effort.