TOGETHER WITH

It’s Monday and we’re wishing a fond farewell to Twitter.com. After months of rebranding, Elon Musk has announced the inevitable: “All core systems are now on X.com.”

COVERT OPERATIONS

Typical Gamer has been “covertly” developing a “super studio” to tap into the $320M Fortnite market

The announcement: Typical Gamer has been keeping a major secret. In a recent interview with Variety, the creator (aka Andre Rebelo) revealed that his team has been “covertly” developing a “super studio” that will invest $2 million to develop custom Fortnite experiences.

• That studio, called JOGO, will level up Rebelo’s already impressive Fortnite empire. As one of the game’s highest-earning creators of custom “islands,” Rebelo has attracted 44 million unique players and triggered 200 million plays (an accomplishment that earned him $3 million from Epic Games’ 2023 creator monetization program).

The progress: JOGO is on a mission to “make the best games possible” (per Rebelo). The company currently employs more than 20 people—with Rebelo serving as CEO alongside COO Chad Mustard and CTO Mark Price—and plans to increase that number to 35-40 people, with specialized divisions for experimental development and talent incubation.

Why it matters: Rebelo’s plans for JOGO are indicative of the growing influence of user-generated gaming content—and its potential as a lucrative revenue source for creators.

• Epic Games revealed earlier this year that it paid Fortnite creators $320 million in 2023, while Roblox doled out a whopping $741 million to creators over the same time frame.
  
  

• JOGO isn’t the only organization built to capitalize on that influx of funding: Karl Jacobs and KreekCraft recently teamed up with Misfits Gaming to launch a venture called Pixel Playground, while esports firm GameSquare is building “metaverse-style games” out of a division named Moonlight Studios.

🔆 SPONSORED 🔆

Elevate your content with the world’s best music—from Billboard Hot 100 hits to songs you won’t find anywhere else

Lickd envisioned a world where creators could make the best content featuring songs from the music industry’s biggest artists—without breaking the bank or facing copyright takedowns.

So, they made it happen.

With 1.4 million mainstream tracks, Lickd is the only platform that gives YouTube creators access to the music their viewers are actually listening to. 

Lickd’s ever-growing catalog offers songs you won’t be able to license anywhere else—including viral hits from chart-topping artists like Coldplay, Bruno Mars, Wiz Khalifa, Dua Lipa, and even Ryan Gosling. (After all, who doesn’t love a stirring rendition of “I’m Just Ken”?).

Whether you’re a YouTuber with millions of subscribers or just starting out, Lickd allows you to grow your channel with the world’s best music while staying protected from copyright claims. 

Check out the site to find out more:

Sign up for your free 14-day trial →

HEADLINES IN BRIEF 📰

• TikTok is running a test that expands the maximum upload length of videos to 60 minutes. (Tubefilter)
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• Creator brand-building company BrandArmy has tapped digital industry vet Rob Ryan to serve as its new Chief Creator Officer. (Tubefilter)
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• Instagram is developing an internal prototype of a tool that would allow users to post photos that can only be viewed once. (TechCrunch)
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• Researcher Jan Leike followed news of his departure from OpenAI with a post warning that “safety culture and processes have taken a backseat to shiny products” at the ChatGPT developer. (The Verge)

MILLIONAIRES 📈

Jay Williams has always been a trendsetter. Now, he’s a verified “trend hunter.”

How it started: Jay Williams was a freshman in college when he got his start on Instagram. As a former theater kid and a “big movies person,” making videos wasn’t exactly out of left field for Williams—but he certainly didn’t expect those funny clips to become his career. At least, not at first.

• Things changed when Williams’ follower account began to rise. By the time his Instagram hit 3,000 followers, the creator was already beginning to feel the stirrings of fame. It wasn’t long before those viewers became his “world.”
  
  

• Williams was determined to make his newfound community proud, so he doubled down on content and ported his videos over to TikTok. The new platform was the perfect fit; within months of launching his account, Williams had instigated an app-wide trend and inspired “thousands and thousands” of videos from other creators.

How it’s going: These days, Williams claims an ever-growing audience of 1.4 million TikTok followers and 127,000 Instagram followers. He has a knack for discovering trends and often collaborates with other TikTok creators—but that doesn’t mean he plans to limit himself to short-form video. In addition to entertaining fans with comedic clips, Williams recently got back into music and hopes to take a stab at short films in the near future.

What’s next: Alongside music and filmmaking, the biggest item on Williams’ 2024 agenda is the development of his own lifestyle/clothing brand:

FIGHT TO THE DEATH 🐉

Kai Cenat’s 156-hour Elden Ring stream proves that the internet loves an underdog

The battle: Kai Cenat might be a record-breaking champ on Twitch, but when it comes to Elden Ring, he’s the very definition of an underdog.

• Cenat embarked on his war against the skill-intensive game last week, when he kicked off a 156-hour stream with a steady wave of violent deaths. Those losses weren’t always easy to watch, but Cenat’s gumption quickly won over viewers. According to Kotaku, the streamer’s Elden Ring viewership peaked at about 230,000 concurrents.
  
  

• Fans offered Cenat plenty of encouragement as he trudged onward, especially during his battle against Malenia (a notoriously difficult boss who killed Cenat roughly 400 times). But loyal viewers proved to be only half of the creator’s support system; partway through his stream, Cenat won $100,000 from Adin Ross after beating a specific boss on the first try.

The victory: Cenat’s final triumph came at around 5:10 ET on May 17, when he beat Elden Ring after dying 1,701 times. Fans responded with a whirlwind of online activity; within 30 minutes, the streamer’s celebratory tweet had been retweeted 7,400 times. As of Sunday evening, the same post has been viewed by 7.5 million users and liked 1180,000 times.

Why it matters: If Cenat’s previous streams weren’t proof enough, the success of his hours-long Elden Ring campaign should serve as an important message to gaming companies about the reach and impact of creators. Elden Ring experienced a 283% rise in weekly viewership following Cenat’s stream, earning it a place at #8 on Twitch’s chart of most-watched titles (per Streams Charts).

WATCH THIS 📺

One of YouTube’s zaniest podcasts has a new owner

The show: If normal people scare you, you’re in good company. In fact, podcast hosts Enya Umanzor and Drew Phillips avoid normalcy as much as possible while filming Emergency Intercom—a strategy that has captured the attention of 342,000 out-of-the-box subscribers and, most recently, TMG Studios.

• Umanzor and Phillips announced the acquisition of their podcast by Tiny Meat Gang’s three-year-old network in a video titled “the big thing came.” (A word of warning: the Emergency Intercom creators have a knack for vivid descriptions and body-centric humor, so don’t watch this announcement clip while chowing down on anything brown.)

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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.