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Today’s News

(NOT) KEEPING TABS

YouTube is replacing the Trending tab

The history: YouTube is finally saying goodbye to its Trending tab. Even with the addition of an “on the rise” section in 2017 (which allowed YouTube to highlight up-and-coming channels), top creators have argued for years that the Trending tab doesn’t quite fulfill its purpose of surfacing “hot” content.

The tab evolved out of YouTube’s original homepage design, which highlighted videos that were rolling up big view counts. And in the early days, that was fine—because the creator community was still small enough to be understood and measured as a single entity. In recent years, however, the rapid expansion of YouTube’s creator community has turned a single hub of trending content into an obsolete concept:

The update: In response to that evolution, YouTube is replacing the Trending tab with a more granular alternative: category-specific charts of top-performing videos. The platform says those new charts will “show a wider range of popular content that’s relevant.”

This development has been in progress for a while: YouTube first began de-emphasizing the Trending tab by removing it from the standard menu on mobile devices in 2020. Then, earlier this year, the video site previewed category-specific charts by debuting a new ranking dedicated to podcast content. Now, the full complement of YouTube’s new trending content charts is set to roll out over the “next few weeks.”

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HEADLINES IN BRIEF 📰

• U.K. free-to-air broadcaster ITV and Disney+ are teaming up to offer viewers “a taste” of each other’s streaming content. (Engadget)
  
  

• Bluesky users in the U.K. will soon be prompted to verify their age in accordance with the Online Safety Act. (Bluesky)
  
  

• New data from Sensor Tower shows that X’s number of daily active users has dropped roughly 10% year-over-year as of Q2 2025. (TechCrunch)
  
  

• Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey has launched a formal investigation into chatbots owned by Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Meta over responses to Donald Trump-related queries. (The Verge)

TOP 50 MOST-SUBSCRIBED 📈

Jesus is doing big numbers on YouTube

The revival: As it turns out, Jesus’ fan club is still going strong after all these years. Over on YouTube, there are at least five different channels in this week’s Global Sub Top 50 that reference either God or Jesus in their names and channel icons.

Christianity’s climb up the charts has a lot to do with the recent flood of Bible-inspired AI Shorts—but some of Jesus’ biggest fans are still spreading the word the old-fashioned way. Take Bispo Bruno Leonardo: instead of peddling AI slop, the Catholic clergyman’s channel is stocked with scripture-based sermons designed to appeal to the Christian masses.

The context: That approach might seem a little traditional for the genAI era, but Leonardo’s success makes sense given the year Christianity has had online. An initial 2024 surge of video-based religious fervor came amid widespread concerns regarding Pope Francis’ health, and Pope Leo XIV’s ascension to the Church’s top role brought another resurgence to YouTube in early 2025. It was amid that second bump that Leonardo’s channel rocketed into the Top 50—and now, he’s doubling down.

The Brazilian clergyman has two channels in this week’s Global Sub Top 50: his primary hub (which reached 15th place with 600,000 new subs) and a secondary, Shorts-focused channel called Bispo Bruno Leonardo SM, which snuck into the ranking at #49.

THE BIZ

52 mergers and acquisitions shook up the creator biz in the first half of 2025

The report: Consolidation is reshaping the creator economy. According to a recent report from Quartermast Advisors, the number of mergers and acquisitions in our industry has surged year-over-year.

The boutique advisory firm looked at “press releases, SEC filings, and news coverage about public transactions” and leveraged “deep professional networks and market expertise” to analyze deals that took place during the first half of 2025. The resulting report found that there were 52 M&A deals in the creator economy during the first half of 2025, as compared to 30 from the first half of 2024. That was good for a 73% uptick.

Quartermast also noted that most relevant transactions (79%) involved North American companies, and software companies were the most common M&A targets. Those were represented in 27% of deals, with media companies (19%), agencies (14%), and talent management firms (14%) trailing behind.

The report’s numbers align with recent transactions that have shaken up diverse fields like entertainment (Skybound’s acquisition of Nine Four), influencer marketing (gen.video picking up Bounty), talent management (Whalar Group adding Sixteenth), and Roblox development (Super League acquiring Supersocial). Quartermast also found that the two biggest M&A transactions of the first half both involved private equity firms. The Summit Partners-backed influencer marketing platform Later acquired social commerce brand Mavely for $250 million, while PSG Equity paid $150 million for a majority stake in membership platform Uscreen.

The future: With those deals, venture capital titans are worming their way into the creator economy—and Quartermast expects the M&A binge to continue into the second half of the year, with international firms potentially joining in. International targets accounted for just 21% of M&A transactions in 2025 Q1 after reaching 40% a year prior, but Quartermast projects a reversal of that trend over the next six months.

WATCH THIS

YouTube is setting the record straight about its new update

The update: Remember that YouTube monetization update we mentioned earlier this month? If you missed the memo, the platform is basically ramping up enforcement of its monetization guidelines to crack down on AI sludge—meaning creators are required to publish “original” and “authentic” videos if they want to earn revenue from the YouTube Partner Program.

The clarification: That’s nothing new, but many creators have expressed concern and confusion over whether their reaction/commentary channels will be affected. Now, a video uploaded to the YouTube Insider channel is clearing things up. According to veteran creator Rene Ritchie, the platform’s “minor update” is targeted at “mass-produced or repetitive” content that viewers see as “spam”—and “that’s it.”

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Today's newsletter is from: Emily Burton, Drew Baldwin, Sam Gutelle, and Josh Cohen.