It's Thursday and the White House isn’t happy about a tool that topped the App Store charts earlier this week: ICEBlock.

Today’s News

SURVEY SAYS

U.K. YouTubers want more training and recognition

The survey: Last year, YouTube teamed up with independent consultancy Public First to conduct the Creator Consultation: a survey that solicited opinions from nearly 10,000 U.K.-based creators to determine what type of institutional support they need to grow.

The effort initially rolled out at the annual gathering known as the YouTube Festival, where the platform began collecting opinions from its U.K. community. Eight months later, the results are in:

• According to the report, 56% of creators feel they’re not able to influence government decisions that affect their work.
  
  

• 43% of respondents expressed a lack of recognition within the broader creative industry.
  
  

• Just 17% of respondents said they feel adequately supported when it comes to skills and training.
  
  

• And only 7% of respondents claimed to receive adequate support in their efforts to seek capital and business loans.

The context: In the U.S. there are several firms committed to filling the kind of governmental, financial, and training gaps cited in the Creator Consultation. But those services don’t seem to be as plentiful in the U.K., where major creators like the Sidemen have started handling areas like investing on their own.

While some of the issues identified in YouTube’s report are tough to address without government recognition (such as inadequate access to filming permits), the platform itself aims to help creators in areas like professional training. Its partnership with the National Film & TV School, for instance, will result in a Creator Incubator designed to impart vital skills to the next generation of U.K. YouTubers. A blog post describes the program as the “first course of its kind” in the British Isles.

HEADLINES IN BRIEF 📰

• 25 of the top 100 hubs in June’s monthly ranking of most-viewed U.S. YouTube channels added at least one million new subscribers across the same 30-day period. (Tubefilter)
  
  

• Substack is launching a slate of new “scheduling, clipping, and sharing” tools designed to make livestreaming more intuitive. (Substack)
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• X has announced that it will open its Community Notes moderation system to AI fact-checkers. (Community Notes via X)
  
  

• TikTok’s U.S. Shop team has once again been hit with layoffs—the third round since April. (TechCrunch)

20 YEARS OF YOUTUBE

In 2014, a faceless Brazilian toy enthusiast conquered YouTube

In February 2025, YouTube turned 20. The platform has gone through a lot over the past two decades, including an acquisition, an earnings glow-up, and multiple generations of star creators. In our 20 Years of YouTube series, we’ll examine the milestones that have defined the world’s favorite video site—one year at a time. Click here for a full archive of the series.

The channel: In 2014, a faceless toy enthusiast known as DisneyCollectorBR became the biggest creator YouTube had ever seen up to that point. According to a Yahoo News report, the collector’s real name is Vera Credidio—but beyond that and her general locale, nothing else is known about one of the top YouTubers of the 2010s.

Credidio’s rise to fame is less of a mystery. At the end of 2014, VentureBeat identified DisneyCollectorBR as YouTube’s most lucrative channel, with estimated earnings close to $5 million. While other popular kid-friendly channels of that era were affiliated with trusted sources like Sesame Street, no one knew why an adult was roleplaying with children’s figurines on the DisneyCollectorBR channel or what sort of education value the content offered.

The projection principle: But while kids’ obsession with the hub initially puzzled parents and outlets, it soon became clear that the rising trend of unboxing videos spoke to a universally joyous experience for children: that Christmas morning adrenaline rush. And because DisneyCollectorBR was a faceless operation, viewers could easily insert themselves in the role of the unboxer.

More than a decade later, that “projection principle” is proving to be even more powerful in the era of Shorts. AffiliateNetwork.com, a network for faceless creators, recently reported that its ranks grew from 5,000 to 21,000 over a three-month span.

DisneyCollectorBR was one of the earliest success stories in that category, but its focus on Disney products proved to be its downfall. The rise of problematic videos aimed at children in the late ‘10s convinced YouTube to purge billions of kids’ videos, and Disney started restricting the use of its IP on unboxing and roleplaying channels. These days, all of the videos from DisneyCollectorBR’s heyday have been taken down or made private.

AND THE AWARD GOES TO…

LA’s largest free clinic is hosting a gala to honor creator industry pros

The fundraiser: For the third year running, the largest provider of free and reduced-cost healthcare in Los Angeles is hosting its Creators in Action cocktail gala. Proceeds from that event—which brings together creators and industry execs from LA’s digital media industry—will help Saban Community Clinic continue serving low-income and uninsured patients. It currently handles over 150,000 appointments each year, and 83% of its patients live below the federal poverty line.

This year’s Creators in Action will be held on September 8 at the Santa Monica offices of Range Media Partners and is co-chaired by CAA senior leader Brent Weinstein and Mythical Entertainment President Brian Flanagan. Its host committee includes creator industry members like Ali Berman (Partner/co-head of UTA Creators at United Talent Agency), Ben Davis (Partner/co-head of WME Digital), and Lauren Schwartz (attorney at Hansen, Jacobson, et al.).

The honorees: Each Creators in Action event honors select creators and execs. For the inaugural 2023 gala, it gave nods to Rhett & Link and creator attorney Adam Kaller. In 2024, it recognized Jay Shetty and Pinterest Chief Content Officer Malik Ducard. This year, Valkyrae and pocket.watch founder/CEO Chris M. Williams are in the spotlight.

As one of the world’s top female streamers, Valkyrae has over 13 million followers, co-owns esports org 100 Thieves, was named “Gaming Creator of the Year” by Adweek, and has been honored at multiple awards shows. She also recently launched her own animation company, Hihi Studios.

Williams, meanwhile, was Chief Audience Officer at Maker Studios. When that company was acquired by Disney in 2014, he joined the Mouse House to help it launch online originals. In 2017, Williams founded pocket.watch, the kids/family content IP developer and distributor that would go on to pick up deals with Ryan’s World, Toys and Colors, Love Diana, and more.

CREATOR COMMOTION

What is the $40.8M Creators HQ doing for creators in Dubai?

The initiative: Nearly six months ago, Creators HQ opened a digital industry makerspace in the Emirates Towers. Announced at the third annual 1 Billion Followers Summit, the initiative—which emerged out of Dubai’s $40.8 million effort to get 10,000 more content creators living and working in the city—promised creator members a range of perks, including over 300 creative and biz dev workshops each year.

Among Creators HQ’s first 100 members were Dhar Mann (25M YouTube subscribers), Yes Theory (9.5M), The Anazala Family (10M), Supercar Blondie (21.5M), Germán Garmendia (1.7M), and Surthany Hejeij (14M Instagram followers).

The programming: Creators HQ has already made a mark on the digital industry, including through its sizable presence at the most recent World Governments Summit, where it brought experts like Nicola Mendelsohn (Meta’s Head of Global Business Group) and Yes Theory co-founder Ammar Kandil to speak to world leaders and Fortune 500 executives.

The makerspace has forged similar connections between execs, platforms, and its own creator members in recent months. In addition to onboarding sessions like an open house, Creators HQ programming has included expert-led workshops like “12 Months in 3 Hours: Map Out the Road to a Successful YouTube Channel” with Moktar Larbi (who helped develop The Anazala Family into a well-known family channel) and “Mastering Edits—Meta’s New Video Editing App” with Meta Partner Solutions Manager Bahjat Hindy and Meta Strategic Partner Manager Samer Jamal.

Last month, Creators HQ partnered with TikTok to host the platform’s first creator bootcamp in the Middle East. That five-day crash course covered topics like:

• Cameras, lighting, and angles

• Editing, coloring, effects, and CapCut

• Storytelling and content planning

• Monetization and brand collaborations

Creators HQ has more programming planned for the coming months, and is already preparing the fourth annual 1 Billion Followers Summit. Find out more on the website.

FYI: Creators HQ is a Tubefilter partner.

WATCH THIS

Rick Beato is settling the AI, Velvet Sundown debate

The Spotify band: Earlier this week, dozens of outlets began contemplating the same question: are over 750,000 Spotify users grooving to an AI band?

The Velvet Sundown is undeniably having a moment on Spotify. The psychedelic rock-inspired band has drawn in more than half a million listeners on the platform with songs like “Dust on the wind” and “Drift Beyond the Flame.” But were those tracks actually dreamed up by four grungy bandmates—or were they generated by AI?

The investigation: Rick Beato confronted that question in a recent video. The music producer/longtime YouTuber took a deep dive into The Velvet Sundown’s social media presence and “odd, unspecific” Spotify bio before isolating the vocals and instrumentals of different tracks to see if they held up on their own.

Check out the full video to hear Beato’s final verdict (or, if you’re short on time, you can always just read this Rolling Stone interview with a Velvet Sundown spokesperson).

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