It’s Monday and after putting blue checkmarks up for sale, X is facing a parody problem. The platform’s solution: a new account designation that differentiates satirical accounts from real ones.

Today’s News

POWER VACUUM

As a TikTok ban looms, other platforms are rushing to court displaced creators

The successors: Unless the U.S. Supreme Court stages a last-minute intervention, a law forcing a divestiture or ban of TikTok will go into effect on January 19. If that happens, the app says it will cease U.S. operations altogether—and competing platforms are already scrambling to fill the resulting power vacuum.

Take Triller, for example. Fresh off its IPO, the headline-grabbing tech company has launched savemytiktoks.com, a proprietary tech-driven site that allows TikTok creators to save and seamlessly migrate their videos to Triller. Streaming services are jumping at the opportunity to snag some of TikTok’s viewership, too. The potential ramifications of a ban affected the discourse at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show, where NBCUniversal’s announcement of vertical video playlists on Peacock offered another alternative to the Bytedance-owned app.

And then, of course, there’s TikTok’s own parent company. In recent months, ByteDance has encouraged TikTok users to head over to its Instagram competitor, Lemon8. That campaign seems to be working. While interest in the app cooled off significantly after its first growth spurt in March 2023, Lemon8 has been gaining traction among U.S. users in the lead-up to the ban-or-divest law. The problem: the federal decree poised to exile TikTok also applies to any app with significant ties to a “foreign adversary”—meaning Lemon8 could face the same fate.

The ad dollars: Platforms like Triller, Peacock, and Lemon8 aren’t only looking to poach TikTok users; the app’s advertising partners are (potentially) up for grabs, too. According to eMarketer, approximately 50% of the marketing ad dollars currently spent on TikTok will likely go to YouTube, Instagram, or Facebook in the event of a ban. The research company’s projections also show that more than 30% of TikTok spend would end up on non-YouTube connected TV platforms or other channels outside the realm of social media.

HEADLINES IN BRIEF 📰

• Pinterest has revealed a list of the fashion and food trends that are due to dominate feeds in the coming months. At the top of the board: pickle margaritas and “rat cake.” (Tubefilter)
  
  

• Meta has reportedly sent out a company memo alerting employees that it plans to do away with its Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) team and programs. (Gizmodo) 
  
  

• Shark Tank host Kevin O’Leary—who hopes to buy TikTok alongside Project Liberty founder Frank McCourt—says he plans to make the app “inter-operative,” so “if you're posting on Truth Social or on X, click here to populate TikTok.” (Fox Business)
  
  

• As wildfires continue to wreak havoc in California, experts are raising concerns about the high volume of water used to power AIs like ChatGPT. (Fortune)

TWITCH TALK

Is Twitch viewership at its lowest point in four years?

The stats: What the heck happened on Twitch last month? According to Streams Charts, the platform may have accumulated just 1.58 billion hours of watch time over the course of December—apparently its lowest monthly total in over four years (since July 2020). And yet, during the same period, Twitch also appears to have seen an uptick in new streamers joining and an uptick in the average number of concurrent channels live at any one time.

(Note: We say this ‘may’ have happened because we can’t independently verify Twitch’s total watch time, and Streams Charts has previously reported watch time totals that were lower than estimates from other analytics companies like TwitchTracker and Rainmaker.gg.)

The factors: So, what (potentially) happened? While it’s normal for December to be a slow month due to the holidays, a year-over-year drop is out of the ordinary—and according to Streams Charts (which averaged Twitch’s watch time totals from December 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023), December 2024’s total is 11% lower than previous years.

There are a few possible contributors to that decline, including the rising market share of competitors like YouTube, Twitch’s tough financial situation, the unpopularity of its recent policy decisions (like using AI to make emotes), and the fact that one of its biggest streamers, Kai Cenat, didn’t stream as much as usual last month. But even combined, those factors don’t fully explain a year-over-year decline of this apparent magnitude—especially since more people joined Twitch and went live in December than in previous months.

In both October and November 2024, for instance, around 89,000 channels on average would be live on Twitch at any one time. During December, that figure pushed up to 92,392. Twitch also saw a bump in the overall number of active channels from 4,490,725 in November to 4,777,395 in December—a 6% increase.

In other words: until we have more evidence to support a clear rise or decline, this is one mystery we’ll be keeping a close eye on.

HAVE YOU HEARD?

Have you heard? MrBeast signed off on reaction content and Nelk gave vapes to villagers

The column: Each week, we handpick a selection of stories to give you a snapshot of trends, updates, business moves, and more from around the creator industry. This week, creators are popping up on flights, making acquisitions, and starting intercultural disputes.

In YouTube news: YouTube’s most-subscribed-to creator “wouldn’t mind” if you reposted his content. In response to a poll from fellow YouTuber Marques Brownlee, Jimmy Donaldson—aka MrBeast—gave fans permission to reupload and react to his videos. That might be the least controversial thing offered up by a top YouTuber this week. On the other end of the spectrum, Nelk started an international controversy by gifting vapes to members of a largely uncontacted community in remote Fiji.

Meanwhile, YouTube is granting permissions to another entity: Delta. The airline announced at CES that it will soup up its in-flight entertainment experience with help from YouTube’s vast video library and Premium offerings—and that’s only one of the new partnership on YouTube’s plate. As the platform hunts for live shopping dollars in Southeast Asia, it’s hoping that joining forces with Shopee will help it cut into TikTok’s dominant market share.

In TikTok news: Vexbolts lost a million subscribers and still came out a winner. A viral TikTok campaign called the "Vexbolts Mass Unfollowing" - intended to troll influencer Vexbolts for his "cringeworthy" trend-hopping and meme-chasing - saw millions follow him in December 2024 just to unfollow him on January 1. His follower count on TikTok skyrocketed from 1 million to over 5 million before the unfollowing commenced. But the stunt backfired as only about a million of the new subscribers ended up leaving Vexbolts at the start of 2025. He's now sitting happily at more than 5.1 million followers. 

Jason Derulo is having a moment on TikTok, too (albeit a less doubled-edged one). The pop star-turned-memelord will host the platform’s next global music event (aka Global Live Fest) when it comes to London later this month. Swedish singer-songwriter Zara Larsson has also been announced as the headliner.

LISTEN UP 🎙️

This week on the podcast…

The episode: New year, new headlines! Creator Upload host Joshua Cohen and longtime producer Adam Conner kicked off 2025 with big news, from Meta’s fact-checking switch-up to the Honey scam that (allegedly) targeted some of social media’s top stars. Also on the agenda: are ad networks coming for YouTube’s burgeoning TV empire?

Tune into the full episode on Spotify or Apple Podcasts to find out more.

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