TOGETHER WITH

It's Wednesday and Meta seems to be taking its cues from the 1800s. The good news: that passion for the past could deliver an Abraham Lincoln chatbot as early as next month.

GOING LIVE

YouTube is coming for TikTok with a series of shiny new Shorts features

YouTube Shorts is in for a major upgrade. Short-form creators can now leverage a video-dueting tool called Collabs and will and will soon be able to try a “mobile-first vertical live experience” that will bring more streaming content to Shorts (if the test feature is a success, presumably).

Those new features come at an opportune time for both YouTube and trend-conscious Shorts creators. Thanks to a recent spike in popularity, “NPC” streamers have made thousands of dollars per day by speaking rehearsed lines in exchange for viewer gifts—an added boon for the many creators who earn income by streaming vertically on platforms like TikTok and Instagram.

Collabs offers creators another way to harness revenue streams that have garnered success on other platforms. The new Shorts feature allows creators to put their recording next to a preexisting YouTube video or Short. Once published, the two selected videos appear side-by-side in a split-screen layout—a format that bears clear similarities to TikTok’s Stitches feature.

Collabs and vertical livestreaming tools are only the start of YouTube’s upcoming Shorts upgrades. According to the platform, creators can expect to see “new recomposition tools” that will simplify the process of transforming long-form uploads into Shorts “in the coming weeks.”

🔆 SPONSORED 🔆

Viral Nation Talent congratulates the talented creators nominated for the 13th annual Streamy Awards!

The nominations are in for the 2023 Streamy Awards! Congratulations to all nominees on a year of incredible content—including ​Viral Nation Talent​ stars Cale Brown, Connor Price, Drew Afualo, Kenz Lawren, Lucas Lopez, and Steven He.

• Cale Brown - Dance 🕺 
  Cale is a sports videographer, photographer, and editor who rose to virality for his epic dance moves.
  
  

• Connor Price - Short Form 🎤 
  Connor has a knack for going viral thanks to combining his innate skill in short form content with his passion for music.
  
  

• Drew Afualo - Breakout Creator 🎙️
  Drew is an AAPI women’s advocate, the host of the Spotify Exclusive podcast The Comment Section, and one of TIME’s Next Generation Leaders.
  
  

• Kenz Lawrén - Fashion & Style 👠 
  As a seasoned model, Kenz has years of experience navigating the fashion and entertainment worlds.
  
  

• Lucas Lopez - Comedy 😂 
  Lucas has amassed 3.2 million TikTok followers with quick-witted humor and Hispanic-focused parodies.
  
  

• Steven He - Scripted Series 🤖 
  Steven’s relatable sketches have earned him a massive YouTube fanbase and several lucrative projects, including his Streamys-nominated sci-fi comedy series, Ginormo!

Viral Nation Talent is ​proud to represent​ these 6 creators, along with 700+ influencers across a variety of verticals and platforms.

​Learn more about Viral Nation Talent →​

HEADLINES IN BRIEF 📰

• Thinking about dubbing your content? Toronto-based creator services company AIR Media-Tech spelled out the pros and cons in a recent sit-down with Tubefilter. (Tubefilter)
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• CAA has signed 26-year-old Roblox content creator KreekCraft for representation in all areas. (Tubefilter)
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• YouTube is reportedly testing out “AI auto-generated video summaries.” (TechCrunch)
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• Meta has announced its decision to block Canadian users from viewing news-related content on Instagram and Facebook. (Gizmodo)

DATA • GLOBAL TOP 50 📈

This pink-haired influencer is harnessing the omnipresent power of Barbie

Mayca Brasil is no stranger to internet fame. The pink-haired creator (whose real name is Mayca Delduque) claims more than 13 million followers on TikTok, where she consistently wows viewers with show-stopping song-and-dance routine. Her YouTube audience is nothing to sneeze at, either: at 3 million subscribers, Delduque is doing just fine on that platform, too.

Or, at least, she was doing just fine. Since the recent Barbie boom, ‘fine’ would be a massive understatement—because during the last full week of July, Delduque scored more than 440 million views in just seven days.

One of the main factors behind that skyrocketing success: the creator’s killer Barbie impression.

Delduque’s top Barbie-themed Short—which includes a Portuguese version of Aqua’s iconic Barbie Girl song—has collected more than 100 million views since July 19. Even when the creator’s videos don’t directly reference Barbie, it’s easy to see why the internet’s obsession with Barbenheimer has taken Delduque’s channel to the next level. The YouTuber’s pink aesthetic fits neatly within the current cultural zeitgest. When you combine that Barbie-esque rizz with her snazzy moves and on-trend song choice, Delduque’s sudden rise in viewership makes a lot of sense.

That stunning success was especially evident throughout the final week of July:

• Over the course of our last seven-day count, Delduque tripled her traffic week-over-week.

• That massive increase brought the creator’s lifetime view count to over 1.4 billion.

• The result: Delduque’s YouTube channel won a place at #9 in the Global Top 50.

REAP THE CREATOR REWARDS

AR artists can now earn $7,200 a pop when they create top-performing Snapchat filters

Augmented reality is a pretty big deal on Snapchat. In total, the app says its community has created over 3 million Lenses, which have been viewed more than 5 trillion times in all. Now, the app is making sure the 300,000 AR creators behind those filters don’t go uncompensated.

According to a recent company post, Snap’s Lens Creator Rewards will pay up to $7,200 for each “top-performing” AR effect on its platform. Those bonuses will be paid out each month to the creators whose Lenses drive the most traffic in the United States, India, and Mexico. (The rewards themselves are available to Snapchat users in 40 countries; eligible AR creators can apply for compensation through Snap’s Lens Studio.)

Lens Creator Rewards aren’t the only incentives pushing AR creators to reach for the stars. Snap’s most prolific Lens users also have a chance to gain support through the app’s AR Innovation Lab, Ghost—along with the financial cushion of five-to-six-figure grants. Those high-profile perks come at a time when Snap itself could benefit from a financial cushion. In the aftermath of a less-than-satisfactory Q2 earnings call, the company saw its stock price fall significantly—and based on Snap’s own projections, Q3 isn’t shaping up to be much of a party, either.

WATCH THIS 📺

Is this a rare bear or just some random person in a suit?

Visitors to Hangzhou Zoo aren’t so sure—and neither are the multitude of viewers who’ve watched this viral clip starring Angela the (alleged) sun bear. The video shows Angela parading around on her hind legs (a behavior that’s supposedly pretty normal for the species).

Despite that habitual two-footedness, the video’s popularity on Chinese social media eventually drove Hangzhou Zoo to respond on WeChat—from the perspective of the Malayan sun bear herself. The takeaway of that post: Angela is deeply hurt that anyone would compare her to a human.

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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.oing i