Creator Generation

Phoebe Lee has been travelling full time for four years and doesn’t live anywhere. She was Little Grey Box when she last sat down with us, a name she picked off the floor of a London flat and could never explain to anyone. She’s now Travel for Phoebe, she’s past 460,000 subscribers, and she’s back to talk about what the last stretch has actually involved. In this episode, Phoebe is open about the...

Derek Muller has an engineering degree, a physics PhD and a job he enjoyed at a tutoring company. In 2010 he quit most of it and started Veritasium, which went on to become one of the channels that helped define what YouTube could be. For our 150th episode, he walks through the whole thing. Derek is unusually candid about the parts creators don’t talk about. The first year of sub-1,000 views and t...

Haley Janicek has spent close to a decade at Kit, where she leads creator community. Her first job there was sales. Her argument on email hasn’t changed in all that time: it was never the sexy channel, it has simply always converted better than anything else. In this episode, Haley is specific about where creators go wrong. The big one is treating the newsletter as the whole plan when it’s really...

Ronald Pruett has spent decades in direct response TV, home shopping and direct to consumer, and now sits on the business side of Gemma Stafford's Bigger Bolder Baking, the YouTube channel that has become the number one baking podcast in the US, and most recently a run on QVC. He calls himself the suit. His argument is that what we call the creator economy isn't one yet, because the participants c...

Andrea Casanova was born in Venezuela, left after her brother was kidnapped, and moved through the Dominican Republic, Panama and Brazil before landing in the US for college. On a student visa she was legally capped at $150 a month, so she hustled: growing League of Legends accounts, walking dogs, shooting photos for bars. She now runs an agency, speaks on creator economy tech, and is building Gin...

@Jazza started as a kid making Flash animations, moved to YouTube in 2012 because he could see a gap where the art tutorials were terrible, and has been there ever since. He's built one of the biggest art channels in the world and, by his own account, has never truly gone viral. The channel grew on being steadily, consistently himself. In this episode, Jazza is thoughtful about what fourteen years...

Miles Sellyn is VP of Partnerships at Rare Days, a company that builds software with creators including Colin and Samir, Cody Sanchez, and Rhett and Link. His argument is simple: 95% of creator businesses are advertising companies, selling other people's products with no long term upside, when the same audience and the same distribution could be pointed at something they actually own. In this epis...

Zoe Soon moved from Sydney to New York on the back of a thirty minute coffee she flew twenty one hours for. When we recorded with her, Zoe led Creator and Gaming at the IAB, the body that standardised digital advertising back when the industry needed agreed ad sizes so brands could buy across the web without rebuilding every unit. She's doing the same job again, this time for creator brand deals....

Robert Kaliati has known Caleb Hammer since middle school. They played music together, ended up doing sales at the same company in Austin, and when Caleb left to start a YouTube channel, Robert eventually joined to run the business side. He is now President and COO of Hammer Media, which means he is the one thinking about what happens to 35 staff and 20 contractors if the guy whose name is on the...

Allison Yazdian started in real estate, where she noticed the best agents were never the ones with the best listings. They were the ones who owned the direct relationship with their customers, so it didn't matter which brokerage they sat at. She went on to LTK and now runs Uscreen as CEO, building the infrastructure that lets creators sell to their audience without a platform standing in the middl...

Devin McGovern spent over a decade producing reality TV, wrapped a show in October 2024, and never got another call. Hundreds of job applications later, not one interview. In his mid forties with two kids, the creator economy wasn't a bold pivot so much as the only place money was moving. In this episode, Devin is candid about the content that flopped first, the disastrous family dinner that led t...

Uptin spent years as a CNBC producer, where he launched the network's international YouTube channel in 2016 and quietly noticed something awkward: the videos he shot on his own iPhone in selfie mode outperformed the ones made with a professional crew. Then the pandemic hit, he was laid off, and he had to decide whether a million-view brand name meant anything without the brand. In this episode, Up...

Rebecca Rechtszaid is a Harvard Law grad and former lead counsel for partnerships at Meta who now represents creators through her own firm. Her core message: if you're a creator, you're running an IP business whether you realise it or not, and most people only figure that out at the worst possible moment. In this episode, Rebecca breaks down the mistakes she sees over and over, from creators treat...

Justin Brown runs Primal Video, a channel with nearly two million subscribers that teaches creators how to actually make videos. But as Justin explains, he never set out to be a YouTuber. He walked away from a profitable production company, clients and retainers, to gamble on a channel he treats less like a creative outlet and more like a business tool. In this episode, Justin is refreshingly cand...

Georgia Mappin is the Managing Director of Haven't You Done Well Productions, the company behind Auntie Donna. But as Georgia explains, what looks like three guys mucking around with a camera has always been a far more deliberate operation. In this episode, Georgia is remarkably open about how it all works. We cover the philosophy of platform agnosticism, and why her business treats every revenue...

Mario Joos has been inside some of the biggest creator operations in the world - including two and a half years with the MrBeast team and a stint as fractional CEO of the Stokes Twins - and what he found working with some of these big teams may surprise you. In part 2 of our interview we get into the real revenue picture for creators - what the revenue mix looks like, why AdSense-plus-sponsorships...

Mario Joos has been inside some of the biggest creator operations in the world - including two and a half years with the MrBeast team and a stint as fractional CEO of the Stokes Twins - and what he found working with some of these big teams may surprise you. In this episode, Mario breaks down the uncomfortable truth about large creator businesses that behind the polished content and massive subscr...

Australia is about to become the first country in the world to introduce a minimum age of 16 for major social media platforms - including Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, reddit and also platforms like YouTube, and its being referred to as the Social Media Ban. Supporters call it a necessary step to protect young people. Critics say it’s unrealistic, hard to enforce, and will have problematic conseque...

Blogger turned tech columnist for the Washington Post Taylor Lorenz discusses the importance of balanced journalism, while wrapping in some of the biggest news items of 2022; including Twitter, the Depp/Heard trial, and NFTs. Episode Chapters: 0:00 Intro 7:42 Becoming the enemy of Right Wing media 14:14 NFTs 20:10 The pros and cons of Mr Beast 27.40 Depp vs Heard 32:05 Twitter 40:17 Future predict...

This week world class talent manager Reuven Ashtar shares with us what makes a good talent manager, why you might need one, how much they should cost you, and a whole lot more! Episode Chapters: 0:00 Intro 6:40 What should a manager do for creators? 18:09 What should creators look for in a manager? 30:50 When is the right time to get representation? 43:00 Is the online space starting to mirror tra...

Michael's company, CreatorDAO, has entered the investment space like few others. Navigating W3, Crypto and Blockchain are some of the things we chat with him about. Plus, we discuss what creators can do to maximise their presence in this misunderstood space, in order to boost their opportunities and make money. Episode Chapters: 0:00 Intro 6:15 What is a DAO? 10:15 The myth about W3 16:05 What are...

In this special episode, we focus on the YouTube Algorithms, breaking down some common misconceptions and answering the most important questions: how do they work and what can you do about it? Episode Chapters: 1:25 What are the YouTube algorithms? 4:27 Do the algorithms hate you? 7:24 How do the algorithms make recommendations? 15:30 Can a bad video tank your channel? 21:32 What is the best thing...

Every month, we spin the wheel and answer your biggest Creator and video platform questions. It's not just random, it's Q&A Roulette! Episode Chapters: 0:54 Are tags important? 4:07 How do you deal with dislikes? 8:46 The difference between YouTube membership and Patreon 16:30 How many social media platforms are too many? Creator Generation features top YouTube creators and video experts shari...

We love when a creator is able to turn their passion into a successful YouTube business. This week, we talk with Dre Glory Allan about his passion for fashion, and how he was able to create a popular label out of what began as sewing tutorials. Episode Chapters: 0:00 Intro 6:05 From a sewing channel to a fashion brand 19:24 Expanding from a 'utility channel' 24:24 How does the business work? 35:45...

If you can profitably leverage your channel into your own business, you're ahead of the game. Sarah is here to tell us how she's been able to win this game, and what you can do to succeed, too! Episode Chapters: 0:00 Intro 15:01 Starting the business 22:01 Picking the right product for your audience 33:35 Testing with your audience 49:55 Best advice to achieve your product goals If you'd like to j...