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TOGETHER WITH |
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It's Friday and Taco Bell's AI experiment is no más. According to exec Dane Mathews, the Mexican chain has fired its non-human drive-thru workers after realizing that "people really like messing with AI." |
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Today's News |
🎩 Kai Cenat recruits Michael B. Jordan 🔒 Collab safeguards creator content 💸 Bytedance ups its value to $330B 🎬 The Sidemen spotlight rising stars 😴 A "sleep stream" goes viral
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STREAMING BIG |
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Kai Cenat tapped Michael B. Jordan for his Mafiathon 3 trailer |
The big event: One of the biggest spectacles in streaming is returning for its third chapter. Kai Cenat has shared the trailer for Mafiathon 3, which will conclude a blockbuster Twitch subathon series that the creator has described as a "trilogy." |
Cenat's first Mafiathon took place in February 2023 and gave the 23-year-old Bronx native the Twitch record for the most active subscriptions at over 306,000 . Not to be outdone, Cenat went even bigger for Mafiathon 2, with Kim Kardashian's internet-breaking appearance in the event's trailer setting the tone for a spectacle that once again rewrote the Twitch record books with 727,694 subs. |
The mission: The guest star in the trailer for Mafiathon 3 is yet another entertainment industry giant: Sinners star Michael B. Jordan. As Jordan pointed out in that video, it's hard to imagine that Cenat's upcoming subathon could make an even bigger impact than the 30 day, 24/7 pace set by its predecessor. |
But Cenat has a clear goal in mind: "This time," he told Jordan, "we're going for one million subscribers. No one's ever done it." |
It would take a Herculean effort to reach that seven-digit Twitch subscriber goal, but if anyone can pull it off, it's Cenat. In addition to the success of the first and second Mafiathons, the streamer rolled up 27 million hours of watch time during the first "semester" of his Streamer University. |
Cenat alluded to the return of that event in the trailer for Mafiathon 3. In the meantime, the Twitch star's third subathon is set to begin on September 1 and will continue throughout the ninth month of the year. |
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🌟 SPONSORED 🌟 |
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Will you join the world's top creators at VidSummit 2025? |
As the creator economy grows and evolves, one thing remains the same: tickets to VidSummit sell out every year. |
Since 2014, the top 1% of creators and digital industry leaders have converged in Dallas to share the keys to their success in a rapidly evolving ecosystem. |
At VidSummit 2025, panels, workshops, and sessions will cover everything from exclusive audience-building strategies to the AI revolution in a space reserved entirely for industry pros. |
Because VidSummit 2025 is designed to elevate you and your career—not to facilitate fan meet-and-greets. |
Here's a sneak peek at this year's VidSummit agenda: |
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Check out the website for more details on speakers, expert programming, and more. Tickets are on sale now: |
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HEADLINES IN BRIEF 📰 |
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Digital content studio and video creator development company Collab is protecting creator content with CollabScan 2.0, a system designed to detect piracy "as soon as it happens." (Tubefilter - Partner Story)
Meta is reportedly testing a new feature that would allow Threads users to include long-form text in posts. (Engadget)
Internet forum 4chan has filed a lawsuit against Ofcom that accuses the U.K. regulator of impinging upon U.S. companies' rights to free speech. (Reuters)
Anthropic says its AI agent, Claude, was weaponized as part of an extortion scheme that attempted to extort victims at over 17 organizations. (Engadget)
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THE BIZ |
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TikTok's parent company just claimed a $330B valuation |
The valuation: ByteDance's latest stock buyback program provides rare insight into the Chinese corporation's financials. According to Reuters, the TikTok parent company is claiming a $330 billion valuation as it offers workers $200.41 per share. That massive valuation places ByteDance among the most lucrative tech companies in the world—which tracks given its reported first-quarter earnings of $43 billion. That number puts the TikTok parent just ahead of Meta, which raked in $42.3 billion of revenue over the same period. |
Of course, those earnings don't rule out the possibility that the value of ByteDance's empire is inflated. The company's critics, for instance, could point to multiple rounds of layoffs that have recently affected global TikTok Shop teams. But the details of the stock buyback program nevertheless suggest that ByteDance is still growing despite widespread regulatory hurdles. Compared to the figure attached to a buyback program that launched six months ago, ByteDance's stated valuation is now $15 billion higher. And revenue is up too, going from $43 billion in Q1 to about $48 billion in Q2. |
The context: Though Americans may associate ByteDance with TikTok's innovations in the social video industry, its 12-figure valuation and rising revenue are largely powered by ecommerce. Shopping on TikTok and its sister app Douyin—particularly in regions like Southeast Asia—helped ByteDance turn a $25 billion profit in 2023. A year later, ByteDance Co-Founder Zhang Yiming became (by some estimations) the richest billionaire in China. |
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EVENTS & HAPPENINGS |
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The Sidemen are giving rising UK stars their own shows |
The shows: The Sidemen are expanding their production horizons. For the very first time, YouTube's favorite seven-man supergroup will release shows that don't feature its own members (aka KSI, Miniminter, Zerkaa, TBJZL, Behzinga, Vikkstar123, and W2S). Instead, friends and fellow content creators will star in two new series on the Sidemen's Side+ streaming service. |
Viewers can pay £6.99/month to tune into Forfeit Footgolf (starring ArthurTV, Bach, Pieface, Weller, George, AB, and Chip) and Blind Dating, which stars Samham, Pieface, Marlon, Jakey, Chazza, and Heinz. |
The inspiration: Those shows were inspired by two pre-existing Sidemen success stories: Sidemen Sunday (a weekly long-form YouTube series featuring all seven Sidemen and some fan-favorite guest stars) and the group's reality competition Inside. |
The premiere episode of Inside—which followed 10 influencer contestants competing for a £1 million prize—racked up an impressive 14 million views on YouTube, and the Sidemen sold Season 2 to Netflix. That season went on to become the #3 most-watched production on Netflix globally, and while its ratings did drop off after that, Sidemen Entertainment Managing Director Victor Bengtsson told Deadline the Sidemen still felt like they'd "completely broken the mainstream." |
The goal: Going forward, Bengtsson says the Sidemen hope its latest slate of Side+ shows can "give creators a chance to meet other creators and see what happens when they come together in a new format—and as a unified group (a bit like the Sidemen setup)." |
"As it continues to develop," he adds, "it can hopefully become a place where any UK creator can come and potentially realize a video idea they had for a long time but didn't have the chance to make." |
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WATCH THIS |
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A "Bed Rot" contest is drawing millions of views |
The competition: Cozy Earth is spotlighting its products with a livestreamed "Bed Rot" campaign—and attracting millions of views in the process. The rules of the bedroom brand's contest are simple: competitors must stay in their respective beds for as long as possible, and the last person to rise and shine will walk away with a $25,000 prize. |
Cozy Earth is broadcasting that sleep stream action on TikTok, where some Bed Rot clips have already cleared 10 million views. Check out the start of the competition here to see what all the hype is about. |
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Today's newsletter is from: Emily Burton, Drew Baldwin, Sam Gutelle, and Josh Cohen. |
