TikTok "content clipper" gets roasted • Bard AI vs. YouTube creators • Short video RPM rates keep growing

Hi! Some personal news: first, I think I need a graphic designer for my covers.

Second, I've joined James Creech and his incredible team at Creator Economy Jobs to help talented professionals find their dream jobs in the creator economy🎉 So hit me up if you're a candidate or a hiring manager, and we'll find out how I can help!

Now, let's dive into some stuff that I've overheard recently 👀

→ "TikTok content clipper" gets roasted

A self-proclaimed TikTok clipper discovered by Georgia Branch (cofounder at We Create Popular) got kind of viral on TikTok and Twitter last week.

In a short video, he explains how he "generates over $10K" simply by creating tiktok clips (aka sludge content), which is basically an excerpt from someone else's YouTube video, and attached clip from a videogame at the bottom so as not to violate copyright.

Sludge content on TikTok is basically a repetition of an old trend that was popular a few years ago on YouTube, when users uploaded movies and cartoons, inserting excerpts of vlogs or random videos to avoid copyright strikes. The trend then came to TikTok, where it became a meme late last year.

Now, with the advent of the Creativity Program, young hustlers are exploiting the monetization system, generating a big cash with dozens of TikTok accounts.

I'm not sure how the process of copyright infringement complaint works on TikTok, but Georgia Branch reports that her company did manage to demonetize such profile after encountering a complete misunderstanding from a TikTok clipper.

There are differing opinions on how damaging such accounts are to the creators of original videos (same story with Youtubers and Twitch streamers who film reactions to other creators' content), but if you read the comments below his tweet, the conclusion is obvious — people hate it.

To be fair, a few commenters think it's a win-win situation, because the author of the original video gets "exposure". But... did the author ask for that exposure, lol?

→ Bard AI 🤝 YouTube creators

So, now you can chat with Google's Bard AI about any YouTube video. Nice. Just give it a link and ask it a question.

What effects will this feature have on creators? Well, it will depend on whether Google compromises between their interests, and the user experience.

Brendan Gahan made a good point about how some tasks will be simplified for those of us working on the brand or agency side: no more going through creators’ video libraries or using third-party tools. You just go to Bard and ask it to find if a YouTuber has said any nasty words or spoken badly about a potential advertiser.

Eric Wei (cofounder of Karat) suggests this is how YouTube can actually beat TikTok: "Even if TikTok wins in discovery - in long term knowledge creation, replayability, and the knowledge library that AI can reference - that's where YouTube can shine."

My take? I just want to know the answers!

1 - Will creators be compensated as users now don't have to watch the ads in videos that YouTube has been fighting so hard for lately against Adblock?

2 - What will happen to video metrics? Everyone knows that viewer retention and CTR are key to growing a video's organic reach. Will interacting with this video in a Bard AI chat have any effect on how the algorithms promote the video?

It seems like a compromise option would be to integrate Bard directly into YouTube, where the user would be able to chat with the YouTuber's AI avatar right below their video. Right now, such a feature is provided by third-party services, like the ones I talked about in the previous edition.

→ YouTube ❤️ relaunched channels

Matt Koval, YouTube Consultant who is also the 1st Creator Liaison at Youtube, shared an interesting case study where his client, creator Adam Taggart, moved from a 300K sub on corporate channel posting 5 videos/week (50K views each) to launching his own independent channel, Thoughtful Money. Using optimized titles and thumbnails, and letting the algorithm drive views, his new channel is now averaging ~48K views per video after 3 weeks (more details on Matt's post).

First off, it once again confirms the thesis that YouTube does not discriminate against new channels in any way, but rather helps them find viewers.

Secondly, and this is also super interesting: relaunching a channel from scratch may seem very stressful, but if you approach it strategically, launching silently at first to get unbiased algorithmic recommendations, it pays off in the first few weeks, which is incredible.

→ Collaborative Articles AI conspiracy

I came across a heated discussion regarding Linkedin's Collaborative Articles.

On the one hand this feature is a good way to show expertise to your network and also get the coveted Top Voice badge, which is rumored to increase your organic reach.

But many users see Collaborative Articles as nothing more than a way to train LinkedIn's AI with user-generated content, without any compensation other than the mentioned badge (which sounds pretty reasonable from a company standpoint, I guess).

One commenter even noticed that articles were being republished at regular intervals, with the generated articles seeming to incorporate responses posted by users in its previous version.

While the majority of users in the mentioned thread prefer to boycott this feature, one user suggested sabotaging the AI by publishing knowingly false information in these articles.

But who will win this fight?

→ Shorts RPM rates keep growing

Hank Green continues to share stats on earning from short videos.

Since the beginning of the year, his average RPM rates from TikTok, Shorts, and Reels have nearly equaled 7 to 10 cents. During this period, as you may recall, TikTok has revamped its creator fund, Instagram has too, and Youtube, which reportedly generates over 70 billion daily views, widely rumored to have recently given more advertisers access to Shorts ads.

Thanks for reading! ❤️

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-Konstantin