YouTube recently announced two new features. "Veo" will allow users to create AI-generated clips and backgrounds for Shorts. And "Hype" is a new way for fans to support small and medium-sized channels. The former seems like a bad but inevitable feature that will flood YouTube with synthetic, low-effort content. But the latter could be a major leap forward in audience-first content discovery. Hype gives all users 3 votes every week. When cast for small creators, they earn points (and potentially revenue) that puts them in a global leaderboard. It's a non-algorithmic, human-powered way to surface the platform's best content, and divert some of the attention economy away from YouTube's 1% of large creators who dominate the home page and suggested videos. Plus: The FTC notices that social media business models are horrible, and the MrBeast lawsuits have begun. Links referenced in this episode: https://www.theverge.com/2024/9/19/24249073/ftc-data-retention-privacy-report-facebook-meta-youtube-reddit https://techcrunch.com/2024/09/18/youtube-shorts-to-integrate-veo-google-ai-video-model/ https://www.theverge.com/2024/9/18/24247995/youtube-hype-creators https://variety.com/2024/digital/news/mrbeast-amazon-sued-beast-games-contestants-class-action-1236148181/ https://newsletter.tubefilter.com/p/roblox-youtube-add-yours-shopify This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod Listen & subscribe wherever you get podcasts: 🍎 https://apple.co/44FeACS 🟢 https://spoti.fi/3UGQjrN ⏯ https://amzn.to/3wCdueF Join our Discord community! https://discord.gg/influencepod Call the show and leave a message: (347)-871-6548 Email me with guest & trivia suggestions! [email protected] (NOICE) Follow me: 🐤https://twitter.com/Matt_Silverman 📸 https://www.instagram.com/matt_silverman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices