The Garden Harvest: 9/19/25
Your weekly digest on the intersection of the Creator Economy and Legacy Media.
Welcome back to the Garden Harvest.
Each week, we gather and curate the freshest insights from the worlds of Creators and Legacy Media, so you can stay rooted in what matters and spot new opportunities where others can’t.
Let’s get into it…
FRESH CLIPPINGS
Change is the new normal
Jen Topping’s latest piece is a sharp reminder that online change is never linear, never predictable, and never-ending. Platforms shift, audiences migrate, new tools emerge. For creators, that means adapt on the fly — constantly…
Today it’s YouTube’s live upgrades, tomorrow it’s Veo 3 flooding Shorts with AI-generated “slop.” Some of these shifts open doors, others close them, but all of them demand an agility that has become a core skill in today’s media landscape.
She breaks it down into three moving parts: the platforms, which never stop tweaking product in pursuit of growth; the audiences, who change behaviors unevenly and often in surprising ways (Facebook may be stale to some, but it’s still where millions gather for community groups); and the broader cultural trends, where forces like AI both expand creative potential and flood the market with low-trust content. Together, they make it clear there is no steady ground, it’s all in constant flux.
And that’s the real tension of the “DTC” era (quotes on purpose). Even if you’re building direct-to-consumer businesses, you’re still mediated by platforms whose priorities may shift overnight. For creators and for legacy players alike, the move isn’t to wait for stability, but to learn to thrive in an ecosystem where stability isn’t coming.
CoComelon’s strained relationship with YouTube
Case in point: Cocomelon can swing from 12 billion views one month to 9 billion the next, not because of audience demand but because of a tweak in YouTube’s algorithm.
It’s a stark reminder that even the most dominant brands aren’t in full control. Platforms hold the keys, and their shifts ripple instantly across billions of views. The reality is: we’re still operating in a platform-first world.
Content as a cost center, not a profit center
As creation costs collapse thanks to GenAI and every other tool in the stack, does the role of content itself shift? These are the questions Doug Shapiro is asking.
He argues that it’s less the final product and more the spark. Movies lead to merch. Music fills concert halls. Podcasts launch beverages. The real engines of profit are fandoms, communities, products, and live experiences.
This doesn’t have to be bleak, it’s just another playbook. The companies that thrive (both in the legacy and creator space) will: lean into proven complements like consumer goods, events, and cross-platform storytelling; experiment with new forms of scarcity, such as exclusive access or status; and bundle these elements in ways that deepen audience loyalty.
Disney has long treated content as the gateway to a wider franchise, but most media companies still see “ancillaries” as side business. The opportunity could be to flip that thinking. If content is the magnet, then the ecosystem around it is where the real economic growth lives.
GARDEN VIEW
A fun and informative CNBC interview where Colin & Samir talk about how they got into the creator economy, economics of YouTube, future of media, and more.
Always a pleasure to see these guys talk about this stuff.
HARVEST QUOTE
“Altogether, I think all of these new updates reaffirm YouTube as a creator-first platform.”
— Reed Duchscher, commenting on the new YouTube updates.
Ok, I felt bad thrashing YouTube earlier (pls don’t hate me?), so here’s some redemption.
Reed makes a point that the platform is committed to always putting creators first given all the changes they’re making to make their lives easier. And he’s not wrong. Read his full post here.
Have a great weekend…