The Garden Harvest: platform loyalty fractures, and is digital-first no longer optional?
Your weekly digest on the intersection of the Creator Economy and Legacy Media.
FRESH CLIPPINGS
The era of digital first
We’re only a few weeks into the year and it’s already shaping up to be a year of major convergence.
As was just announced, former Paramount Co-CEO Brian Robbins raised $100 million to launch a new production company. But it won’t be set up as you’d expect (although, maybe now we must expect this?)
Instead of going straight to streaming or theatrical, Brian will develop IP via short-form platforms such as YouTube and TikTok, and keep an eye on which ones work to then bring them to theatrical and beyond.
I love this quote from Deadline, which is what we’ve been talking about for a while now: “The idea is that proper streaming analytics will be a better indicator, and incubator, for big-screen potential product.”
BUT…
It’s not that simple. Posting on short form and waiting to see what hits is not enough. Building and catering to a strong online fandom isn’t a walk in the park. However, these are smart people, and at least for me, I’m excited to see this play out.
At the very least, it’s a step in the right direction. Launching new IP theatrically is getting harder and harder.
See also: Fox launches its Creator Studios division, a similar “digital first push” we’re tracking.
Ok, so for legacy media this is great, right? But what about for creators?
Fox thinks that “they will be able to diversify their revenue streams, reduce their dependency on tech algorithms and unlock new business opportunities.”
Before, this might have been a weaker argument, but now…
… Are platforms losing the loyalty of creators?
It’s a question that more people are asking as of late. Because how can you maintain a good relationship with your human creators while aggressively promoting (or not fighting enough against) AI-generated slop that most people don’t like?
See: Adam Mosseri’s views on AI, where he effectively urges creators to lean into authenticity because it’s becoming scarce. That sounds right in theory, but if the platform continues to reward AI slop over original work, what’s the actual incentive to be authentic?
I digress.
Oliver Gelpin, CEO of Telos Media, lays it out in his post, and it’s actually pretty simple.
AI channels can publish 10–15 videos a month (if not more). Premium creators and digital studios might publish… less. The result: algorithmic promotion of quantity over quality, with AI-generated documentaries and history videos pulling millions of views away from digital studios like his.
The result? When quality isn’t proportionally rewarded, studios have less revenue to reinvest, leaving many YouTube-first creators reconsidering their platform strategy.
Enter Netflix and and Amazon Prime Video and the rest of the streamers / FAST channels. Their ad tiers offer brands adjacency to trusted, “authentic” content. Not AI sludge.
We’re already seeing early creator licensing plays, and if YouTube doesn’t course-correct, streamers might start to aggressively pull creators, and this time… succeed.
Branded entertainment = entertainment
Branded entertainment has existed for a while, but the creator economy has fundamentally changed the equation. As paid media becomes less effective, brands are shifting toward content and experiences that attract and engage audiences, i.e. the holy grail of community.
This Fast Company piece captures the shift well. You can see it everywhere now: brands launching internal studios, hiring “entertainment officers,” and striking deals that look far less like sponsorships and far more like IP partnerships. The old lines between “brand,” “creator,” and “studio” are dissolving.
As Elizabeth Paul, chief brand officer at the Martin Agency, puts it: “For those who truly believe in the space, brand entertainment will stop being treated as a campaign format and start being managed as a portfolio.” In other words, the smartest brands are beginning to think like studios, not marketing departments.
That shift creates a meaningful opportunity for creators and producers. Brands increasingly need storytellers who can build worlds, audiences, and continuity over time, and what was once dismissed as the commercial is now becoming the entertainment itself.
GARDEN VIEW
Doug Shapiro recently shared this video, raising a very interesting point.
When Disney and OpenAI announced their licensing deal, much of the reaction assumed the same outcome: fan-made AI content would mostly be low-effort noise, people messing around, flooding feeds with more slop. That assumption isn’t wrong in many cases, and the legal and ethical questions are still very real.
But that isn’t the point Doug was getting at. What the video actually highlights is the upside case: what happens when powerful tools land in the hands of talented fans who genuinely understand and respect the underlying IP.
If we default to assuming everything produced this way will be disposable, we may be underestimating its ability to generate real attention, engagement, and cultural momentum.
HARVEST QUOTE
“2025 was the year the star system got pants’d in public.”
— Film/TV Producer and Substacker Alex Lemay
This, and a lot of other great quotes in his end of year post. Worth reading the whole thing for a brutally honest account of legacy media’s recent fumbles, as well as advice for filmmakers on how to move forward in this environment.
Have a great weekend…