Bickering Beekeepers, Marky Mark Trail and A Positive Poparazzi POV

The Bull Case for Poparazzi: Last week I slammed buzzy one-trick photo startup Poparazzi by linking to a takedown post from Ed Zitron. This week Rex Woodbury (who seemingly didn’t convince his VC fund to invest) takes the other side. I agree with many of his points – including how apps for Gen Z differ from those for millennials. But I’m still not sure Poparazzi is *that* app that breaks through long term. What do you think? Pop your thoughts in the comments.

Life Imitates Art Imitating Life: A few months ago, I pointed you to the wholesome TikTok beekeeper @TexasBeeWorks. But she’s now embroiled in a beekeeper battle with @lahoneybeerescue who calls her Texas nemesis foul, fake and dangerous. This would be just another creator vs. creator smackdown, except the whole thing was foreshadowed by 60-year old comic strip “Mark Trail”. Since March a “Bikbok” battle between Mark and viral video influencers Professor Bee Sharp, Killer Bee, Cricket Bro and eco-rapper Reptiliannaire has been playing out in newspapers everywhere. OK, maybe this is a coincidence. Or maybe there’s a sinister plot going on. I’m not sure – but it’s just too weird to ignore.

How YouTube Scaled: If you worked with YouTube from 2008 to 2014 – or you are interested in history – you should read Shishir Mehrota’s “Inside Look at How YouTube Scaled”.  Shishir ran product, engineering and UX during that time - and lays out the cadence, rituals and meeting philosophy that led to the company’s hyper-growth. It’s a great template for startup leaders today, but also a fascinating insight into the history of big Red.

Amazon’s Outrageous Media Dreams: What’s Amazon thinking? First Twitch and now MGM. Dreams of media mogulity or simply stoking the Prime pipeline? This Tuesday I sit down with Brad Stone – the world’s biggest expert on Amazon (he literally wrote the book, TWICE!) to find out. Brad also runs global tech coverage for Bloomberg so you’ll find his perspective both fair AND balanced. Join us at VidCon Now this Tuesday at noon Pacific – and check out Brad’s latest best-seller “Amazon Unbound”. Fun fact in the book – he actually tracked down the real Alexa!

This Week at VidCon Now:

• TUESDAY: Me and Brad. See above.
• THURSDAY: Join our QA session with LianeV here at 3p PT.
• FRIDAY: OkayKaren1 stops by our Discord server to answer all your questions at noon pacific

Tip of The Week: This is from my old co-worker and pal Greg Jarboe, about how to figure out how Shorts – and other social videos – really work.

“Who,” “What,” “Why,” “Where,” “When,” and “How” are still considered by journalists to be the right ones to ask when gathering information for a news story. And marketers can use them, too, to put together an early examination of some of the short catchy videos created with YouTube Shorts.

QUIBIS: 

• Does anyone really win those darn Instagram giveaways?
• How hashtags went from cringey to cool.
• News and Announcements from Facebook’s F8 Developer Conference
• YouTuber CJ So Cool auctions off a third of his future earnings.
• Etsy scoops up social commerce company Depop
• What happens if social networks start charging?  
• Koji, Linktree and Spring up the “link in bio” game.
• New research from Mike Vorhaus shows how huge the creator economy really is.
• Shameless plug: Leaders of CES, Natural Products Expo and VidCon talk about the future of live events

What We’re Watching:. Airrack attempts to take over Mr. Beast Burger. In case you missed it – here’s the “Bear Push”. Lots to wade through, but an interesting retrospective on the greatest and dumbest internet videos.

See you around the internet, and feel free to share this with anyone you think might be interested, and if someone forwarded this to you, you can sign up on our website at VidCon.com – scroll down and select “VidCon Weekly Industry Highlights”.