2023 so far has been...
All about AI, new apps, and paid subscriptions
Nope, not a joke. Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter’s Elon Musk are sparring on social media about a potential cage match. Meanwhile, Meta continues to fight with Canada over Bill C-18 (the Online News Act), and recently announced it will block news for Canadian users of Facebook and Instagram now that the bill has received royal assent. Who has their money on Canada?
In today’s newsletter:
2023 Recap: Paid Subscriptions, New Apps, and AI Dominate the Social Media Landscape
Video: What’s Driving Video Culture in 2023, According to YouTube
Congrats 🎉: Time Magazine Says This Company is a Social Media Maven
*Note: I’ll be taking the Canada Day long weekend off. Watch for the next TSP to pop into your inbox on Monday, July 10th!
2023 so far has been…
A little bit crazy. While we are used to paying for social media with our personal information, 2023 marked a shift to actual payment in dollars, with a big push on paid subscriptions. Meanwhile, the chaos at Twitter under Elon Musk has resulted in a lot of competitor apps to watch for.
The biggest trends for the rest of 2023, though, will be the continued (meteoric) rise of artificial intelligence, and the battle over Search.
Here’s what you need to know…
It’s Getting More Expensive to Use Social Media
Earlier this year, Meta launched Meta Verified in the U.S. This paid subscription service includes a verification badge, and a lot of other helpful features, like access to an ACTUAL help desk. I’m waiting for this to arrive in Canada, and would happily pay for the help-desk feature alone.
Twitter, the OG social media subscription service, caused chaos earlier this year when it started to strip celebrities and other notable people of their free blue legacy checkmarks in a bid to make them pay for a subscription. And Twitter continues to put the squeeze on non-subscribers by offering more and more features to those who pay. Most recently, it announced that Twitter Blue subscribers now have the ability to create tweets of up to 25,000 characters.
New Apps on the Horizon
Meta is preparing to launch its Twitter competitor sometime this summer. According to The Verge, Meta has been recruiting celebrities like Oprah to be early adopters. It will reportedly use Instagram’s account system to generate a user’s information.
Despite multiple TikTok bans by countries and companies around the world, owner ByteDance launched its new Lemon8 app in the U.S. This app has been described by content creators “as if Instagram and Pinterest had a baby.” No word yet on when it’s coming to Canada.
And then there’s BlueSky, another Twitter competitor that is backed by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey. Mashable describes it as a basic microblogging site, where you get 300 characters per post (or, as users call them, “skeets”). You can’t DM anyone, upload a GIF or include video. There is currently a waitlist for this app.
AI and Search Will Dominate the Rest of 2023
The biggest trend impacting social media for the rest of this year — and likely into 2024 and beyond — is the use of AI in generating, editing, and managing content. We’ll also have to get super comfortable with chatbots, like Snapchat’s “My AI.”
But I think we’re currently at the stage where companies are trying to clarify HOW they use of AI. For example, Buffer recently posted on Instagram about how it does (and does not) use AI in the creative process. And The Globe and Mail sent an email to subscribers with its AI practices.
Meanwhile, Google is fighting to stay at the top of the search-engine food chain. However, in the May 15th TSP newsletter, you’ll see how its losing ground not only to AI-based tools like ChatGPT, but also to social media apps like TikTok and Instagram.
Hang on social media friends, it’s going to be a crazy rest of the year!
🍤 SOCIAL SNACK 🍤
What’s Driving Video Culture in 2023, According to YouTube
YouTube just released its Culture and Trends Report 2023, and there are some surprising — and not-so-surprising — results. After analyzing hundreds of videos and interviewing people in 14 different countries, here are a few of their findings:
New levels of fandoms have emerged, with casual, active and professional fans creating content in different ways (54% of those surveyed said they would prefer to watch a creator break down an event, rather than the event itself - such as the Oscars or Grammys).
While video used to be a single-content format, content creators are now taking advantage of multiple types of content, including long form, short form (Shorts), live broadcasts, and podcasts (87% of those surveyed say, across any streaming service, they watched at least four content formats YouTube offers over the past 12 months).
AI is expanding creativity. For example, the report cites one creator who is a real person, but has an AI-generated face (60% of those surveyed said they are open to watching content from creators who use AI to generate content).
ICYMI
Instagram will now allow (U.S.) users to download publicly posted Reels content [Social Media Today]
YouTube will launch thumbnail A/B split testing for creators [Mashable]
Meta introduces Voicebox: “The most versatile AI for speech generation” [Meta Blog]
Reddit users bombard site with John Oliver pictures in latest protest over new policy [CNN]
Pinterest announces Premiere Spotlight and Travel Catalogues [Pinterest Blog]
*Note: As of June 26th:
YouTube is sunsetting Stories
LinkedIn is removing Carousel posts, profile videos, and clickable links to images and videos in the app, according to Social Media Today
📱 SOCIAL MEDIA MAVEN
Congrats to Chipotle’s social media team! The company was just named a “Social Media Maven” by Time magazine in its list of 100 Most Influential Companies. The magazine cited Chipotle’s 2.2 million followers on TikTok, and a burrito giveaway on Twitter that led to its second-highest sales day ever as among the reasons it made the list. Also, let’s not forget how Chipotle leveraged “corn kid” for an ad that has garnered 60.5 million views on TikTok alone.
By the way, TikTok also made the list for “Commanding attention.” That it has, indeed.
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