This Week: I’m spending most of the week walking down forgotten paths in Norway with a band of merry pranksters. So yeah, I’ve prepared this in advance, but just got WiFi after two days so I can send it to you!. See you next week with our more, well, “normal”, fare.
Welcome to our 38,000+ readers! I’m Jim Louderback and this is my weekly creator economy newsletter. If you’ve received it, then you are either subscribed or someone forwarded it to you.
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💡💡TOP STORIES
FUTURE OF CREATOR EVENTS
As most of you know, I spent nearly 9 years helping to build VidCon, starting with the industry track in 2014, and then as CEO/GM in 2017. And now that I’ve been building the industry Summit at Open Sauce over the last three years, along with building creator programs with global events including VivaTech, 1 Billion Followers Summit, IFA, Creator Week, NAB and more, my thoughts on creator events in 2026 have evolved.
12 years ago, creator / fan events stood alone. A roomful of youtubers was enough to entice people to attend. Lots of people. But today that’s different. The most successful events seem to be “Creators Plus” or “Plus Creators”
A few weeks ago I explored this with Night President @Ezra Cooperstein. We’re both creator economy OGs with a long event history. I told him why I loved Open Sauce and he updated me on Dream, held the week before in Houston. @Rene Ritchie and @Kim Larson from YouTube also told me how fun and dynamic Dream was. “Like the early days of VidCon” was how I’d heard both events described.
It would be easy to characterize Open Sauce as just a STEAM-focused slice of VidCon and Dream more of a gaming/anime variant. But these aren’t just niche VidCon spinoffs. They were something new… Creators Plus “X”. Open Sauce, founded by William Osman and other top YouTubers, is an 800-exhibitor-strong Maker/Science Faire that also welcomes 125 top STEAM creators. Dream, founded by YouTube collective RD World, takes the modern-day Comicon/Animecon, and layers in creators… including this year Issa Rae, Berleezy and Duke Dennis.
Paradoxically, just as creators have arrived everywhere, they have become less of a singular draw. Instead, every creator event needs to weave in a “Plus” element that extends beyond parasocial bonds.
But the inverse is also true. Almost every traditional event needs a creator “PLUS” strategy. Just this year I’ve helped VivaTech, IFA and NAB weave creators into their conventions. But you can’t just stick a bunch of creators into the corner and treat them like zoo-animals on display. Instead, you need to infuse creators throughout your event: speaking on stage, amplifying the exhibits, promoting the other sessions and building awareness and excitement with attendees. Hint-hint… creators will sell tickets too.
Look at Cannes Lions, for example. Originally conceived as a festival of creativity, and a boozy break for schmoozy ad execs, they recently added creators into the mix. Last June 250+ Featured Creators showed up, along with more than 1,000 creator attendees. They voraciously mingled with the crème-de-la-crème of the marketing and advertising world to what seemed like tremendous success.
Two other big conventions also exemplify the Event “PLUS” strategy. B&H’s annual Bild show brings the gear AND the creators, elevating it beyond just a gear-fest. And Fanatics Fest takes it to the max, with creators, athletes, teams and interactive experiences. It’s become far more than just a celebration of sporting fandom.
Done right, the “PLUS” can also be geographical. 1 Billion Followers Summit (where I’m building the “economy” track again) combines a global point of view with 250 of the world’s top creators and a unique insight into the fascinating MENA creator market. Smaller summit slices in the creator economy still work, with Orca, Scalable and Press Publish building unique LA events.
If you run a big event, whether B2B or fan, you need a creator strategy. They need to infuse all aspects of your event. And if you’re building a creator event, you need to figure out your “PLUS” strategy. Creators alone are not enough. Thanks to @Colin Hickey and @Lisa Milgram for vetting this with me.
RELATED: Music event NAMM just quantified creators, saying that creator-generated content reached 70 million social views in 2026, with 2.1M likes and 50,000 comments. With creator lounges, studios and influencer programming, NAMM seems to have built the infrastructure to land firmly in the “PLUS” category (PR Newswire)
🩳🩳 QUIBIS
PLATFORMS
Algorithms Optional: Australia proposes legislation to let users opt out of algorithms. The beginning of a trend? (NPR)
OTHER CREATOR ECONOMY
AI May Kill the Influencer Manager First: Fluencify raises $4.3M to accelerate its AI creator discovery, matching, outreach, replies, briefing, content checking, scheduling, boosting and payment service. Brands end up with guaranteed CPMs and can focus on finding the best brand ambassadors, rather than one-off campaigns (ByFounders)
Brands Are Asking Creators to Break the Law: A new study found that 18% of creators have been asked by brands to hide their sponsorship. That’s not just shady, it’s against the law. Don’t lose your audience’s trust… just say no. NOTE: This study only talked to 365 creators (one for each day of the year?) so it’s hardly predictive. (BI $)
TBPNvy: Big Purple just announced a daily 1 hour live streamed show about AI, featuring former CNBC anchor Deirdre Bosa. More like this on the way. But will they embrace TBPN’s true genius moves, including rapid clipping and cozying up to interviewees. (Yahoo)
CREATOR TECH – AI, AR, VR, MORE
The Taming of the Shrew: Suno launches its new models featuring fully licensed source material from three labels, which means AI is moving from “move fast and break things”, to “pay artists and make things”. Licensing is great, but we still don’t know who gets paid, how much, what happens to Suno’s models trained on other artists, and whether other AI companies will follow. (Suno)
The Birth of a New Genre: I ran into this in my travels this week, it’s a continuously generated feed of slop, created and curated by the audience. (Infinite Slop)
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📍 Where’s Jim?
The Birth of a New Genre: I ran into this in my travels this week, it’s a continuously generated feed of slop, created and curated by the audience. (Infinite Slop)
100% written by me. AI was used for light editing, grammar, images/thumbnails and spelling mistakes… and challenging my assumptions. AI liberally used for the illustrations and cover art.
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I've built and sold multiple creator economy startups, including Revision3 and VidCon, to top media companies including Discovery and Paramount. Subscribe for free to get this newsletter every Monday.
Let me know what you think – email me at [email protected]. Thanks for reading and see you around the internet.
DISCLAIMER: I am just one person, sharing his opinion. I do not have a team of analysts or corporate comms to check everything. I am almost definitely wrong about some of the stuff I say. My opinion is subject to change. This is not legal advice, investment advice, or anything else except hopefully some perspective that you may not have considered before.
