gm, world! ☀️

How’s it going? As we sit to write this, we hear Instagram is now prioritizing carousels and standalone posts — has your social media strategy been all about making Reels? What do you think about this sudden transition? 🤔

We’d love to know your thoughts.

And on that note, let’s go through our weekly round-up of all that’s brewing in the creator economy this week..along with some updates from Thousand Faces Club. ✨

In today’s Going Solo

• Gina Grenlee on taking breaks
• Discover a new newsletter: Osmosis
• YouTube is experimenting with podcasts
• Creator Deep Dive: Kane Parsons & his horror fiction

Gina Grenlee on Taking Breaks

Author, traveler, and changemaker Gina Greenlee is an inspiration to many! She has been featured on Oprah Winfrey's Remembering Your Spirit and has traveled solo across the world. Gina expresses herself through writing and has written 14 books, some of which are bestsellers.

What she says about taking breaks or having a safe space is so crucial. 👇

You can check out the book here.

Understand How Humans Get Influenced with Osmosis

Are you curious about human psychology or how we get influenced?

You’ve got to check out Osmosis — a weekly newsletter run by Colin Chung. Colin has over 15 years of experience as a writer, copy chief, and mentor and has worked with brands such as Agora, Jim Kwik, John Carlton, Brian Tracy, Ava Jane Kitchens, and Pineapple.

Why should you read Osmosis? Well, like Colin, if you’re also intrigued by why humans do strange, weird, and dumb things, Osmosis covers all that. Great storytelling guaranteed! 🔥

This weekly newsletter hits your inbox at 9.30 PM PST, every Tuesday. Check it out here. 👇

Will YouTube Podcasts Be the Next Big Thing?

Honestly, it's been a while ever since YouTube announced its podcasting platform or feature. The YouTube Studio will now allow creators to create podcast playlists, create, and upload playlists directly. While YouTube says it intends to simplify content distribution for its creators, the looks of it state that YouTube may be going after Spotify podcasts.

According to Social Media Today, "YouTube’s also testing new podcast analytics, which will provide podcast-specific performance insights, making it easier to measure your podcast content in separation from your video uploads."

Would be really interesting to see how this pans out. What do you think?

Creator Deep Dive: Kane Parsons & His Horror Fiction

In our previous Going Solo, we talked about Kane Parsons, a 17-year-old creator who is known for his YouTube series The Backroom. He bagged a feature film, which he’ll be shooting during his summer holidays.

We made a video about him, where our hosts Shubham Tiwari and Aadil Verma discuss Kane’s content and what sort of feature this might be.

Curious to know more? Watch the video here. 👇

👀 Brewing Hot

• Instagram takes community building to the next level with its ‘Channels’ — a broadcast chat feature. If you’re an Instagram creator, this feature might be super useful, as you have better communication with your followers. Grab all deets here.
• Will Vidcon 2023 be massive? And what should you expect? Find some information here.
• Spotify is launching a new AI-powered DJ that'll curate your playlists and act like a personal DJ. More information here.
• Deep dive into Shorts analytics as YouTube has just made them analytics better. Find more about it here.