Brittany talks with YouTube star, comedian, actress and best selling author Lilly Singh about her rise to fame. Then, Brittany turns to YouTube’s Head of Culture & Trends, Kevin Allocca, to learn more about the business side of the creator economy.
When Lilly Singh started her YouTube channel in 2010, she dreamed of becoming a successful entertainer. Now, she’s an internationally known comedian, actress, and best selling author. In this week’s episode, Brittany talks with Lilly about how she turned her dream into a reality. Then, Brittany turns to YouTube’s Head of Culture & Trends, Kevin Allocca, to learn more about the business side of the creator economy. Some participants have been compensated for their involvement in this series.
KEY TOPICS & TIMESTAMPS
RESOURCES
SOCIAL MEDIA HANDLES
CREDITS
The Upload is a podcast by YouTube Podcast produced in partnership with National Public Media. Our Executive Producers are Brianna LaFleur and Erica Osher. Supervising Producer Shannon Boerner. Our Lead Producer is Theresa Avila; Editing and Engineering by Alie Kilts with assistance from Chris Hoff; Production Assistance by Gurjit Kaur with support from Maddy Weinberg. Our logo was created by Jen Grottle and our music is by TimaLikesMusic. Hosted by Brittany Luse.
Episode 1: Yes, It's a Real Career
Featuring: Lilly Singh and Kevin Allocca
(30:55 mins)
[music in]
Brittany: I can’t quite put my finger on WHEN it happened. But I know that it’s true. If you have ever searched on the internet for advice, for tips or a tutorial of some kind…you’ve probably found yourself watching a video from… YouTube.
And—if you watch a lot of them, like I do, then you’re probably familiar with hearing things like this...
[CTA Montage]
"What’s up everyone?"
"Greetings my beautiful lovelies."
"What’s good Youtube, welcome back."
"What’s up everybody, it’s your girl, Lilly!"
Brittany: Now—let me clarify what this podcast IS and IS NOT about.
This is NOT a podcast about how to make snappy content on YouTube.
What this podcast IS about...is the creator economy and how people have used YouTube as a launching pad. For their careers, for their businesses and SO much more.
But—before we even get to all of that, I think it’s time for an introduction.
[music out]
[Theme music comes up]
[01:00]
Brittany: Welcome to The Upload: The Rise of the Creator Economy, a special podcast from YouTube, produced in partnership with National Public Media.
My name is Brittany Luse. I’m a podcaster, avid pop culture fan, and a big YouTube user. There is a strong possibility that I wouldn’t even know how to do my own hair if it weren’t for YouTube videos.
I’m so happy you’re here with me today!
In this podcast series, we’re going to go behind the video screen to talk to YouTube creators who’ve turned their channels (and passions!) into successful careers and businesses.
And, honestly—I can’t think of a BETTER time to explore this topic.
Because, let’s be real: Whether you're learning a recipe, checking out a new music video or trying to stick to your fitness routine... We’re ALL watching YouTube.
And we’re watching TONs of it.
[theme comes down]
In fact, billions of people across the world log on to YouTube to watch videos on the platform
[02:00]
And...allllll of that watch time? It’s become a vital driver in the creator economy.
A 2019 Oxford economic study looked at the financial impact of YouTubes creative ecosystem in the United States. And here's what it means. In 2019, the overall contribution of YouTube creative ecosystem to the U S GDP was $16 billion at 16 billion, where the capital B to put it another way that created over 340,000 full-time jobs. The 2020 numbers are set to come out next month. And they've only increased since then.
[music in]
How much do we actually know about what goes on behind-the-scenes? Who are the people who’ve made YouTube their home base? How do they manage to scale, form teams, and launch businesses?
Simply put: How do they go from their first upload to their first paycheck?
To help us kick off this special series, I thought maybe we could start with someone who’s not just found success on YouTube…but expanded beyond it. Like, waaay beyond it.
[03:00]
I’m talking about…Lilly Singh.
[Lilly Archival]
“Hi my name is Lilly, I talk so much crap and then I do absolutely nothing. Hi, how’s it going? I know, I’m the worst. Ok when I’m prepping for war, I’m like Leim Neissan, you don’t want to mess with me. The second issues about to pop off, I’m Harry Styles.”
Lilly Singh is a Comedian, YouTube creator, actress, and bestselling author. She started making YouTube videos in 2010 under the username Superwoman (after the amazing song “Superwoman” by Lil Mo ft. Fabolous)
Lilly’s skits often draw upon her experience as the daughter of Indian immigrants in Canada. Though, today, you can find her filming in LA, where she loves creating content about all sorts of awkward but very relatable scenarios.
I can’t think of anyone else who can help us better understand the potential of YouTube. So, let’s dive right in.
[music fade out]
Brittany: Hi. Hi Lily,
Lilly: Hi, Brittany,
Brittany: How are you?
Lilly: How are you? Also, this is going to be edited, right?
Brittany: Yeah, yeah-yeah.
[04:00]
Lilly: If I need a sip of a drink or my sound booth has no air circulation. If I like open the door for one second.
Brittany: Yeah. So you don't pass out. That makes sense. Makes
Lilly: I mean, it depends how viral you want this to go. I can pass out and then it'll probably do really well.
Brittany: We appreciate the commitment. We appreciate the commitment. So, uh, Lily. If you could please introduce yourself.
Lilly: Cool. My name is Lilly Singh. I am an entertainer and, uh, I have an extreme passion for storytelling. I like to say I'm a storyteller. I got my start on YouTube in 2010. And I've been a unicorn about ever since just, uh, trying to have fun and trying to make awesome content.
Brittany: So like, you know, obviously you have been in the tuber diehard for quite a while. Um, I mean over a decade at this point, which is like re like it's like eons in
Lilly: Yeah, a hundred, a hundred percent. I'm 1000 years old.
[05:00]
Brittany: So, I gotta ask though, why YouTube? This was all before the platform had all of these monetization tools and before we were even thinking about the creator economy. Like, what brought you there? What need did YouTube fulfill for you?
Lilly: I think for me, what it fulfills is that I get to say what I want to say unfiltered, and I get to really specifically talk about my experience. And for an artist, that's really important.
You know, especially someone who's been, for lack of a better term in more traditional media. I just really appreciate that there's no walls. And I can connect directly with someone in their home. And it feels really special and magical and intimate in that way. And I think for the audience, you know, countless people have come up to me and it touches my heart each time they say, hey, like, I never, ever had someone like you growing up in. My little sister thinks it's so normal to see someone like you on screen. And that means a lot like that. People are growing up seeing people and stories and perspectives that are otherwise ones they would not see on more traditional media. So that's that's really special, important for me.
[06:00]
Brittany: So interesting. What you said about the representation thing. Like I got started watching YouTube. I had, had, I think when I was in college and I was kind of, I kind of understood, I kind of did it, but, um, when I was trying to get natural hair, product reviews, I became like, I was odd YouTube. Like it was my job, but it was like all of these women with hair that was similar to mine.
Shout out naptural 85. And I could watch that person's videos and just basically like steal their entire like hair routine, which
Lilly: and that’s so important! that's a great resource.
Brittany: did not exist
Lilly: ...tell you if we're going to get real, real here, Brittany, let's get real. There's a lot of things in my life where I'm like, I'd have no one else to talk to about this. I don't know how to deal with this thing. Like, is there a YouTube video on this and I'll be vulnerable and tell you, like, at the age of 30, I came out, which is not, not a very easy thing to do.
[07:00]
I turned to YouTube, you know, I was like, okay, coming out videos, like what did other people do? Are there any resources? So it is kind of, you know, YouTube is this beautiful thing where it is a friend and a point of view and kind of like a resource for you when you have nowhere else to turn in some ways that's really special.
Brittany: So, I mean, there's all these people that are, that are using YouTube.
But also like there's so many people that are making the content. What do you think is the most important thing for people to understand about the actual people that make these videos?
Lilly: I think the people that make these videos are a mix of creatives. And I think they inevitably have to be a little business minded. And I think a great misconception is that creators are not businesses or they don't know how to do business, or they can't operate businesses, which is quite the opposite. I think every creator is forced to become a business. You know, when I started making videos, I was like, no, no, no, I'm just doing comedy videos?
[08:00]
And then very quickly I got emails about brand deals and I got emails about events. Every creator has to become a business, has to learn something very new, every step of the way. And, and so you have this entrepreneurial spirit mixed with passion mixed with a very. Uh, breaking the rules mentality. And I think that's the perfect recipe for people that are going to dominate in the future, to be honest...
Brittany: You've made it really clear that you wouldn't have been able to, you know, achieve the things that you've achieved without the support of your community, of your fans or your viewers.
Does it feel to you like you belong to, or that you have a community of other youtube creators?
Lilly: I do. I do a lot of people I talk to most regularly are other creators. One of the magical things about YouTube and the digital space in general is one of the rules we've broken is being super sensitive about contracts, deals, negotiations, and money. So in traditional, in traditional media, there's a huge
Brittany: Mm that's so real.
[09:00]
Lilly: issue of gender disparity when it comes to pay. You'd never know how much someone else is getting paid. You feel awkward asking about it. You don't know if your deal is good. You're hoping your agent's doing a good job. You know, it's, there's, there's such a, there's such an unspoken awkwardness in business.
In the digital space, we are not about that. I will call up any of my creator friends and be like, okay, I'm working with the brand. I know you worked with, how much did they pay you? How many deliverables did you do? What was the deal? And that's how we conduct business. And it's honestly been really great because it's made sure that people get paid, what they should be paid, especially minorities.
Brittany: Yeah, talk to me a little bit more about all of the work that goes into creating content.
Lilly: Um, I mean, yeah, I'll talk to you from my personal experience of what that workload looks like. So of course there's production stuff. Like you mentioned, then there is the, okay. if someone comes on my channel… Are they incentivized to stay on my channel? Or are they going to leave soon? Like even then connecting to your audience.
[10:00]
Like once you release the video, it's important to then go through the feedback of the video, respond to comments, you'll see what the audience is saying. What do they want to see in the future? You got to maintain that whole level of it. On top of that as being fresh, it is okay. One video happened, but the creator economy is also such. You gotta be consistent.
Brittany: So like, we're talking about sort of the creator economy. Um, but I think that there are a lot of people who may not understand what, like the creator economy that you work with in is could you please like, just really quickly explain what the creator economy is?
Lilly: I mean, it's basically a system of beautiful reality that has eliminated gatekeepers and, and the need for gatekeepers when it comes to creating content. So in 2010, when I had an idea or I wanted to tell a story, or I want to talk about an experience really specific to me that I didn't see on screen anywhere else, I didn't have to go through so many hurdles to do that.
[11:00]
I would literally turn on my camera, upload a video onto YouTube and create a community through my content that was just unfiltered and very authentically me. And so, yes, it's a real career. I specifically, mom, dad. Yes, it is a real career. And I just need to emphasize, and it's full of just. Honestly opportunities that make things on my vision board come true.
I get to tell amazing stories. I get to make a living from doing it, and I get to continuously step out of my comfort zone. I mean, what's better than that.
Brittany: I love that. What does it mean to you to be able to tell these stories?
Lilly: I think. And I'm gonna make a bold statement here. I think there is nothing more powerful than someone who is able to communicate their point of view, their experience unfiltered, like that is a very powerful thing. Not only has it changed the entertainment industry, but it has just changed how we view the workforce. It has changed the opportunity for underrepresented voices.
[12:00]
A lot of creators are self-employed and they are self-taught and there's no one we can look back on. There's very few people you can look back on, you know, in other industries you think, Oh, okay, well, what did so-and-so do in 19, you know, 84, let's go look at that. And when you are a creator, you are paving the path.
I think my parents are used to more traditional career paths. And they were probably really stressed when I said I wanted to make content online. And I think I was shown my inner and outer family, extended family, that this is a real thing. And honestly, it's really the thing that is really sweet to me is I've given them a lot of experiences that I think they would have never imagined they’d be in.
Brittany: I mean it really is so incredible that you’ve been able to give this kind of exposure and experience to your family and for you guys to be able to share that together. And yet somehow there’s this misconception still that being a youtube creator is an easy job. When actually, it's kind of like 10 jobs in one.
[13:00]
Lilly: I was going to say the answer to it's not a real job was like, it's right. It's actually 10 real jobs. Especially when you start. When I started in 2010, I was my writer, my shooter, my director, my editor, my marketing manager, my everything, you do everything.
I always say that back in the day before YouTube has had like popping analytics, I had my own Excel sheet where I would track how many views and how many followers, like I type A personality, y’all. I would like monitor all that stuff myself.
It is a really respectable thing that these creators can pump out content on a schedule that's so rigorous because they're doing it on their own will.
Brittany: So you were obviously committed to making your channel a success from Day 1. What was motivating you to keep going? Was it your fans? Was it something else?
Lilly: I think the relationship between creator and YouTube is one where community gets formed. To be honest, I know there's a lot of opportunity to connect with your audience these days. There's so many different platforms, so many different avenues. I still believe that YouTube is the place where you really build a connection with other people because it's longer form content.
[14:00]
People are actively looking for something. And so when they find it, they have a special connection with that something. Um, and so I just feel like most of my community and my ride or die OG audience members are still on YouTube and that's still the home I go back to.
Brittany: What are things that you've adjusted as you've gone along? Like, um, even specifically with your channel, like, were there things that you tried and didn't work and then learned from and changed? Like, were there things that you sort of accidentally stumbled upon and decided that you wanted to keep?
Lilly: Well a lot of people don’t know this but two of the most infamous characters on my channel, on my mom and dad characters Majeed than bottom Jeep, um, loosely inspired by my real parents. I need to say loosely before I get in trouble. They're not my real parents are loosely inspired. Um, you know, when I first started making videos, those characters were actually played by my friends.
So my friends would come over and be those characters, but then me being Lily, I got obsessed with making content and I wanted to do it so often. My friends were like, we're not coming over every day to play, to put a wig on and be your mom and dad. And I said, fine. So that's why I started playing the characters myself.
[15:00]
And by mistake, I stumbled onto this magic sketch thing where I played all the characters. That's how that happened. I had no intention of ever playing all the characters in my videos. It literally was out of necessity because my friends were about to stop being my friends.
This is what I mean by being a creator means you have to inevitably create a business because back in the day, when I shot my own videos, Couldn't stand on my mark and shoot my video at the same time. so I literally put a lamp in place of where I was standing focused on the lamp, move the lamp out of the way and then. that's literally all I focused on myself when now, you know, my team is, you know, I have an editor, I have a great DP that shoots. I actually have a sound person that comes. We have gaffers that help with lighting. Um, I have interns that come in and also learn about social media from us as well, our company.
[16:00]
In terms of how I've pivoted, I'm gonna be real with you. I think when I started off, I was very driven by how can I grow my channel? How can I expand? How can I get more people in more countries to watch my channel? I still think that's important, but I think where I am right now in my life, I also find it important to be fulfilled and make things that are exciting to me and that I like, and that I think are important. So that's how I've pivoted. I've pivoted to half strategy, half spirituality, which is how I live my life.
Brittany: talk to me about like your, your journey into, I guess, like, Diversifying, I suppose, like we know how you got started. Um, but talk to me more about your journey as a creator, as you realized, oh, I can monetize this and, oh, there are things also outside of YouTube, that would be really good opportunities for me.
Lilly: I think. I've been, I, I did YouTube videos religiously for about eightish years. And for, for eight of those years, I did almost everything myself. And then when I moved to LA, I found it important to have a team so I could diversify. I thought I really like storytelling. I want to do more of it.
[17:00]
I wanted to do it smarter, work smarter, let me build a team. Um, since then I've been able to, you know, really think about what it is I want to do as a creator. And I think what it boils down to is I want to tell stories that are not being told in a very authentic way for people that need those stories.
Right. And YouTube is one great way to do that. And I still maintain that, but some of my ideas are better as a movie or the better as a TV show, or they're better as a podcast. And so I have aspirations to definitely create in a, in a, in a number of places.
Brittany: Having done things your way, rather than the traditional way, how did that help you become a better creator? What skills did you gain?
Lilly: I gained the ability to see the entirety of a project, even though I'm currently only in one aspect of it. That's a big thing. I think, as a creator, when you are writing a script or you're shooting a video. You're not just thinking about that moment. I think if you're an actor on a set, you're like, okay, this is my scene, these lines I got to do. But when you're a creator? you're thinking about, okay, so when I released this video.
[18:00]
Like what is, what is the, what is the description? What does the caption, how am I going to hype up this video? What is the narrative I'm going to put out? And even when you're shooting the video, you're probably editing it in your mind as well.
So often on set. So often on a traditional set, someone will come up to me and be like, are you an editor? And I'm like, I'm literally editing this entire movie in my brain as we shoot it.
Brittany: How would you, like what advice would you give to aspiring entertainers who want to be on youtube?
Lilly: All right. I'm going to give some, some advice. It might be some like big sister advice, but it's real.
it takes a lot of work. It, I know it may not seem like it if you've not done it, but it takes a lot of work because social media is 24/7. There is no punching punching in and punching out.
And so I would say to creators, find the thing that you're really passionate about and create around that, you know, don't follow necessarily solely what the trends are solely what is performing well, solely what gets views. Because that gets exhausting really quick. And I'm a big believer of longevity. When it comes to being a creator, I don't want to be a creator for a year. I want to create for my life.
And to create for my life. I have to create something I'm passionate about because otherwise it's exhausting to put up a facade, to pretend to be passionate about something or pretend to care about something.
So whoever you are, whatever your unique point of view is, lean into that and do stuff you're passionate about because life's too short to be working so hard on something you're not.
Brittany: That’s wonderful advice. Is there anything you recommend that aspiring creators not do?
Lilly: I would say, I know it's, it's, it's more than fine to be inspired by people. I was inspired by lots of people when I started my YouTube career, but I think what made things fun[o] for me and what made me get a lot of opportunity was not to be the second Jenna marbles or the, the second Kingsley or any of these people.
[20:00]
It was to be the first Lilly. And I think that's so important. I think every single person you can be inspired by people don't strive to be the next Lilly Singh. Don't strive to be like losing, like be the first you.
Because that's the power of YouTube. It's whatever your voice is, you have a platform you don't have to conform. You don't have to do things a certain way, do things like you and, and people will gravitate towards that. And you'll see that you'll get opportunities to just be you over and over again in different capacities. And so, um, be consistent, be you, have fun work really hard and also low key. If I'm just being really real, be nice, like be nice.
Um, one of the biggest business lessons I can tell anyone, and I don't think we talk enough about this in business. As we think of business as this cutthroat, ruthless, you gotta be, you know, really edgy and yes, sometimes in business you have to make tough decisions. You have to be risky, but no business has also with people, people do business and to people, you gotta be nice.
[21:00]
People will work with you if they remember having an enjoyable experience with you. And so I don't care who says what - I think a big part of business is being a good person and being nice and being just, I don't know, setting the standard of what it means to have values.
Brittany: That's such good advice. I, a hundred percent agree with that wholeheartedly. And that was like the number one piece of advice I'd give to any young person.
Lilly: Work hard and be nice to people. Y'all that's what it is.
Brittany: Literally, that's what it is. Oh, Lilly. Such a great note to end on. It was so great to meet you.
Lilly: It was so nice to meet you.
[END INTERVIEW]
Brittany: I had a blast finally getting to talk with Lilly Singh! I really appreciated learning about her journey with Youtube and how her success on the platform really opened doors for her as a queer woman of color in entertainment.
And because of our conversation, I wanted to understand the greater business context of the creator economy.
For example, there are more than 2 million creators who make money off of selling ads on their youtube channels.
[22:00]
But how do they get there? And do you have to be a superstar with millions of followers to have a successful business?
I decided to go to the source and hear from someone who understands Youtube from the inside-out.
So, I turned to Kevin Allocca
Kevin: Hello! My name’s Kevin Allocca and I’m the head of culture and trends at YouTube. I’m also the author of the book called Videocracy, which looks at how video has impacted popular culture.
Brittany: Sounds like you wear many hats.
Kevin: Yeah. Yeah. I basically run the team at YouTube that is working on a variety of projects that help people find and understand what's popular on the platform. So that's everything from working with the product and engineering teams to surface content in our apps to doing research into what's happening on the platform, to sharing what we're finding with people outside the company.
[23:00]
Brittany: So, during my conversation with Lilly, she described the creator economy as a place where she can make a living while being true to herself and how she wants to run a business. But how would you describe it?
Kevin: I would describe the creator economy as a sort of modern media ecosystem where individual people can build and interact with audiences directly through digital platforms and generate value from those activities.
So that's allowing basically creative people to financially benefit from their skills, their passions, their interests, without necessarily incurring the upfront costs of distribution and marketing and things that we typically associate with with creative activities and sort of past mass media.
Brittany: So so like what sort of opportunities within that sort of like that platform or that network exist for creators like in terms of money or brand deals or career building?
[24:00]
Kevin: So there are multiple ways that people are able to earn money through creating content online. Some of that is through ads that run on their videos in which they get a portion of the revenue from the ads that run. Sometimes they do direct deals with brands or or advertisers.
In other cases, they can take advantage of different features, like memberships, where you subscribe to a channel and the audience pays directly or selling digital or real world goods like merchandise. And in some cases, you know, you have people who reach a level of celebrity that they're selling books and they're creating all kinds of different things.
So the scale can totally vary and the mix can totally vary based on the type of creator, the size of their audience and the type of things that they make. So I think it's helpful to think about content creators, not just as as the people that you see on the camera, but there are also small business owners. I mean, many of them employ editors. They may have animation artists that they that they work with. They may have a manager or a marketing sort of team they work with. They are entrepreneurs in the sense of, you know, running small to medium to large businesses around their their craft.
Brittany: Help me understand. Like what’s possible in terms of success on YouTube? Like does everyone need, you know, millions of followers to be successful? Or could you find success being more niche?
Kevin: You definitely don’t need a million followers to be successful. YouTube adapts to the type of success potentially that you're seeking. I've seen farmers who have, like their YouTube channel is like one alternative revenue stream to their farming. Like that's not, their full time job is not making content online, but it's like a part of the mix of stuff they're making, right?
You know, it's been interesting how over the years you used to have to produce something every day to be successful. People who do that, there are now people who produce one thing a month that's like an hour long and that's like, you know, that's their path to being successful.
[26:00]
And there are other people who this is one revenue stream, a bunch of other revenue streams they might have that are off of YouTube that they're able to supplement. So success can totally vary per person. And it does not rely necessarily on having the kinds of social media influencer audiences that we kind of typically associate with it.
Brittany: So ok. So. You created the YouTube Trends report and it touches on this idea of togetherness and how YouTube has become a tool for facilitating a sense of connection.
You also talked about how viewers are looking for radical relatability. Lilly mentioned in our conversation that to be successful on YouTube, you have to be yourself instead of trying to emulate somebody else. Like what does radical relatability mean and how does Lilly’s advice fit into that concept?
Kevin: The idea of radical relatability is just the idea of authenticity being key. It's about creating connection in a direct sense. Right. You know, the whole idea of video, what video and YouTube is that? It's unmediated. Right. You're able to connect directly with that audience. And, you know, Lilly, back in the 2010 when she started, her channel was able to connect with her fans all over the world, right from her bedroom. Right.
And so when you're not real, you're kind of breaking the experience of it like you're you're the value the thing that makes the experience so compelling and interesting is that that sense of realness. And then so you take that kind of baseline and then you look at where we've been for the last year and a half.
Which is a time when the lines between our personal and professional lives have gotten totally blurred together. Yeah, here you were talking to each other from our our houses and our kids screaming in the background stuff. I mean, it's like it's like that's life now and that's fine. And so I think there's it's accelerated or increased this appetite for media that is real, that is reflective of our experiences, because we we we we don't have that same expectation of of of distance in the same way that we did before.
[28:00]
So I think, you know, that's that goes back to these channels that are creating content that exists in genres that on paper sounds so ordinary but is actually very compelling because the the perspective that is layered on top of it is unique and interesting.
Brittany: So I wonder, like what are some of the interesting trends that you're seeing in the types of creators that become successful on YouTube?
Kevin: A number of years ago, I became fascinated with trying to understand what is what are the common patterns between all these channels. Yeah, because they were so varied, like I mean, we had everything from farmers to people growing plants to comedians to gamers. I mean, it's just like all over the place. And so you're saying, what is the throughline of this thing? Yeah.
And the the the the interesting thing is that as sort of digital platforms, as YouTube has evolved, there's more and more variety. The thing that sort of unites all this stuff is you just have people who are increasingly skilled with expressing themselves and sharing their kind of very unique point of view.
[music fades in]
I think a lot of these formats, a lot of these genres, a lot of these different approaches to content creation that exist today are really designed to create and enable people to express themselves in a very personal way.
Brittany: Kevin, thank you so much for talking with me today.
Kevin: Well thank you for chatting with me!
[END INTERVIEW]
Brittany: So there ya have it, that was creator economy 101
You know, in my career, I’ve gotten to chat with a lot of creators, entertainers and thought leaders. And I think I’ve learned a thing or two about the creator economy. It’s so big and diverse!
And I so appreciated hearing from Lilly and her experience. But I know that not everyone needs to be a megastar like Lilly. In fact, in working on this podcast, I’ve come to see there are soo many creators who are…just like you and me.
[30:00]
They have bills to pay, they have things they are passionate about and they have families to prioritize. And they were able to find a way to bring all those elements into their channel.
But, that’s for next week!
[CREDITS]
The Upload is a YouTube Podcast produced in partnership with National Public Media. Our Executive Producers are Brianna LaFleur and Erica Osher. Supervising Producer Shannon Boerner. Our Lead Producer is Theresa Avila; Editing and Engineering by Alie Kilts; Production Assistance by Gurjit Kaur with support from Maddy Weinberg. Our logo was created by Jen Grottle and our music is by TimaLikesMusic. I’m Brittany Luse, thanks for listening.