No, Lemon8 Is Not a TikTok Substitute

⏰ 1-SECOND SUMMARY

• What we know — and don’t know — about the TikTok ban.
• Instagram launched Trial Reels to test content with new audiences
• It wasn’t just you, Meta apps experienced a global outage Wednesday
• LinkedIn video posts get 1.4 times as much engagement as other posts
• YouTube tops the list of the online platforms for teens
• Reddit launched Reddit Answers to summarize relevant conversations
• Spotify is planning an Inauguration Day brunch in DC for podcast creators
• BuzzFeed sold Hot Ones company for $82.5M
• Tis the season for trend reports: YouTube, Snap, Twitch and Patreon!
• Plus, what motivates creators and what Gen Z thinks of Gen AI ads?!

💻 ROADMAP

📲 TikTok Updates

• TikTok has filed an emergency injunction to stop the TikTok Ban from taking effect and asked the appeals court to decide on the request by Dec. 16 (more below).

📲 Meta Updates

• Instagram launched Trial Reels, which gives creator and brand accounts the option to share and test Reels with people who don’t follow them.

*My recommendation: Jump on this to test ASAP since it essentially acts like a free boost, exposing your content to lookalike-style audiences. One creator I interviewed, Owen Holt, said he went from 300K followers to 800K during a beta test of the feature.

• Spotted: Meta is testing options to hide Like counts on Instagram Reels and replies on Threads.
• Meta apps experienced a global outage this week that affected Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, WhatsApp, and Threads.

📲 YouTube Updates

• YouTube made auto dubbing available to channels in the Partner Program focused on knowledge and information and say they will expand to other types of content soon.
• YouTube released a 2024 Recap of YouTube on TV.
• YouTube tops the list of the online platforms for teens, according to the latest Pew Research Center survey — followed by TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat.

📲 LinkedIn Updates

• Video posts get 1.4 times as much engagement on average as other posts on LinkedIn and creators say making videos has supercharged their engagement on the platform.
• LinkedIn Premium Business accounts now have the option to customize their profile banners with a rotating slideshow.

📲 Reddit Updates

• Reddit launched Reddit Answers, which curates summaries of relevant conversations and details across the platform in response to queries.

🔎 TIKTOK BAN: FACT OR FICTION

PSA: There’s a lot of bad advice floating around since a federal appeals court upheld the law that could ban TikTok.

Unless it comes from ByteDance or the U.S. government, please ignore TikTok guidance from online coaches with handles like @PassiveIncomeGuru101 or your cousin’s friend’s roommate “who totally works at TikTok.”

“since TikTok may be banned, I just downloaded lemon8 🍋 ~ excited to use a new social media again!!”

“I don’t think the tiktok ban is gonna stick. This is like the 3rd time this has happened.”

“BREAKING: Trump expected to halt TikTok ban.”

-as seen on Threads

What we can’t know:

1. Whether Donald Trump will halt the impending ban — his recent Meet the Press comments were vague.
2. If ByteDance will divest TikTok — and whether they’ll sell it with or without the For You Page algorithm. The company has said it would prefer to shut down the app rather than sell, but… We. Don’t. Know.
3. If the U.S. Supreme Court will decide to review the appeals court’s decision. “SCOTUS has discretion to decide whether or not they will hear the case,” wrote attorney Franklin Graves in a recap of recent proceedings.

So, if someone tells you they know whether the app will or won’t be banned, it’s just a guess at this point.

What we do know:

1. The U.S. Court of Appeals upheld the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act on Dec. 6, which requires ByteDance divest its ownership of TikTok U.S.

In response, TikTok filed an emergency motion for an injunction to stop the TikTok Ban from taking effect and asked the appeals court to decide on the request by Dec. 16.

2. Unless something happens before January 19th, the app would be unavailable in the U.S. at least for a time, according to Graves’ recap, which included this explanation from the court:

“Unless TikTok executes a qualified divestiture by January 19, 2025 — or the President grants a 90-day extension based upon progress towards a qualified divestiture, § 2(a)(3) — its platform will effectively be unavailable in the United States, at least for a time. Consequently, TikTok’s millions of users will need to find alternative media of communication.”

3. Apple and Google may play a critical role in this. Division D, Sec 2 of the Peace Through Strength act prohibits entities in the United States [like the App Store or Google Play Store] from distributing, updating, or maintaining a website or application operated by ByteDance, Ltd., TikTok, or other entities after the January 19, 2025 deadline.

4. Lemon8 isn’t a workaround. The bill “prohibits entities from distributing, maintaining, or updating a website, desktop application, mobile application, or augmented or immersive technology that is operated, directly or indirectly, by ByteDance, Ltd., TikTok, or by an entity that (1) is owned or controlled by a foreign adversary, and (2) the President determines poses a threat to national security.”

That means CapCut, TikTok Notes and Lemon8 could get swept up in this, too.

A TikTok Ban Checklist

✅ Monitor Official Sources

Continue to monitor the situation as we head into 2025. Look to official sources, such as ByteDance and the U.S. government, for information. Anything else is just speculation.

✅ Diversify Your Social Strategy in 2025

Expand your presence to other platforms. Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts are the most obvious alternatives but Snapchat, Pinterest, LinkedIn, X and Facebook are all prioritizing short-form video, too. And consider launching a blog or newsletter to have more direct access to your audience.

✅ Secure Your Usernames

Whether or not you plan to publish on another platform, make sure you’ve obtained and are sitting on your username on all the major networks, including Threads and Bluesky.

✅ Export Your TikTok Content

Save all of your TikTok video content if you haven’t already.

✅ Let Your Followers Know

In your bio, or pinned video, point people to where you plan to be the most active. And then strengthen your presence on those platforms.

✅ Update Contracts

Whether you’re a brand or a creator, make sure any partnership agreement includes a clause addressing what happens if TikTok ceases to be available for use in the US, suggested attorney Robert Freund. If TikTok disappears, do campaign requirements shift to another platform or is the contract terminated?

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🪩 YEAR IN REVIEW REPORTS

“Dare I say that the biggest trend is creating trend reports,” joked Nycole Hampton in the ICYMI Slack channel. She’s got a point. This week saw the release of many 2024 trend recaps, 2025 trend predictions and cultural trend reports. Here are some of the highlights from this week’s branded brain trust.

In 2025, Nostalgia Rules

Creators are giving past content a new lease on life — part of a trend called second-life broadcasting — by turning TV shows, radio programs, and films into fresh experiences through re-broadcasted videos, podcasts, and livestreams. Brands will go back to the archives to revive media assets for an all-new audience.

-Horizon Catalyst, Top Trends 2025

2024 Top Food and Drink Recipe Searches

• Olympic chocolate muffins (all hail Norwegian swimmer and TikToker Henrik Christiansen)
• Tanghulu
• Tini's mac and cheese
• Mango pickle
• Dubai chocolate bar

-Google 2024 Year in Search

Kai Cenat Is Crushing It

• The Twitch streamer holds the all time subscriber record with 727K subs during his Mafiathon 2 subathon
• He scored 178M hours watched this year
• He launched the number one go-to streaming snack of 2024 — the Chicken Big Mac
• And in non-Kai news, people were really looking to decompress this year: the “chill” tag was used more than any other on Twitch and Twitch users watched 100.6 million hours of ASMR

-Twitch 2024 Recap

Social Is the New Late Night TV

YouTube viewers watched over 400M hours of podcasts monthly on living room devices. They’ve been tuning into podcasts similarly to how one would tune into a late-night talk show

-A 2024 Recap of YouTube on TV

Accessible’ish Luxury

66% of luxury shoppers globally said they feel more comfortable trying a luxury product using AR than in-store — making luxury more accessible than ever.

-2024 In a Snap

Billboards Made a Comeback

Patreon celebrated its creators by launching their first billboard in New York City’s Times Square (the most expensive for billboard advertising in the U.S.). They featured twenty six creators over two months with a campaign called “Your Creativity Belongs Here.”

- Patreon End of Year Lookback 2024

Motivated By More Than Money

A detailed new survey on the demographic, social, and economic characteristics of Creators revealed the top five motivations global creators have for creating and sharing content:

1. Showcasing their talent

2. Having fun

3. Entertaining others

4. Connecting with people

5. Sharing content with others

Earning money ranked sixth.

-The Creator Revolution Report

Gen Z Isn’t Buying Into Gen AI Ads

Young consumers feel much less positively about AI-generated ads than industry executives think they do:

• 80% of ad executives think consumers view them positively, but only 48% of Gen Z and Millennials agree
• 52% of industry executives said brands that use AI-generated ads are “creative,” while only 38% of Gen Z and Millennial respondents shared that perception. In fact, consumers were actually more likely to perceive brands that use gen AI to create ads in a negative light — such as “inauthentic” or “unethical.”

-IAB and Sonata Insights AI Ad Gap Report

👀 ICYMI: JUST THE HEADLINES

• How to win on social in 2025: Swipe-left storytelling, long-form’s comeback & the Creator Economy - Building Brand Advocacy (featuring yours truly!)
• Nike was the top brand for influencer marketing in the US this year -Fashion Dive
• How brands are navigating Gen Alpha marketing - Marketing Brew
• Spotify is planning an Inauguration Day brunch in DC for podcast creators - Bloomberg
• Meta says it’s mistakenly moderating too much - The Verge
• Reddit overtakes X in popularity of social media platforms in UK - The Guardian
• Social media influencer is a growing career choice. Colleges have noticed - The Hill
• BuzzFeed is selling Hot Ones to help pay off debt -The Verge
• Inside Jake Shane’s plan to revive late night TV - The Publish Press
• Kylie Kelce Knocked Joe Rogan Off the Top Podcast Slot, In Just One Episode - Vanity Fair
• Brain rot surged in 2024 — what marketers should know about the social media trend - AdAge

*This has been the best work week ever, so I want to say thank you to clients, partners, sponsors and all of you who subscribe to this newsletter and help make a lot of my work possible!

• I got to speak at the Italian Embassy on influence and (dis)information in social thanks to diplomacy influencer Andreas Sandre
• I shared my 2025 predictions with Sprout Social’s Greg Rokisky and Giovanna Gabelmann wrote the best recap of my thoughts on High Concept Content vs High Quality Content
• I got to hang out with creator Sergeant Tyler Butterworth and the Army’s social team and pretty sure they’re going to test Trial Reels after I hyped it up (you’re welcome Mosseri)
• I had a cameo in the HeyOrca team’s end of year wrap-up!
• The San Francisco Examiner named ICYMI a must read for creator economy news, alongside my brilliant peers Jamie Gutfreund and Lindsey Gamble.
• I was honored to make Creator Economy Live’s Top 50 Innovators list for impact in the creator economy

And next week I’m headed to the White House creator holiday party, so I’ll probably send one more newsletter before the end of the year to share any interesting details!