Phil Ranta | The Creator Rep

Oliver Buchannon

Phil Ranta

Phil Ranta has been in the creator economy since 2006 as a creator (over 100m views on produced content), executive (former Facebook, Studio71, Fullscreen), investor, advisor, and all-around digital media wonk. He has a family and they think he's really, really funny.

The Streamer Awards Loves IRL 🕹️

Dec 8, 2025

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11 min read

The Streamer Awards Loves IRL 🕹️

Twitch isn't just about gaming anymore. Never was that more clear than this year's 5th annual Streamer Awards, which happened last Saturday. The Stealth Talent team was in attendance (cheering on our nominee for Best Vertical Streamer, Zesty Bestie!) along with the live streaming elite. The biggest winner of the night? IRL streaming. I'll break down the highlights and lowlights.

Breaking Black Friday Records 📈

Dec 1, 2025

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10 min read

Breaking Black Friday Records 📈

$11.8 billion in online sales in the US. An estimated $80 billion in global sales. Despite low consumer sentiment, this Black Friday was a record-breaking, smash hit. And many outlets are projecting that in-store purchases were down. Online purchasing keeps growing. And depending on the news outlet, this can be attributed to everything from customers looking for discounts in a tough economy to the rise of social commerce, AI shopping, or whatever else makes for a good headline. Let's do a round up of (mostly) good news around online shopping!

What Creator Reps are Thankful For 🙏🏼

Nov 24, 2025

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6 min read

What Creator Reps are Thankful For 🙏🏼

Happy Thanksgiving for those who celebrate, and for those who don't, it's never a bad day to take stock on what we can be thankful for! I'm out of commission this week, so in this special edition, I'll give you the top ten reasons why creator reps can be thankful for the state of the industry this year.

Beehiiv's Platform Value Bundling 🐝

Nov 17, 2025

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11 min read

Beehiiv's Platform Value Bundling 🐝

I know it's weird to write a beehiiv newsletter about beehiiv's new features, but their announcement this week of 20 new features tells the story we've been seeing from a lot of platforms in the vibe-coding era: rapid expansion beyond the core value proposition to conquest other competitive sets. I'll break down the challenges and benefits of this strategy for platforms and creators.

MrBeast and the Middle East 🌇

Nov 10, 2025

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11 min read

MrBeast and the Middle East 🌇

Jimmy has his own creator conference with VidSummit, so we never expected him to bend over backwards for Playlist Live or CreatorFest. But he just announced both a huge 'social good' activation with the 1 Billion Followers Summit in Dubai and a theme park in Saudi Arabia which, as we learned from the Riyadh Comedy Fest backlash, could be considered one heck of a controversial move to some audiences. So what's happening there and why does Jimmy care?

Steven Bartlett: The $425M Man 🤑

Nov 3, 2025

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9 min read

Steven Bartlett: The $425M Man 🤑

Steven Bartlett, the host of the popular podcast 'Diary of a CEO', and CEO of the hold co 'Steven' just raised a round at a $425m valuation. Needless to say, it feels like an investment in him even more than his companies alone. MrBeast has similar ambitions, with rumors circulating he's attempting to raise money at a $5b valuation for a suite of MrBeast branded services. Are we nearing a creator IPO?

The World's Battle for Creators 🌍

Oct 27, 2025

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11 min read

The World's Battle for Creators 🌍

I'm not in China right now, but many creators are there for Creator Week Macao. It's another in a drumbeat of overseas creator events planting their flag as global events, including CreatorFest in London which also happened last week, 1 Billion Follower Summit in Dubai, and a myriad others popping up as localized solutions to VidCon in the US. So why is the world fighting so hard for creators?

The TV-ification of the Internet 📺

Oct 20, 2025

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11 min read

The TV-ification of the Internet 📺

Must See TV. 24-hour news. Game shows. All terms that currently make me think of social media content. YouTube is now the number one OTT app, beating Netflix by watch time. Twitch content has gone political and 24/7. And new start-ups are starting to tie old IP into new distribution methods. Not to mention the success of Beast Games, leading streamers actually to talk to companies like mine again! Is this just another fad or should creators take notice?

Win Creator Economy Conventions 🏆

Oct 13, 2025

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11 min read

Win Creator Economy Conventions 🏆

Just getting back from the Microsoft Partner Summit, LA Comic Con, VidSummit, and an SF Tech Week panel. This week, I have appearances at LA Tech Week, YFCon, CreatorIQ Connect, Uscreen Connect, and TwitchCon. And, yes, I have a framework to master these conventions. I'll share the basics.

Sora 2: AI's Frankenstein Moment

Oct 6, 2025

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10 min read

Sora 2: AI's Frankenstein Moment

It's alive! It's alive! AI video has always been expensive, inaccurate, and exceptionally hard to evolve beyond the most apt term for AI content: slop. But with Sora 2's accessibility, accuracy, and built-in Instagram-like social network, suddenly end-to-end generative AI can be meme-worthy, and perhaps on its path to more. Let's discuss how creators can best use this technology.

Stop Getting Your News on TikTok 🤦🏼‍♀️

Sep 29, 2025

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9 min read

Stop Getting Your News on TikTok 🤦🏼‍♀️

Pew Research found that 1 in 5 Americans are getting their news from TikTok. For young people it's a heck of a lot higher, but, surprisingly, even the olds are in double-digit percentages. And I'm not an old man shaking my fist at clouds here. My problem: the approved $14b acquisition is poised to turn TikTok into the next Twitter.

22 Features From Made On YouTube Ranked ✅

Sep 22, 2025

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14 min read

22 Features From Made On YouTube Ranked ✅

Channeling my inner-Buzzfeed to list and rank my favorite 22 features announced at YouTube's annual Made On event. In my estimation, it was the most exciting group of announcements by a major social platform since YouTube announced the YouTube Partner Program that allowed creators to participate in video monetization through ads.

Why We Built Stealth Talent 🕵🏼‍♀️

Sep 15, 2025

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9 min read

Why We Built Stealth Talent 🕵🏼‍♀️

Greetings from sunny Monte Carlo, where I'm speaking at the 2025 Microsoft MSN Summit. Along with a new company newsletter refresh! Stealth Talent is now out of stealth, and we're bringing together the best creators and entrepreneurs to build generational companies. Because the spirit of 'The Creator Rep' newsletter is providing value to representatives of creators, and we're building a creator representation company, I'm going to get overly transparent and tell you exactly what we're doing, why we're doing it, and how we could fail.

The TikTok to SNL Pipeline 👷🏼‍♀️

Sep 8, 2025

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10 min read

The TikTok to SNL Pipeline 👷🏼‍♀️

Five new hires at SNL. Five faces you've probably seen on your FYP page. This is the most internet-heavy SNL additions we've seen on a show that has thrived on YouTube for decades. The virality of 'Lazy Sunday' made sketch comedy on the platform cool, which stayed the norm for the first 10 years of growth. And although SNL has had some internet-heavy past hires (I was watching Sarah Sherman a lot back when she was Sarah Squirm online), we're seeing the tipping point tip even harder. Does this mean TikTok is the new Second City?

How To Run a Talent Representation Org 💌

Sep 2, 2025

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10 min read

How To Run a Talent Representation Org 💌

In honor of Labor Day in the U.S., I've been reflecting on what I've learned from working as an executive at six different digital organizations, where my primary role involved building careers for creators. None of these were failures (all of my start up failures were when I ventured out of the creator space), but some grew faster than others. And, more importantly, I'm more proud of some than others. I demoed bits of this in my LinkedIn post yesterday, but I wanted to make a special edition where I focused on my most important learnings from my time in this space.

Will AI Save Us or Destroy Us? 🤷🏻‍♂️

Aug 25, 2025

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11 min read

Will AI Save Us or Destroy Us? 🤷🏻‍♂️

Markiplier is doing the AI work capitalism can't: launching a 501c3 non-profit with industry experts called Real Good AI, with a goal to figure out how AI can be used for humanitarian means. I also attended a meeting-of-the-minds at UCLA this week with one hundred of LA's leading creator economy AI experts, and when asked for a show of hands around who is an AI pessimist, I was only one of a handful (though my feelings are more complicated than that black/white sampling). Let's look at some likely outcomes from the AI revolution.

Digital Media's Blockbuster Era 👑

Aug 18, 2025

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9 min read

Digital Media's Blockbuster Era 👑

With only 24 hours of advance notice, Taylor Swift appeared on her boyfriend Travis Kelce's sports podcast 'New Heights' to officially announce her 12th studio album 'Life of a Showgirl'. The result? 1.2m concurrent viewers and 11m views in 24 hours. And the internet is abuzz with 'K-Pop Demon Hunter', the movie that topped 200m views on Netflix and already amassed well over 1 billion streams on Spotify in two months since its release. Oh, and this week, MrBeast did a live stream on Kick and raised over $12m dollars. Are we entering our digital blockbuster era?

Roblox Reaches 1 Trillion Views 🤯

Aug 11, 2025

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10 min read

Roblox Reaches 1 Trillion Views 🤯

If every man, woman, and child on Earth spent their entire day watching 100 YouTube videos of Roblox, we'd still be 180b views short. Roblox isn't a game. It's a platform where kids (80% of users are under 18) socialize, monetize, and, yes, play games. Not to be confused with the very similar Minecraft, another platform that hit 1 trillion YouTube views back in 2021. What does this milestone teach us about how games should view the creator economy?

Charity is SO Hot Right Now 👼🏼

Aug 4, 2025

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11 min read

Charity is SO Hot Right Now 👼🏼

Ryan Trahan raised over $11m for St. Jude's by visiting 50 states in 50 days. MrBeast and Mark Rober announced #TeamWater to raise $40m to bring clean water to households. And don't sleep on creators like DrLupo and Jacksepticeye, gamers with yearly initiatives who have each raised tens of millions of dollars. Charity is hot right now, and I'll get a bit cynical and break down why now is the perfect time.

Sydney Sweeney is Not an Outlier 👖

Jul 28, 2025

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10 min read

Sydney Sweeney is Not an Outlier 👖

A lot of ink was spilled this week about Sydney Sweeney's dominance as the 'it' influencer, following a drop of her American Eagle ad, which led to a 22% bump in the stock price, adding a projected $228 million in valuation to the company. Yes, this is influencer marketing. No, this is not an anomaly. I'll break down what happened.

Mia Zelu is Not Real 🤖

Jul 21, 2025

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9 min read

Mia Zelu is Not Real 🤖

The real winner at Wimbledon: Mia Zelu's puppet master. Or puppet masters. At the time of this writing, it has not been released whether this AI model was created by a brand or a 14-year-old with a Midjourney subscription. Both feel equally plausible. So what does this 18-week-old account with millions of likes and enviable media virality say about the future of AI creators?

Is AI Welcome in Social Content? 🤖

Jul 14, 2025

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9 min read

Is AI Welcome in Social Content? 🤖

YouTube has clarified its stance on its recent demonetization announcement. When they announced plans to demonetize 'repetitious content,' they actually meant 'inauthentic content,' which I find even more confusing. They also clarified that they still welcome AI content. Meanwhile, other platforms vary from a full embrace of AI to a full rebuttal, sometimes both on the same platform. So, where do the platforms currently stand with AI?

Are All Talent Managers the Same? 🤷🏻‍♂️

Jul 7, 2025

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9 min read

Are All Talent Managers the Same? 🤷🏻‍♂️

July 4 always makes for a slow news week as most execs are on some sort of yacht in some sort of amazing place. So I figured it would be a great time to reflect on talent management companies and ask the operative question creators are always asking each other: what's the difference? I'll cover a few things creators should know before they sign, and discuss how some of the top orgs are differentiating themselves.

Beast Breaks With AI Thumbs 👍🏼

Jun 30, 2025

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11 min read

Beast Breaks With AI Thumbs 👍🏼

MrBeast, the world's biggest YouTuber, has a YouTube analytics and optimization platform called ViewStats. He launches an AI thumbnail product (we've seen many of these) for $80 per month, where you can automate thumbnails just like MrBeast's. The product works, but the internet goes nuts because they hate AI. He shuts it down. So what does this mean for the future of AI products in the creator economy?

Streamer Prom Breaks Records 🏆

Jun 23, 2025

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12 min read

Streamer Prom Breaks Records 🏆

513 years. That's how many watch hours FunnyMike's Streamer Prom event drew last Wednesday. And it was a who's who of top streamers, catching the attention of huge celebrities including Kyrie Irving, who was looking to score an invitation. And transparency note: this event was brought to you by Fixated where I am the Chief Business Officer and Partner. So why now, and what does this mean for the future of streaming?