#50 - Plastic Mushrooms & A Singing Baby & 142.7M Followers

🐦 Inspirational Tweet

🐦 Twitter Thread Of The Week:

(Link to thread here)

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🤖 eCommerce News:

⭐️ Facebook Groups are being revamped to look like Discord

“Facebook Groups are about to get some big changes, and if you’ve used Discord, the new approach should seem pretty darn familiar. Meta is testing a new left-aligned sidebar and channels list for Groups, and the changes are giving me some serious Discord vibes. Meta is even evoking Discord with a purple accent color. Central to the changes is a new sidebar that lists your groups with rounded square icons. Like with Discord and Slack, you’ll be able to pin groups so that they show up first on the list.”

♻️ Shop Circle wants to keep Shopify merchants from going ‘round and ‘round finding apps they need

“The global pandemic ushered in new consumer behavior of shopping online, giving a boost to a U.S. retail e-commerce industry likely to reach $1 trillion by the end of this year. E-commerce marketplaces, like giants Amazon and Shopify, support millions of merchants, which is helping the industry reach that valuation. Behind some of Shopify merchants’ tech stack is London-based Shop Circle, a technology company that acquires and grows e-commerce software. They often have to sift through over 7,500 different apps on Shopify’s platform to find the ones that work best for them — and shelling out associated costs until they find the right one.”

⚒️ Meta introduces Instagram Reels APIs for developers

“Developers will be able to use the APIs to schedule Reels and get social interaction metrics for Reels. Developers can also publish Reels on Instagram Business accounts using the new APIs. The APIs will also let developers reply to comments, delete comments, hide/unhide comments and disable/enable comments on Reels. In addition, developers will be able to find public Reels that have been tagged with specific hashtags. Developers will also be able to identify Reels in which an Instagram Business or Creator’s alias has been tagged or @mentioned.”

👀 UK’s Magical Mushroom Company uses mycelium to replace plastic packaging

“Global plastic waste has more than doubled, and 40% of that waste comes from packaging. Luckily there is no shortage of sustainable packaging startups in Europe. Just take a look: Circleback (Germany), Recup (Germany), Sourceful (U.K.), one • five (Germany), Shellworks (U.K.), Woola (Estonia), Papkot (France), Biotic (Israel), FunCell (France) and Traceless (Germany). The latest to join the ranks is Magical Mushroom Company (MMC). It’s now raised a £3 million seed round led by Ecovative Design LLC with participation by Dale Vince, founder of Ecotricity (a green energy company in the U.K.); Robert Del Naja (activist); and Marcus Watson, co-founder of Adoreum Partners, who brought 30 other investors.”

💰 Zendesk drama concludes with $10.2 billion private equity acquisition

“Zendesk has had a difficult time over the last several months. It has been hounded by activist investors, Jana Partners. It turned down a $17 billion acquisition in February believing it was worth more. Its investors turned down a deal to buy Survey Monkey’s parent company, Momentive the same month. Today, the drama concluded when Zendesk was acquired for $10.2 billion by a consortium of private equity firms, well below that original offer.”

🚀 Khaby Lame dethrones Charli D’Amelio as the most-followed TikTok creator

“Just in time for VidCon, TikTok has a new most followed creator on the platform: Khaby Lame, a 22-year-old from Senegal who rose to fame by stitching and dueting other TikToks, wordlessly fixing viral “life hacks” that didn’t initially work. As of yesterday, Khaby Lame has 142.7 million followers, eclipsing longtime leading TikTok creator Charli D’Amelio to take the number one spot.”

😅 Netflix lays off 300 more people — almost 3% of its staff

“Video streaming company Netflix said it has laid off 300 people — which represents 3% of its workforce — because of slowing growth and the economic downturn. This is the firm’s second layoff spree in two months, after it let go of 150 staffers in May. In April, it also laid off a bunch of staffers from its editorial arm Tudum, which launched just last December.”

🤖Amazon announces its first fully autonomous mobile warehouse robot

Amazon has announced its “first fully autonomous mobile robot,” meant to move large carts throughout its warehouses. The robot is called Proteus, and Amazon says it can safely navigate around human employees, unlike some of its past robots that it kept separated in a caged area. Amazon says Proteus robots have “advanced safety, perception, and navigation technology,”

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🎶 Tik Tok Ad Of The Week:

@FaceDance

“Take a selfie, and make it dance! Animate faces and old photos with hundreds of animations to choose from. Try FaceDance today for free!

Don't limit yourself with selfies! Here's how to level up the fun with FaceDance:

- Say your baby's first words

- Make your boss dance to a hilarious song

- Let your pet speak up

- Make your boyfriend sing a love song”

(Link to Tik Tok)

Why was this Ad good?

✅ Hilarious - What isn’t eye-catching about a baby singing “Maya Hee Maya Hoo”

✅ Loud & intense opening - Started with the chorus & big face dance movements. A real thumb stopper

✅ Start with the end - Super short, only shows what makes this app worth downloading and checking out

✅ Viral - Surely everyone else I send a singing baby to will find it funny right?

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📈 Trends Of The Week:

Secondhand Men’s Fashion

“Secondhand fashion platforms (e.g., Poshmark, Vinted, and ThredUp) get millions of visits per month. While they do have men’s categories, they’re lly geared toward women.

But Reddit’s r/MaleFashionMarket shows that guys want in. Members of the subreddit buy and sell secondhand threads using a janky combo of Reddit, Imgur, and PayPal.”

Pour Painting

“Pour painting (AKA fluid painting) is a relatively easy way of creating spectacular art. Interest has been rising on Reddit, Google, and TikTok, where #FluidArt has 1B views.”

“You could offer wine and fluid painting nights, or leverage the activity as a form of art therapy or meditation. Pour painting videos for relaxation are already popping up on YouTube; this compilation from just a few months ago has 4.4m+ views.

How-to guides with affiliate links to supplies are another option. Ahrefs shows the top-ranked links for “pour painting” include a guide and Pinterest board (you could throw those together!).”

Latin music

“… pulled in $886m in the US in 2021, up 35% YoY. The vast majority of that revenue came from streaming, largely thanks to a couple big names:

• Bad Bunny: The Puerto Rican rapper was the most-streamed artist on Spotify in 2021 for the second year in a row

• J Balvin: The Colombian singer known as the “Prince of Reggaeton” was the seventh most-streamed artist in 2021

Up-and-comers Rauw Alejandro (12th) and Myke Towers (18th) cracked the top 20 as well, signaling a bright future for the genre.”

(Link to Hustle)

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Happy Existing 👋