Infrastructure Wars: UGC Acquisitions, VC Funds, and the Creator-Built Economy

Good Morning,

A love triangle of streaming giants has emerged over the last week, but I am sure you have seen enough coverage on the latest live-action episode of Succession. The MENA region saw its own creative consolidation as Abu Dhabi-based Augustus Media acquired UP10 Media for an undisclosed fee—this marks the first acquisition of a UGC company and will bolster Augustus Media’s in-house studio, ODEUM, with new digital-first capabilities.

The creator-adjacent VC money keeps flowing: Anti Fund (Geoffrey Woo, Jake and Logan Paul) announced the close of its oversubscribed $30 million Fund I, successfully pushing total AUM past the $65 million mark. This raise proves founders are ready to take a shot with the Paul-punch machine on their cap tables.

Remember Steven Bartlett's media company, Steven.com? It just dropped a seven-figure investment into Maggie Sellers Reum's female ambition brand, Hot Smart Rich. Lastly, MrBeast and his CEO are launching a creator matchmaking platform (similar to Agentio), Beast mobile and a financial app- can we please just call him Jimmy Donaldson now?

Quartermast Creator Economy Index

Layoff Watch

• The Metaverse is getting a brutal budget trim: Meta is reportedly slashing its Reality Labs spending by up to 30%.

• The 2025 layoff tally across all industries has surpassed 1.1 million, hitting the highest level since the 2020 pandemic cuts.

The Weekly Roundup:

1. Creator Economy is the Media Economy: The Verge argues that the "creator economy" is no longer a niche, but has officially replaced the entire media and internet economy, dominating culture, platforms, and even politics (The Verge).

2. The $110M Loss of the Golden Boy: Financial documents reveal that despite MrBeast's 450M subscribers, his content-creation business lost $110 million in 2024, shattering the myth that content alone is profitable and proving the value lies in physical products (The TechBuzz).

3. The Future is Not Illegible: Spice Capital's founding partner, Maya Bakhai, details her venture strategy of "betting on the illegible"—funding the next generation of creator economy infrastructure and tools that seem improbable until they become inevitable (Net Influencer).

4. $987.5B Market Battleground: The Creator Economy Management Platforms market is projected to skyrocket to $987.5 billion by 2035, as platforms like Patreon and Meta scale up full-stack creator operations to meet demands for predictable income and fair payouts (openPR).

5. 2026 Prediction: Infrastructure is Everything: A Digiday chart of the 2026 creator economy predicts a massive shift to creators as essential industry components, with ad spend on creator content expected to rise 18%, and brands increasingly working with Micro and Macro influencers (Digiday).

6. EU Slams X with €120M Fine: The European Commission fined X €120 million for violating the Digital Services Act (DSA) over deceptive blue checkmarks and data transparency—a ruling that signals greater scrutiny for all platforms and influencer marketing campaigns (Hello Partner).

7. The Brain Science of Burnout: A landmark study surveyed 542 creators, uncovering a profound misalignment between the creator economy's demands and the human brain's design, leading to chronic stress and reward-system overload (Thrive Global).

8. Recurrent Ventures' M&A Playbook: Recurrent Ventures CEO Andrew Perlman revealed his "Creator Economy Playbook," which treats media acquisitions not as consolidation, but as a strategic infrastructure play to fuse creator culture with operational discipline (Net Influencer).

9. Netflix Nabs Football Talent: Netflix is pushing further into creator-led sports content, teaming up with broadcaster Gary Lineker to stream a daily version of his popular show, 'The Rest Is Football,' during the FIFA World Cup (Deadline).

10. Facebook Shifts Back to "Friends": Following news of Metaverse cuts, Meta is revamping the core Facebook app to refocus on friends, photos, and the popular Marketplace, signaling a return to proven digital ground (TechCrunch).

11. Pinterest and Walmart Streamline Shopping: Pinterest launched a new collaboration with Walmart that allows Pinners to instantly add recipe ingredients to their Walmart shopping cart, directly linking content inspiration to conversion (Social Media Today).

12. The Journalist Exodus: An interview with former Vox VP Liz Kelly Nelson highlights the mass exodus of talented journalists leaving traditional media for independent ventures on Substack and YouTube, underscoring the creator economy's draw for quality talent (Columbia Journalism Review).

Upcoming Events

• 1 Billion Followers Summit, Dubai: January 9 - 11, 2026

• Creator Economy Live West, Las Vegas: January 13-14, 2026

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