Latest / Mini Scroll / MINI TECH SCROLL: Travel creators face axed partnerships over AI, microblogging is "dead" + AMAs viral backlash

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MINI TECH SCROLL: Travel creators face axed partnerships over AI, microblogging is "dead" + AMAs viral backlash · Mini Scroll

• 0:00
  Hi everyone, welcome to mini tech scroll today, the daily
• 0:04
  Internet culture podcast bringing you the biggest stories
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  from social media, the creator economy and the digital space.
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  Every Monday through Thursday and sometimes Fridays.
• 0:13
  I'm your host Lauren Meisner, the founder of the youth digital
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  media brand Centennial World. Welcome back to mini tech scroll
• 0:22
  today. This is the last mini tech that
• 0:24
  I'm going to be doing because Annabelle comes back in.
• 0:27
  Well, it's not for another two weeks, but as as you guys know,
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  I'm taking the next two weeks off.
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  I'm going to be writing a miniseries during that time.
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  Like personal essays on the founder journey, like the
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  emotional toll, the mental health toll, the relationship
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  toll, the lifestyle toll on, on being in the middle of building
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  something before you've really made it.
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  So reminder, there is a jot form down below in the show notes.
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  If you guys are also building something, please fill it out.
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  It will really help us secure the sponsor that we are hoping
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  to get. All right, let's get into the
• 1:00
  stories for today. So the first story that I have
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  for you guys is that booking.com has axed their influencer
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  affiliate program. At the end of last week,
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  booking.com announced it was ending its long standing
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  affiliate program for influencers.
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  Creators were apparently sent an e-mail with 30 days notice
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  saying their partnership with booking.com would be coming to
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  an end. A red quote.
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  We determined that our current strategic focus unfortunately
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  does not support continuing our partnership.
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  And it encouraged creators to sign up to their third party
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  affiliate platform, Owen. All over Reddit, travel bloggers
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  and creators have been voicing their opinions, their concerns.
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  They're upset over this. Tons of people are saying that
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  they've been a booking.com affiliate on their travel blogs
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  for like a decade and have generated this company thousands
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  of dollars worth of affiliate sales and being given 30 days
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  notice that this partnership is going to end is kind of insane.
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  And the thing with this too is that these blogs, some of them
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  have hundreds if not thousands of booking.com affiliate links
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  all over them because like I said, some of them are like
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  legacy travel blogs. So these creators are saying
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  like it would be impossible for me to remove all of these
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  affiliate links. So what's going to happen is
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  booking.com is going to have these affiliate links all over
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  the Internet. Travel bloggers are not going to
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  be able to remove all of them. So they're going to still be
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  generating, like these creators are still going to be generating
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  bookings and sales for booking.com through their
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  content and these links. But the links will not actually
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  trace back to the creator anymore.
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  So the creator will not get compensated for that referral.
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  So this is a theme in the travel industry because this comes just
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  days after Expedia announced its AI trip planner, which also cuts
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  creators out of the equation. So Expedia launched this thing
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  called travel shops. I don't know how recently this
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  was launched, but it was launched, I don't know, like in
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  the last couple of years, which essentially was a marketplace
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  where you could shop the travel experiences handpicked by a
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  variety of creators. So you went on the website and
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  there would be like listings almost of different creators.
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  Then you could click on a creator and you could see like
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  what they recommend where you should spend your money at
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  hotels and travel experiences and all of that.
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  And if you booked through this marketplace, then they would get
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  a kickback. But with the introduction of
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  it's AI trip planner, now people that are deciding what they want
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  to do on a trip, what they can do.
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  So what this AI thing does is you can DM Expedia a reel from
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  like a travel creator, for example.
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  And you can basically say like I like what the hotel looks like
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  in this reel. And then they will recommend to
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  you in this like AI chat, different hotels, travel
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  experiences is things that are similar and the creator is
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  completely cut out of the equation, even though you
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  discovered it through them. And of course, Expedia is
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  recommending like Expedia hotels, right?
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  And Expedia travel experiences. So things that they will already
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  get their own kickback, their own Commission from and just
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  completely cutting the creators out of it.
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  So a couple things, obviously, yes, like the industry is
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  fickle, not just travel, but I mean, like social media in
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  general is a fickle industry. We've seen this so many times.
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  I mean, I think the first like major example of this was ad
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  pocalypse on YouTube when basically overnight YouTube just
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  decided, OK, we're cutting your Adsense in half.
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  And I mean, that was for a variety of different reasons.
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  It wasn't just because YouTube wanted to be like greedy.
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  That is what people always say, right is like a wall creators
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  who are building their entire businesses and all of their
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  revenue on social media like they deserve it because they
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  didn't create their own monetization strategies.
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  Like they're relying on someone else's platform.
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  They they don't own this content, they don't own this
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  platform, whatever. Like we hear that all the time.
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  Like all of that's important, don't get me wrong.
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  But like I feel like in 2025, with how absolutely monopolized
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  the digital space has become, there are like 3 or 4 like main
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  platforms that you can actually like grow your platform, grow
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  your audience and like build a profitable business from
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  creators have to play the game to be able to actually monetize.
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  It's such a double edged sword because the platforms have all
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  of the power and all of the eyeballs and therefore that's
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  where creators have to go to build their businesses.
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  And then the companies that help them monetize are now trying to
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  cut them out of the equation. And people are like, well, you
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  didn't build your own audience, your own platforms.
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  Like what did you expect? And it's like, obviously they
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  just went to where all of the people are.
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  Like nobody goes on dot com websites anymore.
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  Like the industry is changing because the social media
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  platforms are like ruining everything, you know, So it's
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  like I, I feel so bad for creators.
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  They have by far absolutely transformed the travel industry.
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  When you think about how heavy even like TikTok, like how
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  influential TikTok is, all my friends when they're planning
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  trips, like now their schedules and all of their planning is
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  literally around what they find on TikTok.
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  It's not just like big influencers, it's people who are
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  creating content in general when they're traveling and they're
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  saying like, you know, 5 restaurants to try in Dublin or
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  whatever. And that video can absolutely
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  blow up. But yeah, this is just an
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  example. I think this is, I mean, this is
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  really sad, but I think it's an interesting example of how
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  corporations are now using AI to get rid of their affiliate
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  programs and like, cut creators out of the equation.
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  They're basically leveraging creator content and creators
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  work without compensation. And we know that AI already does
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  that. You know, like AI is taking from
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  artists and taking from journalists.
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  That's how it's all being trained.
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  This feels just as insidious because it's corporations
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  choosing to use AI and not just to like, quote, UN quote, take
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  away jobs, right? Because it's like, OK, in the
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  corporate world, we've been, you know, warned about that now for
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  years, which is already like, it's also fucked up.
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  But now with creators, it's like, we're actually just going
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  to like, take your work and we're going to make money off of
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  it instead with the use of AI. OK.
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  The next story that I have for you guys, it's more of like a
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  discussion. I wanted to talk about South
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  Internet culture journalist Kat Tenbarge.
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  She wrote a really interesting piece in her newsletter called
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  Spitfire News this week about the belief that micro blogging
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  is dying. And I wanted to talk about that.
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  So Kat notes that the discourse started around May 26th, where
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  Blue Sky users referenced graphs that showed that the platform's
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  growth had started to wane after the US election.
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  I think in this specific context, you can't really use
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  that as an argument for like, Blue Skies moment being over.
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  I don't even really use Blue Sky.
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  Like I'm on it. I don't really use it.
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  Like, I never post. I'm just like a silent watcher,
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  a silent scroller. I think it's pretty common that
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  during something as big as a presidential election, platforms
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  will be flooded with like traffic and new users and all of
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  that. So I think that makes sense.
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  But it still sparked discourse about whether micro blogging is
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  dying. And I think this discourse does
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  make sense to consider because if you look at the micro
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  blogging platforms, a lot of them are kind of in decline or
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  just like completely irrelevant. I mean X, you can't really
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  consider X or Twitter in this argument because it absolutely
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  went to shit after Elon Musk bought it.
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  But people flocked to Mastodon, Blue Sky and Threads.
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  None of those have really been able to sustain their growth,
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  their initial growth or just gain the same like cultural
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  relevance in general that we saw with other platforms.
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  So cat writes quote on a macro level.
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  I have a theory that the decline in micro blogging is also linked
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  to declining literacy in a lot of countries, including but not
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  limited to the US. And this decline isn't just
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  about whether someone can read, but if they prefer text over
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  other mediums, how long they can read before getting bored, and
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  whether they can understand and respond to what they're reading.
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  When you look at the social media platforms that are
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  growing, they tend to feature visual and audio mediums,
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  especially long and short form video.
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  OK, so my personal observation around this argument is I do see
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  that this is true in terms of like the media literature or see
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  conversation. I see this specifically with how
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  people interact on YouTube. So I've been posting on YouTube
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  for like over 10 years. I was posting as myself first.
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  I took a couple years off there and then obviously now I post as
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  Centennial World for the podcast and the difference.
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  And even just the last, I'm going to say like 2 years in
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  terms of user entitlement and expectations is wild.
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  There is this growing entitlement from users about how
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  creators should be structuring like, their free content or be
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  labeling their free content so that it better suits the user.
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  And it's not just like light suggestions, OK?
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  Like sometimes it's incredibly aggressive demands from people.
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  And so much of it, in my opinion, seems to stem from our
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  lack of attention spans and our declining media literacy.
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  People get very upset if they feel like their time is being
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  wasted. You guys know we have the time
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  stamp drama over here. It's like part of our lore now.
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  But I have introduced chapters. OK, finally, I broke down.
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  You beat me down enough for years.
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  And I have introduced chapters. I started, I think it was last
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  week. But yeah, there's just this
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  growing entitlement. It's it's not just like a
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  comment here and there. It's something that I'm noticing
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  is quite trending. I'm very interested for other
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  people that post on YouTube, if you guys see this too, where
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  it's like people get very angry if they feel like the video is
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  not at the pace that they exactly want it to be.
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  If they feel like you are wasting their time with like 30
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  seconds of an intro where you're basically saying like, thanks so
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  much for watching, please subscribe.
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  If you don't give the exact details that they want in a
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  story, like there's there's so much to it.
• 10:56
  And I feel like so much of it stems from, yeah, like our
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  attention spans and just being able to have that kind of
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  instant gratification from the content that we consume.
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  Because if if you think about TikTok even it's like, OK, so
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  TikTok talk came out videos for 15 seconds and then they were a
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  minute. But as soon as they went to like
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  3 minutes, then TikTok introduced the two time speed
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  feature. So you actually don't ever have
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  to spend 3 minutes watching a video.
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  There's so many other examples. But all of this like trains our
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  brains, right? And then we become very angry
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  when we feel like the content, the free content that people are
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  putting out doesn't align with our expectations or like how our
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  brain is now trained. However, that being said, I do
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  think the rise of like stack and newsletters shows that there is
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  an appetite still for the written word, but I don't think
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  that microblogging is necessarily feeding the appetite
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  that people have. I think the appetite has
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  changed. Initially micro blogging and
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  like Twitter was my number one. You guys like I was such a micro
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  Blogger girly, OK, but like, and I'm obviously a writer by trade,
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  but you know, I think the time of the micro blogging era, like
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  I think that is over. If people are consuming the
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  written word, they want it to be deeper, which obviously micro
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  blogging just can't be right. They want to read like essays.
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  They want to read analysis and commentary and opinion,
• 12:16
  especially in categories like politics or pop culture category
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  that are kind of inherently more social and cover like society
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  and culture. You can't really cover those
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  categories without commentary and analysis.
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  And Cat kind of notes this in her piece.
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  She says that Blue Sky isn't engaging for users that aren't
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  obsessed with consuming political content because that's
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  largely what the culture has become on Blue Sky.
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  So if you don't have the context of whatever political discourse
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  that people are talking about because it is like a micro
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  blogging site, then it's not going to be interesting to you
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  because you're going to miss so much.
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  And I do think this appetite for like commentary and analysis and
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  opinion, whether short form video or long form video, I
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  think it's why video is still kind of dominating because it is
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  easier to provide analysis in like a 2 minute TikTok video
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  than in 140 characters on a micro blogging app.
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  People don't need to go to these apps anymore for their like news
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  bites because we can get news 24/7 like delivered and push
• 13:21
  notifications to our phones. The reason why we're interested
• 13:25
  in social media is because we want to hear people's opinions
• 13:28
  on it. OK, the last story that I have
• 13:30
  for you guys, Oh my God. This is not tech related.
• 13:36
  I mean, I mean, it's it's happening on tech Talk, but it's
• 13:40
  it's just, you know, sometimes mini tech is just whatever we
• 13:42
  want. Like Annabelle always says that
• 13:44
  she's like, she just, she just exists and we can put whatever
• 13:47
  we want in mini tech. OK, so I need to talk about the
• 13:50
  American Music Awards and how it was branded as the worst awards
• 13:55
  show ever as clips circulate all over TikTok because people are
• 14:00
  like, what the actual hell happened here with Jlo with the
• 14:04
  performances? So let me get into it, OK?
• 14:06
  The American Music Awards happened last night.
• 14:08
  It was the 51st annual AM as it was in Vegas, and Jlo was the
• 14:14
  host. First of all, everybody is
• 14:16
  saying she was just giving like desperate.
• 14:19
  Her performances were actually crazy.
• 14:21
  People think she was trying to recreate the shock value of
• 14:24
  Brittany and Madonna's kiss, which was like 100 years ago.
• 14:27
  But aside from Jlo, OK award shows, right?
• 14:30
  Like they're usually what, like 4 hours long?
• 14:33
  This was two hours. Apparently it was like one hour,
• 14:35
  57 minutes. And it seemed like it was very
• 14:37
  much like cut short. Only 6 awards were announced.
• 14:41
  There were like no celebrities there.
• 14:43
  Like they would pan to the audience when there were
• 14:45
  performances and stuff. And usually, you know, you see
• 14:47
  like the celebrities or like the artists or whatever in the
• 14:50
  audience. It was just like random people.
• 14:53
  But what you guys need to see Eclipse of is the musical
• 14:58
  performances. There are all of these videos
• 15:00
  going around showing what the performances looked like from
• 15:04
  the crowd, like from the audience's perspective.
• 15:07
  And it was literally like people sitting on the stage setting up
• 15:10
  a set, maybe dancing with a set around them, but the actual
• 15:15
  artist and the performance around them was happening on a
• 15:19
  screen above the stage because so many of the performances were
• 15:25
  actually pre recorded and they were not happening live.
• 15:29
  Even in the moment. It's not like that.
• 15:31
  You know, these people were like in LA and like live streaming to
• 15:33
  Vegas. Apparently they were like pre
• 15:35
  recorded. Also, in some cases, like Blake
• 15:39
  Shelton's, it's theorized that his performance was just a clip
• 15:44
  from one of his concerts. It wasn't even a performance.
• 15:48
  People are like, what was the budget?
• 15:51
  OK, so like the AM as are, I mean, they are like a big award
• 15:54
  show. They're like apparently voted
• 15:56
  by, you know, the people, like by the fans.
• 15:58
  So that's kind of what makes them interesting.
• 16:01
  People aren't expecting like a Grammys level experience.
• 16:05
  But still, this is like a professional award show.
• 16:07
  Big celebrities typically. But so many people were actually
• 16:11
  watching last night's show because it was kind of a big
• 16:13
  deal in pop culture because there was this big theory among
• 16:16
  the Swifty's that Taylor Swift would show up because she was
• 16:19
  nominated for a bunch of stuff, that she would show up and
• 16:22
  announce reputation Taylor's version.
• 16:24
  So they actually had like a lot of eyeballs on this, on this
• 16:28
  show, on this award show. And they absolutely probably
• 16:32
  regret that now because everybody's talking, all the
• 16:34
  people that watched are talking about how it felt like a talent
• 16:38
  show or something like an elementary school talent show.
• 16:42
  So now there is a theory that people didn't show up, like
• 16:45
  celebrities and artists who were nominated and people who were
• 16:48
  invited didn't show up largely because of Trump and his tweets
• 16:53
  against Taylor Swift. So I didn't cover this, but I
• 16:56
  think it was last week or the week before he tweeted something
• 16:58
  like disgusting and misogynistic about Taylor Swift.
• 17:01
  So the AM as are an award show produced by Dick Clark
• 17:05
  Productions, which is owned by Penske Media.
• 17:08
  Penske Media publishes Billboard, the Rolling Stone,
• 17:11
  like a bunch of the big entertainment titles in the US.
• 17:14
  And Penske gave over $1 million to the Make America Great Again
• 17:19
  incorporation. So now the running theory is
• 17:21
  that people didn't show up like celebrities, artists didn't show
• 17:24
  up out of kind of solidarity for Taylor Swift after Donald Trump
• 17:28
  tweeted did all that stuff. And obviously Penske is like
• 17:32
  kind of affiliated with Donald Trump.
• 17:34
  Whether that theory is true or not, like we will probably never
• 17:37
  know. But regardless, you guys have to
• 17:40
  watch these clips like I I don't even know.
• 17:42
  It's the most shocking thing I've ever seen.
• 17:45
  And they must be like Dick Clark productions must be so
• 17:49
  embarrassed going viral for truly all of the wrong reasons.
• 17:54
  Anyways guys, that's it for mini tech scroll today.
• 17:56
  Thank you so much for listening. I love you guys.
• 17:59
  Please remember to rate review and subscribe.
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  tomorrow for regular infinite. No regular mini scroll.
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  OK, bye.