Latest / Mini Scroll / MINI SCROLL: Phoebe Gates called out by influencer, Austin McBroom addresses Catherine Paiz's book + Nylon's tastemakers club
Transcript
- 0:00Hi everyone, welcome to Mini Scroll, the daily Internet
- 0:04culture podcast bringing you the biggest stories from social
- 0:07media, the creator economy and the digital space every Monday
- 0:10through Thursday. I'm your host, Lauren Meisner,
- 0:14the founder of the youth digital media brand Centennial World.
- 0:19Welcome back to Mini Scroll, everyone.
- 0:21OK, before I get into the stories for today, I have some
- 0:23exciting news to share for you guys.
- 0:25The people that care about the business growth, the business
- 0:28journey, you guys, I care about this.
- 0:31But last week we hit 100,000 podcast listens in a single
- 0:38week. That's a major milestone for us.
- 0:41So 100,000 downloads, streams, listens in seven days.
- 0:46That is so massive. And sometimes when I say the
- 0:50numbers of our brand and like even saying that number, it
- 0:53feels fake because I still feel like we are literally the
- 0:56smallest podcast in the entire world and we are absolutely
- 1:00niche. Like that's that's the truth for
- 1:02sure. But no, it feels like insane to
- 1:05say that those numbers. Like if we consistently got
- 1:08that, that would make US1 of the biggest podcasts in Australia,
- 1:10which is insane. So I'm really excited because we
- 1:14had some sponsors, you know, over the course of that big
- 1:17period of growth, we had Blackbird and we had Bumble as
- 1:20well. So I'm very happy for our
- 1:22sponsors because the that absolutely popped the fuck off.
- 1:26But yeah, it's so exciting. I can't believe that I'm not
- 1:29even kidding. Like just a few years ago we
- 1:32were hitting like 5000 listens a month.
- 1:35Like, you know, and I mean, this is before we filmed things and
- 1:38like kind of re strategize our brand to be much more podcast
- 1:41first, of course, but still like that is some massive growth.
- 1:45And you guys know, if you've been on this journey with us for
- 1:48a while, like this brand has been built slowly, like we are
- 1:52slow and steady. We never had like an overnight
- 1:55success moment. We never had fast success.
- 1:58It has been built like brick by brick by brick.
- 2:01Like for real. So to hit that number is so, so
- 2:04insane and I'm so grateful and I'm so excited in this journey.
- 2:08I honestly question if I am building something legitimate at
- 2:13all times. I'm always like, nobody cares
- 2:15about this. Nobody wants this.
- 2:17My ideas are stupid. Like I'm sure that every single
- 2:19person that's trying to build something have their own
- 2:21business, whatever. Like feels that way all the
- 2:24time, especially when you're like in the trenches, which it
- 2:27feels like we are in the trenches a lot.
- 2:29So I constantly have that in my brain of like, what the fuck am
- 2:34I actually doing? So to see a number like that,
- 2:37like a huge milestone like that, it's very cool.
- 2:41In seven days, seven days. So please tell your friends
- 2:45about our podcast. We have to keep this going.
- 2:48We need this momentum to keep going.
- 2:51All right, let's get into the stories for today.
- 2:53So also I'm wearing my emotional support sweater.
- 2:55So I swapped out the Aneen bang for this is like one of Sean's
- 2:58hoodies. And I'm sorry because I play
- 3:00with these drawstrings all the time when I wear a sweater, but
- 3:05it just has to be done. OK?
- 3:07The first way that I have for you guys is that Bill Gates
- 3:09daughter has been called out for asking for free influencer
- 3:14promotion for her new app. Bill Gates youngest daughter
- 3:18Phoebe and her former roommate Sofia Kiani have launched a
- 3:22shopping app called FIA. I think it's FIA.
- 3:25It looks like FIA could be FIA, but I think it's FIA.
- 3:28They've been doing tons of high profile press for this.
- 3:30They had a New York Times feature.
- 3:32They went on Call her daddy. Like big big stuff.
- 3:36So this is directly from The Verge quote.
- 3:39Fiat is designed to help shoppers compare prices on
- 3:41listings of clothing, shoes and accessories.
- 3:44Once you install the app or extension Should I Buy?
- 3:47This button will appear when you land on a product page.
- 3:50Click the button and FIA will scour the web to compare prices
- 3:53to new and used listings of the same and similar items before
- 3:57telling you whether the price is high low or typical.
- 4:00FIA says it uses AI to analyze quote current market trends and
- 4:04compare them against a database of more than 250 million used
- 4:08goods from sites like the real real vesty air, thread up stock
- 4:12X, eBay and poshmark. So yeah, I was reading a little
- 4:15bit about this and it seems that basically the big difference
- 4:18between this app and like a honey or some of the other kind
- 4:21of like shopping price comparison discount apps is that
- 4:25they have a focus on thrifted clothes for this app.
- 4:29So I think the app had some traction.
- 4:31But now a popular luxury brand strategist and stylist, Jared
- 4:35Jenkins, is claiming that Phoebe reached out to him trying to get
- 4:38a free review of the app to post on his platform.
- 4:42So Bill Gates's daughter reaches out to me.
- 4:43I don't know her, but she knows that I'm a luxury deal expert.
- 4:46So she reaches out saying, hey, I have the startup, we're
- 4:49focusing on deals, and I want you to review my product and
- 4:52give a review to your followers for free.
- 4:55Mind you, this is a service that I was charged thousands of
- 4:57dollars for and she didn't even subscribe to my sub stack.
- 5:00That's $5 a month, $30 a year, and they just signed up for the
- 5:03free tier. He also claims the app just like
- 5:05doesn't really work very well, at least when he tried it and he
- 5:09would have suggested to them that they not launch yet.
- 5:12He said he offered to be an advisor after trying the app and
- 5:15realizing kind of how glitchy it seemed.
- 5:18And that's how he responded was like, you know, I could be an
- 5:21advisor. And then he had never heard
- 5:22back. I actually can't believe that we
- 5:25are still in the era of people trying to get free shit.
- 5:28Contra deals, I feel are a little bit different.
- 5:31But this is an app that in theory is like available to
- 5:34everyone. You know, I think they were
- 5:36offering him like a early access.
- 5:39But regardless, like it's going to be free, it's going to be
- 5:41available to everyone different when you're trying to get
- 5:44someone to use your product, your app, whatever, when they
- 5:48don't like need it already, you know, like I, I, I'm not like
- 5:52against Contra deals at all. We will consider Contra deals
- 5:57when it's something that we really need.
- 5:59Like for example, if the Commons, like our Co working
- 6:02space wanted to work with us and give us like free rent, you
- 6:05know, because they wanted some promotion in some capacity on
- 6:09the podcast or TikTok or whatever.
- 6:10Like we would do that, you know, cuz that's like a service that
- 6:12we actually need. This is not something that Jared
- 6:15needs. Like she's trying to get him to
- 6:17download it and use it by saying like, I'll give you early
- 6:20access. Like, OK.
- 6:22And the influencer industry is hard because a lot of people do
- 6:25free stuff because there was early on, like I am not kidding,
- 6:29early, early days of like blogging and Instagram.
- 6:33The whole mentality was if a brand sees you doing free
- 6:37content for them, whether you have paid for the products
- 6:39yourself or you've engaged in a Contra deal with them and that
- 6:42content as well, then they will partner with you in the future.
- 6:46And I'm sure that still kind of happens, but it is not a
- 6:50consistent or like a reliable strategy.
- 6:54But because of this advice that everybody would give back in the
- 6:57day and this mentality that everybody had, so many creators
- 7:01still do free stuff. And I think that has been very
- 7:05much to the detriment of the industry.
- 7:07Now when it comes to the app, I understand launching a minimum
- 7:13viable product and having work still to do like along the way.
- 7:18You know, that is part of like startup culture is you kind of
- 7:21just have to like launch and figure it out as you go.
- 7:25Otherwise you'll never launch if you're waiting for it to be
- 7:27perfect or for all the bugs to be fixed.
- 7:29Like you will literally never launch.
- 7:31If you think about all the biggest apps that we use, they
- 7:33are constantly making us update because they were constantly
- 7:35fixing bugs. Obviously the apps are still
- 7:38like doing what they say they're going to do, but this is still
- 7:41like a new app, right? So I understand being like, we
- 7:44need to just launch. We need to just get out there.
- 7:47But I think the difference here, if what Jared is saying is true
- 7:50that like the app doesn't really work and didn't really work for
- 7:53him. I think the difference here is
- 7:55that Phoebe and Sophia are a lot more high profile than like your
- 7:59typical young tech founder. So the bar will naturally be
- 8:04higher for them when they launch.
- 8:07And that's OK because the barrier to entry for them as
- 8:12Bill Gates daughter was significantly lower.
- 8:16It reminds me of when influencers or celebrities
- 8:18launch brands or products and it doesn't go well.
- 8:21And, you know, some of the conversation will be around
- 8:23like, well, why aren't they allowed to make a mistake?
- 8:26Well, they're allowed to make mistakes.
- 8:27But like, the bar is higher for them because they're already
- 8:29going in with this, like, huge advantage.
- 8:32So far at the time of recording, Phoebe has not responded to
- 8:36Jared's allegations. Feel like she's not going to.
- 8:39But yes, I will keep you guys posted if she does.
- 8:42OK. The next word that I have for
- 8:43you guys is that Austin Mcbroom has responded to Catherine
- 8:47Pius's book expose. Austin Mcbroom of the Ace Family
- 8:51is going off the deep end again, trying to defend himself against
- 8:55his ex wife's new book coming out on July 1st.
- 8:58I mentioned this yesterday, but the first few chapters of
- 9:00Catherine's book were seemingly released or leaked.
- 9:03And in these chapters she allegedly speaks about her
- 9:06experience being cheated on by Austin.
- 9:09And I guess Austin is confirming that those chapters are probably
- 9:12real because he's responded on Snapchat and as you can imagine,
- 9:17it's unwell. He posted videos saying he's
- 9:19blindsided because he and Catherine have an amazing Co
- 9:23parenting relationship. OK, I get that maybe being a
- 9:27little bit surprised, but like she's still allowed to tell her
- 9:31story and she's still allowed to share like what he did to her
- 9:35even if they have a good relationship.
- 9:37Now in this video, he also confirms that he did cheat on
- 9:41her, saying he stepped out of his marriage but said he voiced
- 9:45his issues with Catherine saying he felt like she gave him no
- 9:48affection and they actually had a year where they didn't have
- 9:52sex, he says. So he was kind of like trying to
- 9:55justify it by being like, well, I told her that I wanted more
- 10:00affection from her. We never had sex.
- 10:02So like, what was I supposed to do?
- 10:04It's giving Sandoval so bad. I I'm sorry for like
- 10:09continuously referencing VPR. It's obviously just top of mind
- 10:14for me at all times. And because I just finished re
- 10:17watching all of the scandal all season, I cannot stop seeing
- 10:21scandal situations and men like Sandoval who are acting in the
- 10:26way that he acted during scandal.
- 10:27Like everywhere. You don't cheat because you feel
- 10:31like the person that you're with doesn't give you intimacy or
- 10:35doesn't like you anymore or whatever.
- 10:37Like just break up with that person.
- 10:38If you have such a big issue with that and you guys, you
- 10:41can't see a way that it's ever going to get fixed.
- 10:43Like you don't stay in the relationship and just cheat.
- 10:47Get out of the relationship, go to therapy.
- 10:49Like there's so many options and like trying to flip this and be
- 10:53like, well, she was the one that wouldn't give me affection.
- 10:55I'm the victim here. I was forced to cheat.
- 10:59Insane so he also said that he thought she was OK with the
- 11:03cheating because she said to him when they were talking about
- 11:07this like just don't embarrass me.
- 11:10So he took that as like just do what you want but like I don't
- 11:13want the public to know like don't embarrass me publicly.
- 11:17He says that she knew he was cheating and still stayed with
- 11:20him for another five to six years despite this.
- 11:23Again, like, who knows how long she knew he was cheating for.
- 11:27It's very much going to be like a he said, she said situation.
- 11:30I'm going to assume that Austin Mcbroom was hearing what he
- 11:34wanted to hear, making some assumptions based on like what
- 11:37Catherine was saying to him. Because of course, like, then
- 11:40you get to be guilt free. You get to cheat guilt free.
- 11:43If you have convinced yourself that your wife's response to
- 11:46your cheating is like, oh, just do what you want, like, of
- 11:50course, then why would you not try and, like, delusionally
- 11:53convince yourself of that? I also think it's OK if even if
- 11:58in that moment, like she did know what was happening and she
- 12:01still stayed with him, now she's been out of this relationship
- 12:04for a long time. There was so much wrapped up in
- 12:06that relationship, like their whole life, like their business,
- 12:09like their online presence, like everything was all tied up, you
- 12:13know, with that relationship. So yeah, I can imagine that like
- 12:17now unraveling her entire being from the Ace family in Austin, I
- 12:22imagine she's going through a lot of like self discovery and
- 12:25like realization. And that's also OK that like now
- 12:27she's had some distance and she's like, whoa, what the fuck
- 12:30was I doing? You know, OK.
- 12:31Then he played voice recordings that he took.
- 12:35And it is unclear if Catherine knew that these were being
- 12:38recorded, but in the recording it was from January 2024.
- 12:42And so it was like a mid their divorce.
- 12:44And he says that he was going to make it a video explaining that
- 12:47he did step out on their marriage.
- 12:49And then like in in this recording, you can hear
- 12:51Catherine say basically like, don't post it.
- 12:54You'll get a lot of backlash. So he's playing this to be like,
- 12:57well, why would you tell me back then not to post it because I'll
- 13:01get backlash. But now you're writing about it
- 13:03in this book knowing that I'll get the backlash.
- 13:05So he's like, all she wants to do is like monetize this for
- 13:08herself. I have no doubt that being
- 13:10married to Austin Mcbroom is literal hell.
- 13:14And I think no matter how we feel about Catherine, I think if
- 13:18she wants to monetize her story about what she went through
- 13:23being married to that demon of a man, then she can do that.
- 13:28The only caveat I will say there is like, I do fear for the
- 13:31children, but I don't have kids. So like, I don't know.
- 13:34I can't speak to the fact that, like, if you're a parent, you
- 13:36should keep everything, you know, inside or private, like
- 13:40amongst like your friends and family, and never be public
- 13:42about any of your stories because, as you know, you might
- 13:45hurt your kids. Like, I don't know.
- 13:46I don't know. I don't have kids.
- 13:47I have no idea what I would do in that situation.
- 13:50That's the only, like, small thing where it's like, OK, yeah,
- 13:52maybe. But like, I don't fucking care
- 13:53about Austin. I don't care about Austin.
- 13:55Who cares about you? Austin?
- 13:57Shut up. OK.
- 13:59The last word that I have for you guys is that Nylon is
- 14:02launching a free invite only club for young people to
- 14:06challenge the traditional revenue model of digital media.
- 14:10This is like a rogue digital media story that I've thrown in.
- 14:13I know some of you guys like when I talk about the industry,
- 14:16so I thought I would share this T because I was pretty
- 14:19interested in this as well. So Nylon is launching Nylon like
- 14:23the magazine, like the well, they're like a digital publisher
- 14:25now. I don't even, I don't even know
- 14:27if they do print anymore. Did they ever do print?
- 14:29I'm so confused. They went digital only in 2017
- 14:33and then in 2024 I think they relaunched print anyways, the
- 14:38magazine. So they are launching a
- 14:40membership only program at the end of 2025.
- 14:43It's invite only. It's free to join if you're
- 14:46invited, but it is invite only. So CEO of Bustle Group, which
- 14:51like owns Nylon, Brian Goldberg said, quote, we're going to
- 14:55bring together thousands of the most influential young
- 14:58tastemakers in America into a membership and the brands will
- 15:01pay us to get adjacency with this incredible community of
- 15:05influencers. Our goal is to ultimately get
- 15:08this program to 50,000 influencers with an average of
- 15:10100,000 followers each, which would get us to a 5 billion
- 15:15reach. So this model essentially is
- 15:19similar, especially because it's free for invite only members.
- 15:23This model is similar to the controlled distribution model in
- 15:26the magazine print days where a specific group of people that
- 15:30advertisers like wanted to get in front of, let's say it was
- 15:32like finance people or like people in IT or whatever.
- 15:35They got sent magazines or print issues for free.
- 15:39And the advertisers were paying obviously to like be in these
- 15:42magazines and have their ads and their brand sent to these people
- 15:48in these industries for free. This also differs from other
- 15:51invite only membership programs because you don't have to pay.
- 15:54So like there are a lot of those like Soho House is a good
- 15:57example. Or like kind of there's a lot
- 15:59for like entrepreneurs where you like get invited based on like
- 16:02your status in the industry or based on like your company's
- 16:05revenue or whatever, but you have to pay.
- 16:07So I do like that this is free for the people that they invite.
- 16:10I think that does make it, I mean, it's, it's going to make
- 16:14it more appealing to people who get invited, but also it's, I
- 16:17don't know, just feels more like ethical.
- 16:19I think, even though I understand because the people
- 16:21that they're going to invite are going to already be probably
- 16:23like rich slash famous people, but it just feels more ethical
- 16:27than asking them to pay. I don't know.
- 16:28He also said that media businesses have not embraced
- 16:31community enough. And I could not agree more.
- 16:36I actually talked about this when I did that big presentation
- 16:39about the brand at Sunrise a couple weeks ago.
- 16:41I talked about how like a couple years ago, Centennial pivoted to
- 16:44like almost fully community based publishing, which
- 16:48essentially just means like we deprioritizedour.com.
- 16:51We deprioritized like anything for clicks and we went all in on
- 16:55like building a culty audience who like specifically like know
- 16:58who we are. Come for us.
- 17:00You know, it's not just like people Googling like what
- 17:02happened between like Tana Mojo and Brooke Schofield and then
- 17:05like clicking on the article on our website, reading it and
- 17:07leaving Because I was saying we could have literally 10 million
- 17:11users on our website every single month and advertisers did
- 17:15not give a shit about that. And users don't really give a
- 17:18shit about that. Like that's not building an
- 17:20audience of fans of people that actually like care about your
- 17:25brand and what you're putting out.
- 17:27That's just like people that those are just eyeballs.
- 17:29Like those are just people that are like reading the story
- 17:31because they want the tea and leaving.
- 17:32So I talked in the sunrise presentation about how we went
- 17:35all in on that. And then of course, like
- 17:37launching Mini Scroll was like kind of replace placing our like
- 17:40daily publishing on our.com because we used to publish news
- 17:45stories every single day on our.com and like a couple
- 17:47opinion pieces a month. And so now obviously, like
- 17:50launching mini, like bringing all of our Daily News to a
- 17:53podcast, we're like, now we're actually building an audience
- 17:57that like, cares about us, like knows who we are and cares.
- 18:00And it's just been transformative.
- 18:02And it's, it's so true. Like the community.
- 18:05If you can figure out how to build a community as a media
- 18:08brand, as a publisher, like truly people who are like fans
- 18:11of your brand, then that is the key to success and longevity.
- 18:16And I think with traditional media, unfortunately, like young
- 18:19people don't trust like big names because they're, they,
- 18:23they just feel faceless, you know, like we're all used to
- 18:25having parasocial relationships with like creators, Tik tokers,
- 18:29like, you know, we want to have like a face to the name and like
- 18:32just these big brands that we don't know, they're just like
- 18:37faceless that doesn't like, no one can connect with that.
- 18:39Even like Vogue, like we all know who Anna Wintour is.
- 18:42You know, it's not like I don't necessarily connect with Anna
- 18:45Wintour, but I understand who is like behind the brand, which is
- 18:48also why in media and digital social media, which we talked
- 18:52about what, what was it last week I was talking about?
- 18:55Oh yeah. It was in the Try Guys situation
- 18:57where they said like nobody would like in buzz at BuzzFeed,
- 19:01they wouldn't let people have like jobs outside of her, like
- 19:04freelance work, whatever, like outside of BuzzFeed.
- 19:06And I was saying like, I have so many friends in digital media
- 19:09who really struggle because they want to do more like influencer
- 19:12type content or whatever and they're not allowed to.
- 19:15And it's like if you just let your employees be influencers
- 19:19too, because they already have a lifestyle so similar to that.
- 19:22They're already testing all these products, they're already
- 19:24doing all these things. I get it.
- 19:25Like, I understand from a business perspective, like the
- 19:28fear of like a conflict of interest.
- 19:30However, allowing employees to do their own, like to build
- 19:33their own personal brand, that is what's actually going to
- 19:36bring like relevancy back to traditional media is if people
- 19:41are connected to the editors, like influencers like they used
- 19:45to be. And then all of these media
- 19:46companies put in these clauses in everyone's contract where
- 19:49like they can't do any like self promotion like that.
- 19:52They can't do any freelance work, they can't do any
- 19:54influencer stuff, whatever. So then that all kind of went
- 19:57away. And it's like that's actually
- 19:59what's going to get them back into relevancy.
- 20:02As if people know the face behind the these brands, right?
- 20:05These like big publishers. That's a tangent.
- 20:07OK. So the other thing though that I
- 20:09wanted to talk about this story is so I was talking to one of my
- 20:12other friends that owns like a digital media brand, like an
- 20:15independent digital media brand. And I was like, this is
- 20:17interesting. They're going all in on these
- 20:19like kind of tastemaker events, whatever.
- 20:21And you hear that all the time in media, all the time.
- 20:24One of the number one pieces of advice that people give me about
- 20:29like revenue and like diversifying is like get into
- 20:31events. It's like, I'm not an events
- 20:33company, but yeah, my friend was like, why is it that media feels
- 20:38like one of the only industries where you have to constantly be
- 20:41changing your revenue model like legitimately every two years?
- 20:44Like of course there's always fluctuations in every industry,
- 20:47every market, especially with the rate of tech and everything
- 20:49now. Like of course every industry
- 20:52has to evolve and adapt, but media is 1 where it is like the
- 20:55goal posts move constantly so much.
- 20:59It is so difficult to monetize in media.
- 21:02And I feel like until you're in it or unless you're in it like
- 21:05you, you might not realize that because it seems like you see
- 21:08influencers, they make so much money or these big companies
- 21:11like Barstool or whatever BFFS podcast, like they have so many
- 21:13ads. The 1% is making like a
- 21:16bajillion dollars and then no one else is making any money.
- 21:20And so yeah, my friend was like, OK, sure.
- 21:23So now we all have to be events companies, but I thought that
- 21:27was some interesting industry tea.
- 21:30It actually gave me some stuff to think about, especially as we
- 21:33grow a bigger audience, A cultier audience.
- 21:36Something to think about anyways guys, that's it for Mini Scroll
- 21:39today. Thank you so much for listening.
- 21:40I love you guys. Please remember to rate, review
- 21:43and subscribe. We're trying to get to 10,000
- 21:47YouTube, YouTube, YouTube subscribers.
- 21:50I love you guys and I will talk to you tomorrow for Mini tech
- 21:54scroll. Bye.