Latest / Mini Scroll / MINI SCROLL: TikToker Eva Evans passes away, Brit Smith defends JoJo Siwa's Karma + Watcher goes back on paid service

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MINI SCROLL: TikToker Eva Evans passes away, Brit Smith defends JoJo Siwa's Karma + Watcher goes back on paid service · Mini Scroll

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  Hi everyone. Welcome to Mini Scroll, the
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  daily 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. I'm your host, Lauren Meisner,
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  the founder of the youth digital media brand Centennial Worlds.
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  Welcome back to Mini Scroll, everyone.
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  All right, I wanted to let you guys know that I watched Baby
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  Reindeer. My brother and I just finished
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  it last night and I considered recapping it on today's mini
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  Scroll, but I already had three stories and I just don't know
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  where to insert like content updates.
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  I don't know if I should do like a full episode recapping it.
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  So let me know, slide into my DMS, leave a comment, whatever.
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  Let me know if you guys want content recaps again.
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  And if you want to hear me talk about baby reindeer.
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  I don't know if it will be in like a deep dive or mini scroll,
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  whatever. But if you want to hear from me
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  about it, let me know. All right, the first story that
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  I have for you guys today is a very sad one.
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  So TikTok star Eva Evans has passed away at the age of 29.
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  It's been a rough week for the TikTok community as another
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  prolific creator has passed away too soon.
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  Eva Evans, a popular TikTok creator who posted about her
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  life in NYC, has passed away at the age of 29.
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  Eva's passing was announced by her two sisters, Zoe and Lila
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  Joy, they wrote. Quote Yesterday my family
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  received news that our sweet, fabulous, creative, caring,
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  hilarious Eva, my beautiful sister, has died after 24 hours.
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  I still find myself in a constant cycle of denial and
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  acceptance, so I know how unbelievable and hard to process
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  this news will be. So when Eva wasn't building her
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  brand on TikTok, she was a filmmaker, having directed and
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  starred in the Amazon Prime Video web series called Club
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  Rat. Club Rat rolled out last year
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  with five episodes and saw Eva play an influencer who was
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  navigating dating in New York City after a chaotic and viral
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  breakup. So many New York City
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  influencers and personalities have paid tribute to Eva online,
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  including Julia Fox, who said Eva always stuck up for her, and
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  photographer Ashley Armtage, who wrote quote.
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  Eva was smart, hilarious, creative, caring, magnetic
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  confidence. She said on Instagram.
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  She moved through the world loving and laughing at
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  everything. So sad.
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  And like I said last week, I really consider how to report on
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  death and if I'm going to report on people passing away on this
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  podcast. But I feel like when they are a
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  prolific creator that has made an impact like clearly Eva had,
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  then I think it's important to kind of pay tribute to that and,
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  you know, touch on her legacy. So very, very sad.
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  All right, the next story that I have for you guys is that Brit
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  Smith has set the record straight on JoJo Siwa allegedly
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  stealing her song Karma. So singer-songwriter and model
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  Britt Smith has finally addressed the accusations that
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  JoJo Siwa stole her song Karma. JoJo released Karma earlier this
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  month as her first kind of grown up single.
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  As we know, Jojo's rebrand has been highly criticized, as has
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  her new music. One of the most contentious
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  parts of this rebrand is that it turned out that JoJo single
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  Karma was actually a song that was originally performed by
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  Britt Smith in 2012. So somebody leaked the Vimo
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  music video of Britt initially singing this song, the music
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  video from it, and then Britt actually released the song
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  herself. I don't know how I feel about
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  that move but I also understand just from like your own personal
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  perspective wanting to capitalize on this moment.
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  Like TikTok users were so excited to hear Britt's version
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  and many people said that it was better than Jojo's so I
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  understand wanting to release it.
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  OK so this all led to accusations that JoJo stole
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  Britt's song. So there is so much
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  misinformation going around about Jojo's rebrand and so many
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  people are accusing her of lying about writing her own songs,
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  which she has never said. And in relation to karma, she
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  actually spoke about her first reaction the first time that she
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  heard the song in an interview with Billboard.
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  So she talked about like the lyrics that were presented to
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  her and how she felt about singing that song.
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  In my opinion, that makes it pretty clear she didn't write
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  the song. So after weeks of JoJo being
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  dragged, some of it is rightfully so.
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  Okay. Like I'm not trying to be a JoJo
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  apologist but I just feel like we need to operate off of facts.
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  And when it comes to Jojos rebrand nobody wants to hear the
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  facts. They just have so many feelings
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  about it and they're just throwing things out and claiming
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  that she is like lying about this or doing that when none of
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  that is true. So Britt Smith has taken to
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  TikTok to talk about or address JoJo, quote, UN quote, stealing
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  her song. She said, I'm here to set the
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  record straight once and for all.
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  JoJo did not steal my song. There's been a lot of talk and a
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  lot of comments and they just keep going.
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  So I thought, let me come on here and hopefully put an end to
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  this. She was totally in the right to
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  record her version. And I hate to see that anybody
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  would think I'm a part of any kind of bullying or anything
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  like that. I was bullied in high school and
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  I know what that feels like. And I would never want to be
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  thought to be any part of that. I just want to make it clear
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  that JoJo has done nothing wrong to me.
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  Also, just to say on the other side of that, I'm so grateful to
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  you guys for the support and love you showed me on my
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  version. Somebody unearthed it from 12
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  years ago on Vimo, my video. And it has been a crazy
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  whirlwind since the last week. And then Britt basically
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  finished by saying she is releasing an EP kind of off the
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  back of all of this love and support on May 17th.
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  So I am glad that she has addressed this.
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  There have been lots of people in the music industry that have
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  come forward saying there's no way that JoJo like stole this
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  song. She obviously had permission and
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  the rights to record this. But then if you guys have seen
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  any of that content, you'll see that in like Twitter, tick tock
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  comments, whatever. People are just going off being
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  like, there's no way or like, I don't care.
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  She stole Brit's song. Brit did it better just not
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  believing that JoJo didn't steal the song.
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  That would be just highly illegal.
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  Like she is so visible. She is very, very famous.
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  She did not do this with the proper kind of procedures in
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  place, the processes in place. But anyways, so that puts that
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  to bed. JoJo did not steal this song.
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  She obviously had permission and the rights to record her own
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  version of it. And the last story that I have
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  for you guys is a little update on the watcher situation from
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  yesterday. So following backlash from their
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  audience after the announcement that they would be pay walling
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  all of their content moving forward, YouTube creators
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  Watcher Entertainment is back with an update.
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  In a new video posted today, Watcher creators Steven Lim,
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  Ryan Vergara, and Shane Mage said they quote messed up and
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  are taking the feedback seriously.
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  So they started this video by apologizing for their previous
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  video, which they posted on Friday.
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  They apologized to their audience for not making it clear
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  how important the Watcher viewers are to them and for
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  failing to acknowledge that the viewers are really the reason
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  that they have a platform to begin with.
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  And then they went on to say sorry for implying that the
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  price of 599 a month, which is what their paywall content will
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  cost, is an amount of money that anyone can afford.
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  Now, the creators have made some changes off the back of this
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  feedback. They said that they will keep
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  all of their content for free on YouTube and for those who have
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  signed up for their subscription service for their pay walled
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  content, they will just get access to that content one month
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  earlier and ad free. And finally, they addressed why
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  they chose to launch their own platform.
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  Basically, they said it's been difficult to stay relevant to
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  advertisers as the YouTube landscape has changed.
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  And I don't know if this is true or not, But they said, and it
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  sounded pretty honest, that if they hadn't chosen to go with
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  this model, like if they were just going to stick to what they
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  were doing with YouTube and their Patreon, they would have
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  either had to lay off a bunch of their staff or they would have
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  had to just close the Watcher Entertainment company
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  altogether. And they didn't want to do that.
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  They wanted to give it its best shot.
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  So that's the update on that. I think it's pretty rare that we
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  see people flip flop so easily. So maybe I will take back what I
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  said yesterday, which is that they knew how much of their
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  audience would not sign up to it.
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  I mean, maybe they still did, but I just feel like the
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  immediate flip flop, it's either because the backlash was so
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  intense and so unexpected, which I think is part of that.
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  And like I was saying yesterday, the fact that they got like all
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  this mainstream press over it in like a negative way, I'm sure
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  impacted their decision to do this.
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  But then also, so I feel like they're kind of flip flop tells
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  me maybe this wasn't a very thought through decision.
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  I don't know. Anyways, guys, that is it for
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  mini scroll today. Thank you so much for listening.
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  Please remember to rate review and subscribe.
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  I love you guys so much and I will talk to you guys tomorrow.
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  Bye.