Latest / Mini Scroll / MINI SCROLL: Justin Baldoni $400 million lawsuit, TikTok creators spill "secrets" ahead of ban, Trisha Paytas x Alex Consani campaign + Allanah Harris update

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MINI SCROLL: Justin Baldoni $400 million lawsuit, TikTok creators spill "secrets" ahead of ban, Trisha Paytas x Alex Consani campaign + Allanah Harris update · 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 World.
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  Welcome back to Mini Scroll, everyone.
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  All right, I want to get straight in to the stories for
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  today. And the first one, it's a little
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  bit of an offshoot of Friday's deep dive.
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  So I'm going to talk about how Justin Baldoni is now suing
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  Blake Lively, Ryan Reynolds and their PR team for $400 million
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  in the ongoing It ends with US legal battle.
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  OK, before I get into what he's saying, I knew that Friday's
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  episode would be very divisive because that the whole situation
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  around this legal battle, there are a lot of very, very strong
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  opinions, but I did not realize how divisive it would be.
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  I genuinely like, I don't know how to accurately convey this
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  but I genuinely did not try to sway your opinion one way or
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  another and I'm getting comments that episode was about celebrity
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  smear campaigns. I genuinely apologize if you
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  feel like we didn't do it justice.
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  Like that is literally my biggest concern about this
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  brand, this podcast in general. That's one of my biggest
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  insecurities. That's why every time you guys
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  let me know I've made a mistake or if I discover that I've made
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  a mistake on a story in my reporting, I come on here and I
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  literally immediately address it or I make a community note or
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  whatever it is. I'll re edit episodes sometimes.
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  Like that is one of my biggest concerns.
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  And I also recognize that the people listening to this are
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  probably not the people that have since unsubscribed after
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  Friday's episode. And so this is probably landing
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  on deaf ears kind of. But genuinely, that episode was
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  about celebrity smear campaigns, the history of celebrity smear
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  campaigns. I recognize that obviously there
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  was some type of, you know, like I talked about how Blake Lively
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  was smeared, but the episode was about like online smear
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  campaigns and how we participate in them.
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  And you know, the, at the time, the evidence that we had about
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  Justin Baldoni's PR team specifically, I even indicated
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  in that episode, like we have no idea if he was aware of some of
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  these tactics and things that were said between his publicist.
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  That episode was written and released literally.
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  I mean, it was released like an hour before this, his lawsuit
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  was made public. And I indicated that in the
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  YouTube comments as well. So I apologize if you think I'm
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  stupid now. And honestly, it like, genuinely
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  hurt my feelings. But yes, so let's get into the
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  updates. So like I said on Friday,
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  literally a couple hours after we released that episode, it was
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  made public that Justin Baldoni is suing Blake Lively and her
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  husband Ryan Reynolds for defamation and extortion,
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  seeking $400 million in damages, including loss of income.
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  Quote, This is a case about two of the most powerful stars in
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  the world deploying their enormous power to steal an
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  entire film right out of the hands of its director and
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  production studio, the suit says.
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  Then, when Lively and Reynolds efforts failed to win them the
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  acclaim they believed they so richly deserved, they turned
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  their fury on their chosen scapegoat.
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  This is something that I think I failed to mention in the deep
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  dive, which is one of the I think less talked about elements
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  of this legal battle is that Justin Baldoni has significantly
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  less power like cultural capital influence power in Hollywood and
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  in the public sphere, at least at the time then Blake obviously
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  did and Ryan Reynolds and them as a couple.
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  And that is something that you typically don't see, I guess, as
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  far as we're aware of in these kind of like, celebrity smear
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  campaigns, it typically is the person with more power, you
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  know, who kind of has the upper hand and is helping push that
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  narrative forward. OK, so this is definitely not
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  everything, but some points from his filing.
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  So Blake's claims that she was shown pornography and subjected
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  to unwanted sexual discussions from Justin are false.
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  The suit claims, quote, Lively was so close and comfortable
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  with Baldoni that she freely breastfed in front of him during
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  meetings, the suit says. The suit then claims that Blake
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  took moments like this and recast them as sexual
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  harassment. It also says that contrary to
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  Blake's claims, every request she made for an intimacy
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  coordinator was honored. In relation to the fat shaming
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  allegations, Justin claims he has back problems, so he
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  privately and politely asked Blake her weight so he could
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  work with his trainer to be able to lift her safely.
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  Ryan Reynolds then quote swore at Baldoni and accused him of
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  fat shaming his wife. In Justin's complaint, he claims
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  that Jake Blake sorry that Blake joked that he needs a nose job.
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  The suit alleges that Ryan Reynolds was responsible for
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  Justin being dropped by his talent agency WME, claiming he
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  approached an executive and quote, expressed his deep
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  disdain for Baldoni, suggesting the agency was working with a
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  sexual predator. He claims Blake didn't read the
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  book, which caused creative clashes.
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  If that's true, that is so wild. But the part of the lawsuit that
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  the Internet is absolutely running wild with is this text
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  that Blake allegedly sent to Justin in which she refers to
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  herself as Khaleesi from Game of Thrones and talks about Taylor
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  Swift and Ryan Reynolds as her Dragons.
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  So she allegedly wrote to Justin, quote, if you ever get
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  around to watching Game of Thrones, you'll appreciate that
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  I'm Khaleesi and like her, I happen to have a few Dragons,
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  for better or worse, but usually better because my Dragons also
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  protect those I fight for. So really, we all benefit from
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  those gorgeous monsters of mine. You will too, I can promise you.
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  That is unfortunately one of the most cringe things that I think
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  we've ever seen come out of celebrity culture.
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  I've seen so many people be like, you just know Taylor Swift
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  is seething that this text got released and that she is being
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  referred to as one of Blake Lively's Dragons.
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  But yes, so that is again, like a high level recap of his suit
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  against Blake. And again, I am very sorry if
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  you felt like I was trying to sway you one way or another last
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  week. Obviously, the episode
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  specifically was about celebrity smear campaigns, and I was using
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  what happened to Blake Lively back in like August as kind of a
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  prime example of that. And that was related to like
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  Internet culture. OK, The next story that I have
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  for you guys is obviously we're going to talk about the TikTok
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  ban, OK? So obviously we've been awaiting
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  this TikTok ban. And it happened in the US.
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  It did happen, but it was less than 24 hours.
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  So Annabelle will cover this more in depth on Wednesday's
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  tech update. But I wanted to share some
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  thoughts from like a cultural perspective.
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  I was on a bunch of TikTok lives all Sunday afternoon, just
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  watching Americans get like wiped off the app, like their
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  accounts just get taken down while they were on live.
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  And it was really sad. And it was it was just it felt
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  like eerie and creepy. They would be on live and then
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  suddenly they would be gone, but their profile picture would just
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  be kind of like where their face was and the chat would still be
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  going. And people were saying the
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  craziest stuff in the chat. Like people were writing like
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  diva down or like Mama a legislation behind you, like the
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  most insane stuff. And like it was funny, but it
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  was also sad because a huge part of this whole TikTok ban and I
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  think we can reflect on it now that it's back up.
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  But like there was almost no communication from TikTok on how
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  this would go down. So creators were kind of aware
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  that they were going to be losing their jobs.
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  Businesses that rely on TikTok were kind of aware that they
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  would be using this massive, losing this massive influential
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  platform. But there was so little
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  communication around what that would look like and how that
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  would go down South that I think felt a little bit unethical.
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  To me, it felt a bit icky because the accounts, unlike I
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  think what we originally thought, which was that they
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  would just get deleted. Like American TikTok essentially
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  would get deleted. And if it ever came back, they
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  would have to start from scratch.
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  So that was not the case, right? Their accounts all still
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  existed. They were just locked out of
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  them. And to me that felt very not
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  worse because obviously I don't want anyone to lose their
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  followers or anything like that, but it felt risky.
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  I suppose it's probably the right word because in that case,
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  you know, we as non Americans still had access to all their
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  content, all their comment sections.
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  We could still duet stitch, like engage with all of their
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  content. But these creators, A, had
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  probably very little way to know about what was going on on
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  TikTok and B, no way to respond to that or like, moderate their
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  comment section. And so if this ban had gone on
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  longer, I think we would have seen some serious consequences
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  of that with like, rumors, misinformation, all of these
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  things. And, you know, things that could
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  just spread like wildfire, whether it's about a specific
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  creator or just specific information that starts going
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  wild in these comment sections. And nobody can stop it because
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  these accounts, they don't have access to them anymore.
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  Obviously this didn't really end up being an issue because they
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  were only locked out for, you know, such a short amount of
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  time. But if this did last
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  significantly longer, I think that this would have become a
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  problem. Then there was the trend of
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  creators revealing their like secrets before the app went
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  dark. So I didn't really take a lot of
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  these secrets that seriously. I don't know about you guys, but
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  I feel like a lot of these secrets were kind of like
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  satire. However, I suppose the through
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  line with all of these secrets, I'm sure there's like a a shred
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  of truth to all of them. And the through line was that
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  creators are really not as authentic as they pretend to be.
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  So there were a lot of creators claiming that they embellish or
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  lie in their vlogs or their fitness videos or their mukbangs
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  or whatever type of content they create.
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  I think the most damaging was that a few big creators claimed
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  that they lie about brand deals where they haven't even tried
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  the product. And I think even though we all
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  know there is an element of allusion to what we see online,
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  I think hearing from these creators that they've sold us a
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  lie, I don't know how there's going to be any coming back from
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  that for them. I don't know.
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  And when I say it, we all know that there's this element of
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  illusion. I don't necessarily think that's
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  a bad thing. Like for me, when I watch, I
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  don't know, day in the life logs or morning routines or whatever,
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  like I am seeking out the most unrealistic or aspirational ones
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  because I want to use them as like inspiration.
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  So I have something that I'm like striving for, if that makes
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  sense. However, I am also so 33 years
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  old and you know, I have had time and space to develop my
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  sense of self and just understand my triggers and
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  understand how to interact with online content in a way that is
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  more healthy. But if I was consuming that type
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  of content all throughout my teens and my 20s, I could not
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  have handled it like that would just not have been the case.
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  So I think there's several layers to the impact of like
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  these confessions. It'll be interesting to see if,
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  in general, audiences lose a lot of trust for specific
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  influencers who claimed that they've been lying about things
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  or if, you know, these creators have trouble working with
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  different brands in the future and things like that.
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  I think this was such a blip in the radar, at least for now.
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  It's possible that we just kind of like, move on business as
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  usual. But we will see.
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  OK. The next story that I have for
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  you guys is it seems like Trisha Paytas and Alex Kansani will be
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  starring in a campaign together soon.
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  So the creators were in the UK this week posting content
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  together on a photo shoot in very big glam.
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  Tricia tagged one of her videos quote models and everyone was
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  like, Oh my God, what is this about?
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  And now it seems like this photo shoot could have been for an
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  upcoming Mac campaign as the official Mac Cosmetics TikTok
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  account commented. I think this play is about us.
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  And then Tricia liked it. So if you don't know who Alex
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  is, she's a famous model and a huge tick tocker.
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  With over 4.3 million followers, she's considered the world's
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  youngest transgender model, starting her career at the age
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  of 12. In 2024, she was also the first
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  transgender model to walk in the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show.
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  But in the digital space, she's just kind of like, I don't know
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  if she's just like, an icon. Like, her content often goes
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  viral. She started this trend in 2023.
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  Just from, like, a really random funny video of her swirling this
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  jug of water when she was, like, at a restaurant swirling the jug
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  of water that they brought her and had a lemon in it.
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  And her caption said, when they be giving me the fancy water.
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  And she was like, dancing at the table.
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  And everyone started recreating that.
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  So people are really excited to see them together.
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  People are really excited to see them getting possibly a big
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  commercial campaign like Mac cosmetics.
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  That would be so sick. And that would be pretty on
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  brand for Mac. They're like usually quite on
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  the pulse with that kind of stuff.
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  At least they have been historically.
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  OK. And the last story that I have
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  for you guys, this is a trigger warning.
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  I'm going to be talking about alleged child abuse.
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  So TikTok influencer Australian TikTok influencer mummy vlogger
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  Alana Harris has allegedly been arrested.
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  So I covered the story a couple of months ago but at a high
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  level. Australian mummy Blogger Alana
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  Harris built a following of over 1,000,000 on TikTok for posting
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  family content. A huge portion of her content
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  centered around taking care of their one daughter, who they
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  claimed her and her husband Brock claimed was very sick.
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  In November, an anonymous whistleblower claimed that Alana
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  was making their baby sick intentionally by drugging her.
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  This was seemingly confirmed when Alana's husband Brock
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  posted about it on his Snapchat, saying that he had no part in
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  this. Now Alana has reportedly been
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  arrested in Queensland. This is from the ABC quote.
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  It is alleged between August and October last year the woman gave
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  her daughter, who has a medical condition, medications which
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  were not prescribed to her and without medical approval.
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  She allegedly poisoned her daughter and recorded her
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  physical and emotional suffering to illicit donations and is
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  accused of defrauding donors of $60,000 via crowdfunding.
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  This continues. She was charged with several
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  offenses including multiple counts of administering poison
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  with intent to harm and one count each of torture, making
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  Child Exploitation material, and fraud.
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  So that is an update on the Harris family.
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  This is just such a tragic situation and another example of
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  why children should not be allowed online.
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  Family vlogging should legitimately be illegal.
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  Anyways guys, that's it for mini scroll today.
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  Thank you so much for listening. Please remember to rate, review
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  and subscribe. We love you guys and I will talk
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  to you tomorrow. Bye.