January 23, 2025 • 24 mins
In this episode, we’re diving into the latest industry shake-ups, tools for professional growth, and the power of connections in driving innovation. Here’s what’s on the agenda:
In the News:
- Shutterstock and Getty Unite: A deep dive into the potential merger of these visual media giants—how it could reshape the creative landscape, empower creators, and redefine storytelling in the digital age.
- Fanbase on the Rise: With a surge in users and successful fundraising efforts, Fanbase is setting the stage for creator-driven platforms. What does this mean for digital independence and the future of monetization?
- Big Agency Consolidation: Omnicom and IPG merge to create a super holding company, while Publicis Worldwide and Leo Burnett combine forces. We explore the market implications and what this means for creative professionals.
Graphite Pro Tool Tip of the Day:
- Master the art of pivoting: what it means, tools to help, and embracing the unknown.
- Find joy in your work and strategies for coping with industry consolidation.
Networking for Innovation:
Discover why personal connections and industry events are critical for staying ahead in the ever-evolving creative and tech spaces.
Get ready to explore, adapt, and find opportunities in a changing industry landscape. Tune in now!
You've been tuned in to Graphite Radio, where creativity meets culture. Part of the Kaffeine Audio Network and proudly distributed by Pepper Labs. Thanks for joining us on this journey of ideas, art, and innovation. Be sure to subscribe and stay connected for more stories that shape the world we create. Until next time, keep sketching your vision into reality.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is.
This is this is Graphite Radio.
Thank you.
What's good, peeps.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
I'm your conductor.
Instructor Adrian Franks, akaAD Frank, want to welcome you to
Graphite Radio Show, episode 3.
Yeah, I know it's the thirdweek of January.
It's a new year, new ideas, newopportunities.
I hope you guys are doing well.
I know we're kind of enteringthis new phase of like existence
(01:22):
and you know we're going to befine.
So again, welcome to the show.
We're gonna have fun.
It's gonna be a great journeyand you know we're just gonna go
out here and we're just gonnabuild.
We're not gonna let anythingget in our way and we're just
gonna be the best we can be withwho we can be.
Let's jump right.
In last episode I updated youguys on what we were doing at
(01:42):
graphite in terms of the websiteand some of the other platforms
.
As you guys know, we're part ofthe Caffeine Pod Network and
you know we've got a coupleother different pods on the same
network.
But you know we want to just Iwant to just let you guys know
that.
You know the site is currentlyup.
It's been up for a while.
We also are going to startadding certain things to it,
(02:06):
like, you know, ways to find usoutside of social.
You know social is in thisweird state and we can get into
that later on in the pod, but Ijust want to make sure I create
things that I can connect withyou guys directly, and that's
usually through emails or sometype of newsletter or what we
call like crm.
Also, I'm actually going to dosomething that's kind of like
throwback, right, it's the thingthat we started these set
(02:27):
publishing journeys about, Iguess 15, 20 years ago.
Yeah, I'm bringing back my blog, right, I was talking with my
wife, nicole, and she mentionedsomething about this idea of
bylines and blogs.
We kind of got to get back tothat.
Right, we can no longer justgive all our just creative
capital to these platforms, ofall our just creative capital to
these platforms either we don'town or, obviously, we don't
control.
So why not go back to thethings that we used to control,
(02:50):
which was, like, you know,blogging?
I remember my first blog was,you know, blogger, right, I
think it eventually got boughtby Google, but it was like a ton
of different blogging platformsin like the early 2000s and I
think there was something coolabout that, right, you know, it
was kind of like Tumblr.
Then it was Blogger and it waslike I can't remember something
else.
I don't know how old I'mgetting, but yeah, those
(03:10):
platforms were really coolbecause it just allowed for you
to express yourself freely, youcould post photos, you could
write about it.
I think even a guy likeTa-Nehisi Coates actually got
his start.
That had started like justwriting, like professionally,
just blogging, and that turnedinto like a wonderful career
here, producing all thesebeautiful books and even doing
things for Marvel.
So, yeah, I do think a lot ofus that are like these, you know
(03:33):
, pro creatives or semi-procreatives are just inspiring
dope individuals.
We got to get back to owningwhat we do.
And then I think bringing backthe blog may not be a bad idea,
right?
Especially if you attach it toyour website and attach it to a
newsletter.
I just mentioned that earlier.
So, yeah, let's bring back theblog.
You know social mediatechnically is what they call
microblogging.
It became social media, solet's go back to like some
(03:55):
things that we own.
So, again, they'll be bringingback the blog.
They'll be rolling out thenewsletters in the coming weeks,
so definitely stay tuned forthat.
Let's jump right into the news.
I want to talk about threespecific things around
creativity and imagery, some newopportunities around social
(04:17):
media as well as what I'mcalling the big agency
consolidation.
So the first thing I want totalk about is the big
consolidation, or, more so, theShutterstock and Getty combining
into this big super giant oflicensing.
Now, if you know anything aboutShutterstock and Getty, it was
the premier house in terms oflicensing of imagery and
(04:39):
photography and illustrationsand even iconography and
definitely videos.
At one point in time, theseguys was actually actually like
in this thing what we call likea licensing war.
You can see like Getty'simagery and like their name in
any credit of a film and TV.
And Shutterstock you can see alot of their things in like
campaigns, and both of thoseguys were kind of more or less
playing in each other's face.
(04:59):
But as you notice how things arehappening in today's world,
that it's like this bigconsolidation of like everything
Well, it's also that you knowsomething like a Shutterstock
and Getty.
They got to kind of combine too, because if you're going to be
somewhat competitive, they gotto think about what it means to
produce content.
Catalog has been licensedthrough.
You know professionalphotographers.
I guess you guys want to callthem content creators of today.
(05:22):
I still call them.
You know, pros, right?
Photographers, illustrators orjust videographers Overall, just
these beautiful people who makejust great content right.
A lot of that imagery and thatcontent have more or less been
licensed, either through like abrokerage house or directly
(05:43):
through the extra producerthemselves, and those things are
licensed out for differentpurposes, where it's gonna be
for advertising, b2b efforts oryou know anything, for TV and
definitely like some otherpromotional things.
Now, if you think about this newworld that they're living in,
they kind of kind of competewith generative AI.
They got to compete with socialmedia.
You can argue that generativeAI probably put the nail in the
coffin, but what really gaveboth of these platforms a run
(06:05):
for their money was thedemocratization of creativity
itself through the phone,especially with social media.
You know, iphone came out in2007.
You know, everybody all of asudden now had a really decent
kind of camera in your pocket,right, but what made it powerful
is that that camera becameattached to the internet and
then it also became attached tosocial media.
(06:26):
We won't name the big onethat's out there, but early days
was like Hipstamatic and Iforgot the one.
I think it was called Flickr,right, yeah, it was Flickr.
So those platforms allow peopleto like, upload imagery and
share with the people.
Then came along social media.
You know Friendsters to whatused to be, I guess, cool
Facebook.
Even Facebook kind of started alittle fringy by judging
(06:48):
people's well, women's faces.
But we won't go there.
Then it was Hipstamatic.
Then it became Instagram.
Instagram, I think, is whatreally unleashed the democratic
power of content creation as weknow it today.
Shutterstock and Getty they werekind of like the OGs, right,
and it was like a couple otherones too.
It was like Corvus.
It was like, oh man, I used toknow all these off the top of my
head.
Now I guess it's been so longsince I've had to use stock
(07:12):
photography I just can'tremember.
And, by the way, stock used tobe one of those things that you
have to actually look through acatalog and order it on a phone
to actually get that image.
So they'll send you some CDs.
You kind of download a comp ofit client like it.
You get the high res sent toyou and some kind of
downloadable link or a CD, andthat's what it was.
But in today's world that'sdefinitely changing.
(07:33):
These two platforms are nowtrying to see how can they
really engage designers, how canthey engage marketers, even
content enthusiasts, but youwant to look at the reason why
they're actually combining.
They got to stay competitive.
They can't beat the techcompanies.
They can't beat the differentways to generate an image from
the different large languagemodels, or you know these AI
(07:55):
bots right.
So, yeah, I think that mightnot be a bad move for these guys
.
Unfortunately, it's going to bea lot of layoffs, but I do
think for those who are stillworking for those companies, the
best thing to do is they canjust try to pivot Learn these
tools, learn these new AI tools,shoot better content right, or
maybe go work for a smallerlicensing company that really
does this very well.
(08:16):
So that's my take Show thestock and get it.
Let's chat about fan base More.
So.
Let's specifically talk aboutfan base.
Maybe spill a couple otherplatforms that now can more or
less capitalize on opportunityfrom the backlash of people not
really liking a lot of thepolicy changes coming out of
(08:36):
meta.
Now, if you're followingeverything on social right fan
base owned by isaac hayes, thethird son of Isaac Hayes.
Second, the beautiful musicianfrom way back when.
Love is love is music, love ismusic.
Long story short, this guy got achance to give people reason to
kind of join fans base, notjust because they've been around
(08:57):
they're the alternative to, youknow, instagram and a lot of
the social platforms but more soit's this idea that you can
actually own a part of a fanbase.
Now they're doing like this bigcampaign that are more or less
getting people to kind of go anddonate I think like $399 and
you kind of become like a partowner on a platform, which I
actually think is something kindof cool to that, bro.
(09:17):
You know this idea that, hey,you can be on a platform that
you can build culturally withyour ideas and your content, but
also with your dollars.
It's nothing like in capitalismthat speaks louder than your
actual dollars, because that's alevel of intent that says that
I'm going to take this tool forliving and enjoyment and, you
know, I guess, convenience, andI'm going to use it to empower
(09:40):
something that I actuallybelieve in.
Right, it's like you buy stockson an exchange.
It's kind of the same thing.
Now, I think this approach hereis it seems that they're
wanting to make sure that whenyou're contributing to this
platform, that certain thingswill have to kind of more or
less be thought about, notnecessarily from the people who
started Fanbase or who currentlyrun in it, but more so from the
(10:01):
community.
If everybody who's on thisplatform for the most, not all
are investing in this platform,then it's probably not one of
those things that they can justeasily change it up how they
feel.
The problem with the bigplatform out there, the big
boogeyman Meta, the big megaplatform, is that at any given
(10:22):
moment, the person who leadsMeta, which is Zuck, he can just
kind of change what he wantsright.
This guy, I think, has roughlya large percentage I think it's
even like 16% of the company.
That's pretty huge.
So his voice is going to ringloud and far and this is a
publicly traded company, but heowns a lot of stocks and he's
(10:44):
basically only going to look outfor the you know, the interests
of the stockholders.
So if you take Fanbase, samething.
If everybody or most of thepeople on this platform is now
owning something on the platformand have invested in it, I
think that's their approach too.
But it's going to be somethingthat for a lot of people who are
just feeling, are not reallyfeeling what's going on with
(11:06):
Meta.
They feel like they're going togo to a space that feels
somewhat safe if not a littlebit outright safe, I guess and
feel like they have some controlover it.
I think that's like the biggerapproach here, and it seems like
their fundraising efforts havebeen kind of paying off.
They've raised roughly likeseven plus million dollars,
right.
So that's kind of that's prettybig right, especially for, like
an independently owned startupI guess I really can't call it a
(11:29):
startup, but nonetheless theyare independent and they are
driving this like culture oflike creativity and this idea of
like digital independence.
So go check out fanbase.
I'ma throw him a plug.
I don't know the guy I used.
I actually used the app, got alot of my content over there,
just got some kind of way.
Maybe Graphite should have itsown page.
I think I'm going to do that,especially since we need to kind
(11:50):
of create more creativecommunities on platforms that we
own, right.
So check it out.
Last in the news, let's talkabout the big agency
consolidation.
Now, I talked about this awhile ago.
If you think about the holdingagency consolidation now, I
talked about this a while ago.
If you think about the holdingcompanies right, it's a lot of
them, but there's four of them,right, it's omnicom, it's it's
(12:11):
ipg and it's wpp.
You know, you guys already knowabout omnicom and ipg.
They're going to emergesometime this year, if, I guess,
you know, the government allowsthat, which I can kind of see
that happening.
I mean, listen, we had someweird shit going on.
It's, it's odd, right, a wholelot of like conflict of interest
, right like we're living in aone big conflict of interest.
(12:32):
But I I digress, I definitelythink that's going to go through
.
But, um, publicist worldwide andleo burnett, they're definitely
going to merge and they'regoing to merge to this new
company called leo, which iskind of interesting.
You know they're going to mergeto this new company called Leo,
which is kind of interesting.
You know they're part of thesame network.
You know, publicis' worldwidelogo looks like a lion.
Leo Burnett is, well, this is ahandwritten type of Leo Burnett
(12:53):
.
But you know, some people calla lion a Leo.
So I guess that's kind of cool,right.
But you know, I know they'regoing to be merging to be, I
guess, this same, I guess,reason why everybody else is
merging.
They want to be competitive.
Now, what does this mean for themarketplace?
Again, I keep saying it and Isay it again, and it's not just
me saying this, everybody who'sunderstanding this landscape of
(13:15):
merging as well as trying tostay competitive like you kind
of got to do it right.
You kind of got to click up alittle bit if you're going to
actually be very competitive,because it seems that you know
that biggest competition is notnecessarily a market I'm not
going to say marketplace, it'snot even necessarily the
marketplace of other ad agencies.
It's the tech companies, it'sGoogle, it's Meta, it's, you
(13:39):
know, amazon, there's anye-commerce platforms such as
like Shopify, like these are allplatforms that know how to
engage an audience throughdifferent means, but mostly
through their technology andtheir overall just strategic
thinking, and they can godirectly to the consumer to
engage them.
They can even bypass theagencies and go directly to the
(14:01):
brands and be like hey, brandXYZ, you can use our platform to
engage your audience directlyfor a fraction of the cost.
You're not having to place ads,buy all this inventory in terms
of media, and you can engagedirectly with your audience with
your brand, you know.
So I guess we have to kind ofwait and see what that means.
In terms of Pulisic and LeoBurnett, especially, leo Burnett
(14:25):
was like this traditionalagency that did a lot of like
storytelling through campaignsand ads and publicists worldwide
, more or less the same, butthey had some kind of, like you
know, digital chops.
But again, I guess we have tojust kind of wait and see where
this merges is going to go.
Now I tell all my people againif you're working in this
respected field or thoseagencies, learn how to pivot.
(14:47):
This is the time to pivot.
This is the time to learnsomething new.
Learn somebody else's job.
Learn your job better.
Go learn something about CRM.
Learn how to understand briefsor write briefs better.
Definitely learn every aspectof AI.
They got a ton of courses onYouTube and even things you can
take for free from, like,certain institutions of higher
(15:08):
learning, or even like onlinecourses with masterclass and
courses, like you know.
So this is the perfect time toactually disrupt yourself before
you get disrupted.
So you know, a great big pivotConsolidation is the word of the
year.
So I won't be shocked if I starthearing more and more of these
agencies definitely come by, Ithink, before I left WPP.
(15:28):
I'm not going to even name theagency.
I'm a little petty, so I won'tname them for a couple different
reasons.
I kind of did some foul things,but whatever, they were
starting to merge with anotherdigital-minded agency and it
kind of happened, oddly, on myday off.
I kind of feel like Greg, fromFriday, you kind of get fired on
your day off.
I didn't get fired, but everytime I take a day off, odd,
(15:52):
weird things happen at my job.
So there you go, leo Burnett,who was his worldwide merchant.
Okay, so now that we kind ofhave covered some things from
news and culture, let's talkabout this idea, about what it
(16:14):
means to pivot.
Right, it is 2025, as you guysknow, and a lot of things have
already just kind of kicked off.
We got a new administration, wegot new laws that have been
signed and kind of got to getapproved and see how it plays
out, right.
But you know, we got a lot ofthings that's going on in the
world in general, right, and youknow, obviously most people
(16:38):
biggest angst is going to bearound personal goals, life
aspirations, job focus, keepingthe job, finding a new job, this
idea of what it means to pivot.
What does that actually mean?
You know?
(16:59):
I know, for me, pivoting for, Iguess, this last, I guess the 30
years of my career in general,I've always had this idea of
embracing the unknown right, andI think embracing the unknown
it kind of well, it kind offreed me up.
I can't really speak foranybody else, but if you do
embrace what it means to justyou know you don't really know
what's going to happen, but youkind of know you got to do it A
lot of times that does free youmentally, it can possibly free
(17:22):
you spiritually, it definitelycan free you just creatively.
Right, you know, a lot of timesyou just can't control certain
variables.
You can't control what happensat a job in terms of sometimes
them losing market share.
Sometimes you just can'tcontrol what happens in society.
Right, you can go cash yourvote, you cannot vote, you can
vote for the wrong candidate orthe right candidate, and things
(17:44):
still just won't go exactly theway you see it, right, when it
comes down to, like you know,overall pivoting, I think
definitely embracing thatunknown, finding joy, is a great
one right, like, what are somethings you're doing outside of
what you do currently at yourjob is always a great thing, you
know.
Going back to the unknown, yeah,I mean, if you just think about
(18:06):
people who kind of doreconnaissance, they go out,
they see what's the most coolestthing out there, or they kind
of do this thing, what we callinnovation.
Innovation can be very messy,it can be expensive.
At times it can be very, veryconfusing, because you sometimes
just don't know where you'regoing.
This unknown thing is justprevalent in every step of the
process of being innovative.
(18:28):
But when you kind of do it longenough, something just
magically happens right when theaha moment goes off, or you
kind of discover something, orthe universe if there's
something magical about that itjust opens up and just give you
this beautiful gift in terms of,like an opportunity or I don't
know, maybe a bag laying up inyour lap right All of a sudden.
Now you got an opportunity tomake some more money, right, or
(18:50):
you got an opportunity toactually take on new projects
and a job that you didn'tconsider, or maybe it's one of
those things where, hey, youmeet some brand new people.
You know, I know most of ushave met our circle of friends
In most cases through work.
I mean, you look at most of thethings you even see on TV.
Culturally, most TV shows iseither centered around work or
(19:15):
centered around a placespecifically where somebody
actually stays.
So you look at a TV show calledAbbott.
There's a bunch of people who'sdoing things around teaching
kids.
It's work.
Same thing with the TV show ATL.
Teaching kids right, it's work.
Same thing with the TV show ATL.
All those group of characterswas always working towards
getting Paperboy to be thehottest artist in Atlanta and
(19:36):
beyond.
So you know, work, play life.
That is kind of like, you know,more or less like the
opportunities when you embracethe unknown.
Embracing the unknown is goingto be a good thing.
It allows you to get rid offear.
It allows you to like at leasttry something new, right?
I mean, hey, I'm notnecessarily skydiving, maybe I
tried it to kind of overcomecertain types of fears.
(19:58):
I don't really like needles buthey, maybe I get a tattoo.
I'm not saying to be thatextreme, but you do have to kind
of like break it up a littlebit in terms of embracing the
unknown.
Now, part of this overallappearance is looking at I guess
being insightful to look at thelandscape of any industry that
you're in, right, look at what'shappening.
Maybe read the newspaper andnot necessarily listen to things
(20:20):
on social media.
Look at patterns that hashappened to you in the past.
Know when you're possibly aboutto be laid off.
I can tell you, every singletime I was laid off I kind of
knew what I was about to be laidoff because you know people get
quiet, start having all thesemeetings without you or all of a
sudden your projects thatyou've been working on for like
a long time, just you know,miraculously just disappear.
(20:41):
So yeah, look at when you knowconsolidations start happening
or they start bringing in likenew outside vendors to kind of,
you know, optimize the new wayof doing things or you know,
optimizing old work streams.
You know, understand that right, that may be a time to actually
pivot and do somethingdifferent in your life or at
your job or what you're doing.
(21:01):
So look for those signs when itcomes to like actually having a
pivot.
I know also embracing theunknown and knowing when to
pivot it's expanding yournetwork.
Be open to these newopportunities of meeting new
people.
Again, some of my bestconnections in life have come
from, like, people I've met onmy job or, you know, I guess, in
the industry I work in.
(21:22):
So some of these people wentfrom being co-workers to like
dear friends, to like prettymuch quasi-family members in
that sense.
So definitely be open topivoting and I think that's kind
of like what I'm going to say,really the graphite tool of the
day Normally I want to talkabout, like these other tools,
you know, that are like digitaltools but the biggest tool you
can have is, you know, this ideaof knowing when to pivot and
(21:44):
embracing the unknown and beingopen to new opportunities.
One last thing to leave you withspecifically expand on the
whole making connections in thepersonal network.
What I've been doing lately toohas been, you know, getting
back out in the world andactually attending real industry
events.
You know, for a while we kindof, you know, strayed away from
(22:06):
that right, for obvious reasons.
But I do think thisin-real-life approach to like
making you know away from thatright for obvious reasons, but I
do think this in real lifeapproach to like making you know
personal connections, it'squite an important.
You know, humans, we're asocial animal.
We need to be around otherhumans sometimes to just kind of
validate what's going on orjust more or less have a chin
check or just really just to behuman.
(22:27):
Right, you can't be human justby yourself.
So, you know, building theserelationships and attending like
industry events it keeps youkind of ahead of like a lot of
things, right, whether it'sgoing to be creativity, the
newest um text and you know, thenew kind of things coming out
in tech or new processes ormethods, I do think attending
industry events where they'rekind of like these big events or
(22:48):
something that's a little bitmore intimate, it's key, right.
Uh, I've noticed that's why Imostly dwell.
I get a lot of ideas from justmeeting people and hearing new
ideas that you know I neverthought about, or just hearing
from another perspective.
So, again, get out there,attend some events and
definitely, uh, just connectright, just to be human, you
(23:09):
know.
Okay, that's it, peoples, forthis episode of Graphite Pro
Radio.
I want to leave you guys with abig thanks, definitely, if you
can spread the word right, I'mstill building this platform to
be beautiful, but I need morepeople and you know I've noticed
every time I post, my number'sactually doubled.
So get more people to like,more people to subscribe, more
(23:31):
people to actually just share.
So those three actions arevital and important to kind of
grow this platform and I'd bemuch appreciative if you'd like
subscribe and share Graphite Pro.
Tell all your peoples about theother shows on caffeine as well
.
So we out here just buildingand we appreciate everything you
(23:52):
guys do.
We appreciate your attentionand your time.
As always, stay cool, staycreative, be human.
Peace out, guys, holla.
Speaker 3 (24:02):
You've been tuned into Graphite Radio, where
creativity meets culture, Partof the Caffeine Audio Network
and proudly distributed byPepper Labs.
Thanks for joining us on thisjourney of ideas, art and
innovation.
Be sure to subscribe and stayconnected for more stories that
shape the world we create.
Until next time, keep sketchingyour vision into reality.
(24:25):
You.
This is.
This is this is Graphite Radio.
Thank you.
What's good, peeps.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
I'm your conductor.
Instructor Adrian Franks, akaAD Frank, want to welcome you to
Graphite Radio Show, episode 3.
Yeah, I know it's the thirdweek of January.
It's a new year, new ideas, newopportunities.
I hope you guys are doing well.
I know we're kind of enteringthis new phase of like existence
(01:22):
and you know we're going to befine.
So again, welcome to the show.
We're gonna have fun.
It's gonna be a great journeyand you know we're just gonna go
out here and we're just gonnabuild.
We're not gonna let anythingget in our way and we're just
gonna be the best we can be withwho we can be.
Let's jump right.
In last episode I updated youguys on what we were doing at
(01:42):
graphite in terms of the websiteand some of the other platforms
.
As you guys know, we're part ofthe Caffeine Pod Network and
you know we've got a coupleother different pods on the same
network.
But you know we want to just Iwant to just let you guys know
that.
You know the site is currentlyup.
It's been up for a while.
We also are going to startadding certain things to it,
(02:06):
like, you know, ways to find usoutside of social.
You know social is in thisweird state and we can get into
that later on in the pod, but Ijust want to make sure I create
things that I can connect withyou guys directly, and that's
usually through emails or sometype of newsletter or what we
call like crm.
Also, I'm actually going to dosomething that's kind of like
throwback, right, it's the thingthat we started these set
(02:27):
publishing journeys about, Iguess 15, 20 years ago.
Yeah, I'm bringing back my blog, right, I was talking with my
wife, nicole, and she mentionedsomething about this idea of
bylines and blogs.
We kind of got to get back tothat.
Right, we can no longer justgive all our just creative
capital to these platforms, ofall our just creative capital to
these platforms either we don'town or, obviously, we don't
control.
So why not go back to thethings that we used to control,
(02:50):
which was, like, you know,blogging?
I remember my first blog was,you know, blogger, right, I
think it eventually got boughtby Google, but it was like a ton
of different blogging platformsin like the early 2000s and I
think there was something coolabout that, right, you know, it
was kind of like Tumblr.
Then it was Blogger and it waslike I can't remember something
else.
I don't know how old I'mgetting, but yeah, those
(03:10):
platforms were really coolbecause it just allowed for you
to express yourself freely, youcould post photos, you could
write about it.
I think even a guy likeTa-Nehisi Coates actually got
his start.
That had started like justwriting, like professionally,
just blogging, and that turnedinto like a wonderful career
here, producing all thesebeautiful books and even doing
things for Marvel.
So, yeah, I do think a lot ofus that are like these, you know
(03:33):
, pro creatives or semi-procreatives are just inspiring
dope individuals.
We got to get back to owningwhat we do.
And then I think bringing backthe blog may not be a bad idea,
right?
Especially if you attach it toyour website and attach it to a
newsletter.
I just mentioned that earlier.
So, yeah, let's bring back theblog.
You know social mediatechnically is what they call
microblogging.
It became social media, solet's go back to like some
(03:55):
things that we own.
So, again, they'll be bringingback the blog.
They'll be rolling out thenewsletters in the coming weeks,
so definitely stay tuned forthat.
Let's jump right into the news.
I want to talk about threespecific things around
creativity and imagery, some newopportunities around social
(04:17):
media as well as what I'mcalling the big agency
consolidation.
So the first thing I want totalk about is the big
consolidation, or, more so, theShutterstock and Getty combining
into this big super giant oflicensing.
Now, if you know anything aboutShutterstock and Getty, it was
the premier house in terms oflicensing of imagery and
(04:39):
photography and illustrationsand even iconography and
definitely videos.
At one point in time, theseguys was actually actually like
in this thing what we call likea licensing war.
You can see like Getty'simagery and like their name in
any credit of a film and TV.
And Shutterstock you can see alot of their things in like
campaigns, and both of thoseguys were kind of more or less
playing in each other's face.
(04:59):
But as you notice how things arehappening in today's world,
that it's like this bigconsolidation of like everything
Well, it's also that you knowsomething like a Shutterstock
and Getty.
They got to kind of combine too, because if you're going to be
somewhat competitive, they gotto think about what it means to
produce content.
Catalog has been licensedthrough.
You know professionalphotographers.
I guess you guys want to callthem content creators of today.
(05:22):
I still call them.
You know, pros, right?
Photographers, illustrators orjust videographers Overall, just
these beautiful people who makejust great content right.
A lot of that imagery and thatcontent have more or less been
licensed, either through like abrokerage house or directly
(05:43):
through the extra producerthemselves, and those things are
licensed out for differentpurposes, where it's gonna be
for advertising, b2b efforts oryou know anything, for TV and
definitely like some otherpromotional things.
Now, if you think about this newworld that they're living in,
they kind of kind of competewith generative AI.
They got to compete with socialmedia.
You can argue that generativeAI probably put the nail in the
coffin, but what really gaveboth of these platforms a run
(06:05):
for their money was thedemocratization of creativity
itself through the phone,especially with social media.
You know, iphone came out in2007.
You know, everybody all of asudden now had a really decent
kind of camera in your pocket,right, but what made it powerful
is that that camera becameattached to the internet and
then it also became attached tosocial media.
(06:26):
We won't name the big onethat's out there, but early days
was like Hipstamatic and Iforgot the one.
I think it was called Flickr,right, yeah, it was Flickr.
So those platforms allow peopleto like, upload imagery and
share with the people.
Then came along social media.
You know Friendsters to whatused to be, I guess, cool
Facebook.
Even Facebook kind of started alittle fringy by judging
(06:48):
people's well, women's faces.
But we won't go there.
Then it was Hipstamatic.
Then it became Instagram.
Instagram, I think, is whatreally unleashed the democratic
power of content creation as weknow it today.
Shutterstock and Getty they werekind of like the OGs, right,
and it was like a couple otherones too.
It was like Corvus.
It was like, oh man, I used toknow all these off the top of my
head.
Now I guess it's been so longsince I've had to use stock
(07:12):
photography I just can'tremember.
And, by the way, stock used tobe one of those things that you
have to actually look through acatalog and order it on a phone
to actually get that image.
So they'll send you some CDs.
You kind of download a comp ofit client like it.
You get the high res sent toyou and some kind of
downloadable link or a CD, andthat's what it was.
But in today's world that'sdefinitely changing.
(07:33):
These two platforms are nowtrying to see how can they
really engage designers, how canthey engage marketers, even
content enthusiasts, but youwant to look at the reason why
they're actually combining.
They got to stay competitive.
They can't beat the techcompanies.
They can't beat the differentways to generate an image from
the different large languagemodels, or you know these AI
(07:55):
bots right.
So, yeah, I think that mightnot be a bad move for these guys
.
Unfortunately, it's going to bea lot of layoffs, but I do
think for those who are stillworking for those companies, the
best thing to do is they canjust try to pivot Learn these
tools, learn these new AI tools,shoot better content right, or
maybe go work for a smallerlicensing company that really
does this very well.
(08:16):
So that's my take Show thestock and get it.
Let's chat about fan base More.
So.
Let's specifically talk aboutfan base.
Maybe spill a couple otherplatforms that now can more or
less capitalize on opportunityfrom the backlash of people not
really liking a lot of thepolicy changes coming out of
(08:36):
meta.
Now, if you're followingeverything on social right fan
base owned by isaac hayes, thethird son of Isaac Hayes.
Second, the beautiful musicianfrom way back when.
Love is love is music, love ismusic.
Long story short, this guy got achance to give people reason to
kind of join fans base, notjust because they've been around
(08:57):
they're the alternative to, youknow, instagram and a lot of
the social platforms but more soit's this idea that you can
actually own a part of a fanbase.
Now they're doing like this bigcampaign that are more or less
getting people to kind of go anddonate I think like $399 and
you kind of become like a partowner on a platform, which I
actually think is something kindof cool to that, bro.
(09:17):
You know this idea that, hey,you can be on a platform that
you can build culturally withyour ideas and your content, but
also with your dollars.
It's nothing like in capitalismthat speaks louder than your
actual dollars, because that's alevel of intent that says that
I'm going to take this tool forliving and enjoyment and, you
know, I guess, convenience, andI'm going to use it to empower
(09:40):
something that I actuallybelieve in.
Right, it's like you buy stockson an exchange.
It's kind of the same thing.
Now, I think this approach hereis it seems that they're
wanting to make sure that whenyou're contributing to this
platform, that certain thingswill have to kind of more or
less be thought about, notnecessarily from the people who
started Fanbase or who currentlyrun in it, but more so from the
(10:01):
community.
If everybody who's on thisplatform for the most, not all
are investing in this platform,then it's probably not one of
those things that they can justeasily change it up how they
feel.
The problem with the bigplatform out there, the big
boogeyman Meta, the big megaplatform, is that at any given
(10:22):
moment, the person who leadsMeta, which is Zuck, he can just
kind of change what he wantsright.
This guy, I think, has roughlya large percentage I think it's
even like 16% of the company.
That's pretty huge.
So his voice is going to ringloud and far and this is a
publicly traded company, but heowns a lot of stocks and he's
(10:44):
basically only going to look outfor the you know, the interests
of the stockholders.
So if you take Fanbase, samething.
If everybody or most of thepeople on this platform is now
owning something on the platformand have invested in it, I
think that's their approach too.
But it's going to be somethingthat for a lot of people who are
just feeling, are not reallyfeeling what's going on with
(11:06):
Meta.
They feel like they're going togo to a space that feels
somewhat safe if not a littlebit outright safe, I guess and
feel like they have some controlover it.
I think that's like the biggerapproach here, and it seems like
their fundraising efforts havebeen kind of paying off.
They've raised roughly likeseven plus million dollars,
right.
So that's kind of that's prettybig right, especially for, like
an independently owned startupI guess I really can't call it a
(11:29):
startup, but nonetheless theyare independent and they are
driving this like culture oflike creativity and this idea of
like digital independence.
So go check out fanbase.
I'ma throw him a plug.
I don't know the guy I used.
I actually used the app, got alot of my content over there,
just got some kind of way.
Maybe Graphite should have itsown page.
I think I'm going to do that,especially since we need to kind
(11:50):
of create more creativecommunities on platforms that we
own, right.
So check it out.
Last in the news, let's talkabout the big agency
consolidation.
Now, I talked about this awhile ago.
If you think about the holdingagency consolidation now, I
talked about this a while ago.
If you think about the holdingcompanies right, it's a lot of
them, but there's four of them,right, it's omnicom, it's it's
(12:11):
ipg and it's wpp.
You know, you guys already knowabout omnicom and ipg.
They're going to emergesometime this year, if, I guess,
you know, the government allowsthat, which I can kind of see
that happening.
I mean, listen, we had someweird shit going on.
It's, it's odd, right, a wholelot of like conflict of interest
, right like we're living in aone big conflict of interest.
(12:32):
But I I digress, I definitelythink that's going to go through
.
But, um, publicist worldwide andleo burnett, they're definitely
going to merge and they'regoing to merge to this new
company called leo, which iskind of interesting.
You know they're going to mergeto this new company called Leo,
which is kind of interesting.
You know they're part of thesame network.
You know, publicis' worldwidelogo looks like a lion.
Leo Burnett is, well, this is ahandwritten type of Leo Burnett
(12:53):
.
But you know, some people calla lion a Leo.
So I guess that's kind of cool,right.
But you know, I know they'regoing to be merging to be, I
guess, this same, I guess,reason why everybody else is
merging.
They want to be competitive.
Now, what does this mean for themarketplace?
Again, I keep saying it and Isay it again, and it's not just
me saying this, everybody who'sunderstanding this landscape of
(13:15):
merging as well as trying tostay competitive like you kind
of got to do it right.
You kind of got to click up alittle bit if you're going to
actually be very competitive,because it seems that you know
that biggest competition is notnecessarily a market I'm not
going to say marketplace, it'snot even necessarily the
marketplace of other ad agencies.
It's the tech companies, it'sGoogle, it's Meta, it's, you
(13:39):
know, amazon, there's anye-commerce platforms such as
like Shopify, like these are allplatforms that know how to
engage an audience throughdifferent means, but mostly
through their technology andtheir overall just strategic
thinking, and they can godirectly to the consumer to
engage them.
They can even bypass theagencies and go directly to the
(14:01):
brands and be like hey, brandXYZ, you can use our platform to
engage your audience directlyfor a fraction of the cost.
You're not having to place ads,buy all this inventory in terms
of media, and you can engagedirectly with your audience with
your brand, you know.
So I guess we have to kind ofwait and see what that means.
In terms of Pulisic and LeoBurnett, especially, leo Burnett
(14:25):
was like this traditionalagency that did a lot of like
storytelling through campaignsand ads and publicists worldwide
, more or less the same, butthey had some kind of, like you
know, digital chops.
But again, I guess we have tojust kind of wait and see where
this merges is going to go.
Now I tell all my people againif you're working in this
respected field or thoseagencies, learn how to pivot.
(14:47):
This is the time to pivot.
This is the time to learnsomething new.
Learn somebody else's job.
Learn your job better.
Go learn something about CRM.
Learn how to understand briefsor write briefs better.
Definitely learn every aspectof AI.
They got a ton of courses onYouTube and even things you can
take for free from, like,certain institutions of higher
(15:08):
learning, or even like onlinecourses with masterclass and
courses, like you know.
So this is the perfect time toactually disrupt yourself before
you get disrupted.
So you know, a great big pivotConsolidation is the word of the
year.
So I won't be shocked if I starthearing more and more of these
agencies definitely come by, Ithink, before I left WPP.
(15:28):
I'm not going to even name theagency.
I'm a little petty, so I won'tname them for a couple different
reasons.
I kind of did some foul things,but whatever, they were
starting to merge with anotherdigital-minded agency and it
kind of happened, oddly, on myday off.
I kind of feel like Greg, fromFriday, you kind of get fired on
your day off.
I didn't get fired, but everytime I take a day off, odd,
(15:52):
weird things happen at my job.
So there you go, leo Burnett,who was his worldwide merchant.
Okay, so now that we kind ofhave covered some things from
news and culture, let's talkabout this idea, about what it
(16:14):
means to pivot.
Right, it is 2025, as you guysknow, and a lot of things have
already just kind of kicked off.
We got a new administration, wegot new laws that have been
signed and kind of got to getapproved and see how it plays
out, right.
But you know, we got a lot ofthings that's going on in the
world in general, right, and youknow, obviously most people
(16:38):
biggest angst is going to bearound personal goals, life
aspirations, job focus, keepingthe job, finding a new job, this
idea of what it means to pivot.
What does that actually mean?
You know?
(16:59):
I know, for me, pivoting for, Iguess, this last, I guess the 30
years of my career in general,I've always had this idea of
embracing the unknown right, andI think embracing the unknown
it kind of well, it kind offreed me up.
I can't really speak foranybody else, but if you do
embrace what it means to justyou know you don't really know
what's going to happen, but youkind of know you got to do it A
lot of times that does free youmentally, it can possibly free
(17:22):
you spiritually, it definitelycan free you just creatively.
Right, you know, a lot of timesyou just can't control certain
variables.
You can't control what happensat a job in terms of sometimes
them losing market share.
Sometimes you just can'tcontrol what happens in society.
Right, you can go cash yourvote, you cannot vote, you can
vote for the wrong candidate orthe right candidate, and things
(17:44):
still just won't go exactly theway you see it, right, when it
comes down to, like you know,overall pivoting, I think
definitely embracing thatunknown, finding joy, is a great
one right, like, what are somethings you're doing outside of
what you do currently at yourjob is always a great thing, you
know.
Going back to the unknown, yeah,I mean, if you just think about
(18:06):
people who kind of doreconnaissance, they go out,
they see what's the most coolestthing out there, or they kind
of do this thing, what we callinnovation.
Innovation can be very messy,it can be expensive.
At times it can be very, veryconfusing, because you sometimes
just don't know where you'regoing.
This unknown thing is justprevalent in every step of the
process of being innovative.
(18:28):
But when you kind of do it longenough, something just
magically happens right when theaha moment goes off, or you
kind of discover something, orthe universe if there's
something magical about that itjust opens up and just give you
this beautiful gift in terms of,like an opportunity or I don't
know, maybe a bag laying up inyour lap right All of a sudden.
Now you got an opportunity tomake some more money, right, or
(18:50):
you got an opportunity toactually take on new projects
and a job that you didn'tconsider, or maybe it's one of
those things where, hey, youmeet some brand new people.
You know, I know most of ushave met our circle of friends
In most cases through work.
I mean, you look at most of thethings you even see on TV.
Culturally, most TV shows iseither centered around work or
(19:15):
centered around a placespecifically where somebody
actually stays.
So you look at a TV show calledAbbott.
There's a bunch of people who'sdoing things around teaching
kids.
It's work.
Same thing with the TV show ATL.
Teaching kids right, it's work.
Same thing with the TV show ATL.
All those group of characterswas always working towards
getting Paperboy to be thehottest artist in Atlanta and
(19:36):
beyond.
So you know, work, play life.
That is kind of like, you know,more or less like the
opportunities when you embracethe unknown.
Embracing the unknown is goingto be a good thing.
It allows you to get rid offear.
It allows you to like at leasttry something new, right?
I mean, hey, I'm notnecessarily skydiving, maybe I
tried it to kind of overcomecertain types of fears.
(19:58):
I don't really like needles buthey, maybe I get a tattoo.
I'm not saying to be thatextreme, but you do have to kind
of like break it up a littlebit in terms of embracing the
unknown.
Now, part of this overallappearance is looking at I guess
being insightful to look at thelandscape of any industry that
you're in, right, look at what'shappening.
Maybe read the newspaper andnot necessarily listen to things
(20:20):
on social media.
Look at patterns that hashappened to you in the past.
Know when you're possibly aboutto be laid off.
I can tell you, every singletime I was laid off I kind of
knew what I was about to be laidoff because you know people get
quiet, start having all thesemeetings without you or all of a
sudden your projects thatyou've been working on for like
a long time, just you know,miraculously just disappear.
(20:41):
So yeah, look at when you knowconsolidations start happening
or they start bringing in likenew outside vendors to kind of,
you know, optimize the new wayof doing things or you know,
optimizing old work streams.
You know, understand that right, that may be a time to actually
pivot and do somethingdifferent in your life or at
your job or what you're doing.
(21:01):
So look for those signs when itcomes to like actually having a
pivot.
I know also embracing theunknown and knowing when to
pivot it's expanding yournetwork.
Be open to these newopportunities of meeting new
people.
Again, some of my bestconnections in life have come
from, like, people I've met onmy job or, you know, I guess, in
the industry I work in.
(21:22):
So some of these people wentfrom being co-workers to like
dear friends, to like prettymuch quasi-family members in
that sense.
So definitely be open topivoting and I think that's kind
of like what I'm going to say,really the graphite tool of the
day Normally I want to talkabout, like these other tools,
you know, that are like digitaltools but the biggest tool you
can have is, you know, this ideaof knowing when to pivot and
(21:44):
embracing the unknown and beingopen to new opportunities.
One last thing to leave you withspecifically expand on the
whole making connections in thepersonal network.
What I've been doing lately toohas been, you know, getting
back out in the world andactually attending real industry
events.
You know, for a while we kindof, you know, strayed away from
(22:06):
that right, for obvious reasons.
But I do think thisin-real-life approach to like
making you know away from thatright for obvious reasons, but I
do think this in real lifeapproach to like making you know
personal connections, it'squite an important.
You know, humans, we're asocial animal.
We need to be around otherhumans sometimes to just kind of
validate what's going on orjust more or less have a chin
check or just really just to behuman.
(22:27):
Right, you can't be human justby yourself.
So, you know, building theserelationships and attending like
industry events it keeps youkind of ahead of like a lot of
things, right, whether it'sgoing to be creativity, the
newest um text and you know, thenew kind of things coming out
in tech or new processes ormethods, I do think attending
industry events where they'rekind of like these big events or
(22:48):
something that's a little bitmore intimate, it's key, right.
Uh, I've noticed that's why Imostly dwell.
I get a lot of ideas from justmeeting people and hearing new
ideas that you know I neverthought about, or just hearing
from another perspective.
So, again, get out there,attend some events and
definitely, uh, just connectright, just to be human, you
(23:09):
know.
Okay, that's it, peoples, forthis episode of Graphite Pro
Radio.
I want to leave you guys with abig thanks, definitely, if you
can spread the word right, I'mstill building this platform to
be beautiful, but I need morepeople and you know I've noticed
every time I post, my number'sactually doubled.
So get more people to like,more people to subscribe, more
(23:31):
people to actually just share.
So those three actions arevital and important to kind of
grow this platform and I'd bemuch appreciative if you'd like
subscribe and share Graphite Pro.
Tell all your peoples about theother shows on caffeine as well
.
So we out here just buildingand we appreciate everything you
(23:52):
guys do.
We appreciate your attentionand your time.
As always, stay cool, staycreative, be human.
Peace out, guys, holla.
Speaker 3 (24:02):
You've been tuned into Graphite Radio, where
creativity meets culture, Partof the Caffeine Audio Network
and proudly distributed byPepper Labs.
Thanks for joining us on thisjourney of ideas, art and
innovation.
Be sure to subscribe and stayconnected for more stories that
shape the world we create.
Until next time, keep sketchingyour vision into reality.
(24:25):
You.
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