Researching, writing, podcasting about creators and digital media Editor @ Creator Spotlight for beehiiv Co-host of Tasteland with Daisy Alioto 📧 francis@creatorspotlight.comhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.socialhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3luagrnj5jc2qOn Tasteland this week, @mikerugnetta.com joined us to talk about late-stage platformism, the rise of the agentic web, that the attention economy is a zero-sum game, how Hentai explains platforms, and heading to the library to avoid AI slop. Full episode on all pod platforms! pod.link/1760333416/18 Jul 2025 12:22 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3luagrnj5jc2qhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3ltzjs4rfnc2zPeople ARE paying independent, creator-model journalists for their work. @lizkellynelson.com is one of a network of leaders helping journalists make the jump from traditional newsrooms to starting up their own publications through her essential newsletter, Project C. An essential episode today.15 Jul 2025 18:28 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3ltzjs4rfnc2zhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lrdsnwcdms24Today on Tasteland, @colenowicki.com joins @princessdaisy.bsky.social and I to talk about the state of the skate industry, Perfection by Vincenzo Latronico (and the pitfalls of happinessmaxxing), the smell of skateboarding, and religion being big in skateboarding. https://www.tasteland.fyi/ep-46-state-of-skate-ft-cole-nowicki/11 Jun 2025 16:17 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lrdsnwcdms24https://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lmkndl367k26“[What qualifies someone] to run a digital media company or be a digital media creator is making digital media.” — @amandamc.bsky.social on The Creator Spotlight Podcast today. What Amanda, Eric, and co. are doing at Multitude is a blueprint for sustainable creator-first media businesses. Listen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60XshjJvZog11 Apr 2025 18:25 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lmkndl367k26https://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lmf4zuyqns2pToday in TASTELAND, Colin Nagy joins @princessdaisy.bsky.social and I to discuss laundering credibility, who gets to decide what we remember, how cultural mores get baked into LLMs, fact-check literacy, "irrational hospitality," and more https://www.tasteland.fyi/ep-37-in-defense-of-hospitality-ft-colin-nagy/09 Apr 2025 13:50 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lmf4zuyqns2phttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lkqcs3shhs2cToday on Tasteland, Trey Taylor joins @princessdaisy.bsky.social and I to discuss his new fragrance brand Serviette, how he taught himself to make perfume, the art of selling a lifestyle, perception vs. perception vis-à-vis taste, Kelly green, and more. Listen — https://www.tasteland.fyi/ep-34-fragrance-rich-ft-trey-taylor/19 Mar 2025 13:42 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lkqcs3shhs2chttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3ljppsee7ns2rSworn enemy of video podcasts @ericsilver.bsky.social came on my video podcast and we talked about: 🎙️ How he teaches podcasting 🎧 Audio-only podcasts are still the future 🚫 Spotify toxicity 🤝 Building an ethical, creator-first business 🎲 Why "actual play" podcasts work so well And more : ) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yn6Nu45XEW806 Mar 2025 14:37 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3ljppsee7ns2rhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3ljnnys3qv22o"It is so much harder to teach someone who has no imagination how to have a creative idea than to teach a creative person to learn Excel." @ericsilver.bsky.social on tomorrow's episode of The Creator Spotlight Pod. It's a good one.05 Mar 2025 18:59 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3ljnnys3qv22ohttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3ljazcw2fz22fHad a wonderful time chatting with Matt a couple weeks ago. Read the writeup! [contains quote post or other embedded content]28 Feb 2025 18:17 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3ljazcw2fz22fhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lj4kuipnss2vEvery morning, famously, Sisyphus re-jiggered his strategy to roll the stone up the hill based on first principles. [contains quote post or other embedded content]26 Feb 2025 23:48 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lj4kuipnss2vhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lj3qzvfalk2iToday on TASTELAND, our guest rugged us so I asked @princessdaisy.bsky.social to tell me 5 things she did this week or I would accept her resignation as co-host. We also spoke about media productions vs. consumption literacy, why we need more working-class media, islands and empires, and more — https://www.tasteland.fyi/ep-31-art-of-the-steal/26 Feb 2025 16:05 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lj3qzvfalk2ihttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3liwleh54w22x"For me, when you take on the label of creator, you're more saying that you're making content, obviously, and that content is being shared and owned by these platforms where you have no control over anything.” Wrote about Alicia Kennedy choosing to be a writer over being a creator, on principle. https://www.creatorspotlight.com/p/alicia-kennedy24 Feb 2025 14:41 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3liwleh54w22xhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lik2wwzrw227Today in TASTELAND: @defaultfriend.bsky.social joins @princessdaisy.bsky.social and I to chat e-girl etymology, anti-woke entertainment, treating AI chatbots like you treat people, dolphin accelerationism, internet history is oral history, and more — https://www.tasteland.fyi/ep-30-mammalian-e-girls-ft-katherine-dee/19 Feb 2025 15:15 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lik2wwzrw227https://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3li5u6l24ck2g3 weeks ago I interviewed @kofie.bsky.social for Creator Spotlight. 2 days before the podcast's publication, he and a couple of colleagues were laid off. 3/4 of my most recent interviews have been laid off by Vox in the last few years. So I scrapped my planned profile and wrote about it! https://www.creatorspotlight.com/p/kofie-yeboah14 Feb 2025 18:42 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3li5u6l24ck2ghttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lhyds4ak7k2aToday on Tasteland, @princessdaisy.bsky.social and I chat with Jad Esber about inverting the internet's personal data model to favor individual users over companies, "data gravity," how taste aggregation apps do and don't contribute to social relationships, and more — https://www.tasteland.fyi/ep-29-shelf-life-ft-jad-esber/12 Feb 2025 14:05 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lhyds4ak7k2ahttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lhtlfhfjvs2wYou will not survive a month lost in the wilderness without knowledge of bushcraft, either pre-existing or gained by sheer force of will to survive. Neither will you thrive long-term in the creator economy without knowledge of entrepreneurialism. My latest: https://www.creatorspotlight.com/p/creators-are-entrepreneurs10 Feb 2025 16:38 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lhtlfhfjvs2whttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lfux6fqlv22aI'm hiring an Assistant Editor. We hit 330k subscribers this week. Looking for an excellent writer and research to increase our output and depth of quality. We're building a lighthouse publication for the creator economy — aim to be the leading source of strategic writing and industry analysis. https://careers.beehiiv.com/postings/0916b934-841a-4188-9a15-ba8c1395400316 Jan 2025 18:51 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lfux6fqlv22ahttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lfph53umys2qInterviewed Lindsey Stanberry, current creator of women's personal finance newsletter The Purse and founding editor of Refinery29's Money Diaries, for last week's Creator Spotlight. Here she is on the traditional wall between editorial and advertising departments:14 Jan 2025 14:21 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lfph53umys2qhttps://bsky.app/profile/fzierer.bsky.social/post/3lf3deemlms2i"That's the primordial soup. When you're in a time period where nobody really knows what to do. Pivot to video, pivot to podcast, run eight different social accounts that have a decreasing return on investment. How do you make it work?" @princessdaisy.bsky.social in Creator Spotlight! https://www.creatorspotlight.com/p/daisy-alioto06 Jan 2025 14:20 +0000at://did:plc:lbcnpukmexfu7ssui2f2rk55/app.bsky.feed.post/3lf3deemlms2i