What's up, everyone? This is Alex Lieberman, co-founder and executive chairman of Morning Brew.

Welcome back to Founders Journal, my personal audio diary, where I give you the business builder,

the tools you need to think better in order to build better, whether that's building a business,

a team, or a new product. Today, I am talking about the creator economy with our very special guest,

Katie Gotti. Let's hop into it. So in 2021, creator economy startups raised $3.7 billion.

Some people are wildly excited by that figure. Others are wildly skeptical. Now, to understand

the excitement, let's start with a short history lesson. Pre-internet, power was wielded by the few

that could afford distribution. Newspapers relied on printing presses and delivery routes.

Radio had recording equipment and airwaves. TV had broadcast licenses and physical cables.

You get the pattern. Then, the internet came along and took away the distribution power

of traditional media. Newspapers and magazines took a serious hit when the web brought the cost

of distribution to basically zero. The printing press became a keyboard, the paper route became a

website, and social media only furthered traditional's decline. The advantage shifted from

distribution to owning attention, and the power shifted from traditional media institutions

to aggregators. Think Twitter, Facebook, TikTok. But there's another shift in power that we're

going to focus on today. The internet created a real economy for creators who are now able to

extract value from the audience that they've worked to build for so long. Individual creators now

have the tools and distribution to earn a massive audience and monetize that audience.

But it isn't easy. It is a physical grind that can take years to pay off. There's also a mental

battle to overcome. For every like, follow, and share that offers a dopamine hit, there's a

hateful or cruel comment. And committing to creating full time forces you to spend time on things

you may not be good at or you may not like. Think time management, operations, emails,

...