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Premium streamers are suddenly all-in on short video.
The Walt Disney Company’s new CEO Josh D’Amaro highlighted its new TikTok-like feed Verts, which launched on Disney+ in the US in March, during its earnings call last week. “We’re still in early days here, but it’s already driving deeper engagement,” he said.
Short-form video and “creative content” are areas the company is now focusing on to reach new and existing fans, especially Gen Alpha, he added.
As you can see from our chart, Disney+ is one of many premium streamers to launch dedicated short-video feeds for their mobile apps lately. Netflix, Prime Video and Paramount+ all introduced their own versions in April and May. Peacock announced it’s rolling out a short-video feed in summer 2026.
Zooming out, this is yet another example of how media is converging. As streamers roll out short-video feeds, the social platforms are launching their own TV apps or leaning into TV-like content, as we previously reported.
YouTube, in particular, has been doubling down on TV screens. People now watch over 200 million hours of YouTube content in the living room each day, company executives said during parent company Alphabet’s latest earnings call. Instagram, which launched its smart TV app in December, is also now thinking about how to support longer-form content, Tessa Lyons, Instagram’s vice president of product told us last week.
Even so, many of the streamers’ short-form video efforts feel half-baked. Netflix and Prime Video seemingly didn’t even bother coming up with original names, with each of them calling their feeds “Clips.” The name is also very on the nose: Most of the content on these feeds are video clips or highlights from existing content.
That makes most of these short-form feeds from premium streamers feel more like in-app discovery tools than content hubs to rival or replace TikTok. The idea is to help viewers find shows, movies or other longer videos to watch, rather than be places to watch original short-form content.
Take Disney’s Verts. It launched with clips from TV shows that viewers can save or start streaming right away. During the earnings call, D’Amaro also made clear that Disney is still focused on making sure that its “IP shows up in relevant ways across social platforms.” Read: Disney will still be present on TikTok and other short-video feeds.
This makes sense. Disney has a beloved host of characters and storylines that many creators and users already create content around. Continuing its efforts there is good marketing for the company.
Ultimately, though, Disney’s ambitions with Verts are likely much broader. Verts gives Disney a natural place to feature creator and user-generated content in its own app. That’s something the company has alluded to previously—and again last week during earnings.
D’Amaro pointed to Disney’s recent “Creators Collection,” which highlights creator content about movies including “Lilo & Stitch” and “Predator: Badlands” on Disney+. While those videos aren’t part of the short-video feed, the move shows the growing importance of creator content to the company.
“We’re adjusting our own products to reflect the way consumers want to interact with our content,” D’Amaro said.
Summit Soundbites
Our takeaways from the fireside chats at last week’s Scalable Summit. Links to the full Q&As are in each bullet.
• “We are not becoming a media company,” said OpenAI’s business and partnerships lead David Duxin following its surprise acquisition of TBPN. That’s bad news for all the tech podcasters out there hoping for an exit.
But post TBPN and after shutting down its video generating app Sora, OpenAI is still interested in the creator economy. We dove into what that strategy looks like in our story here.
• Instagram will return to long-form video as it plots an expansion of its smart TV app, according to Tessa Lyons, the company’s longtime vice president of product. While Reels has improved, short-form video won’t be enough to keep people watching on TV screens.
Reels is helping creators find new audiences, but it’s also made it harder to reach followers consistently. Lyons said Instagram needs to strike a better balance between the two: “It’s something we need to fix.” Read the full Q&A.
• TikTok, on the other hand, doesn’t think premium content means long-form video. Marisa Hammonds, TikTok’s global head of creator marketing and community, explained how to succeed on TikTok today.
“It’s not about overly-produced content. It doesn’t require extremely fancy production equipment,” she said. But it does require structure: “There’s a story arc, a clear beginning, middle and end. There's editing.” Read the full Q&A.
• Twitch CEO Dan Clancy wasn’t afraid to share his opinions on stage: He called AI “overhyped,” said there isn't a real community on TikTok and called paid clipping just another form of marketing. The full interview is worth a read.
🎥Next Stop: Cannes Film Festival
We’re so excited to head to the South of France later this week for the Cannes Film Festival!
In recent years, TikTok, YouTube and other social platforms have invited creators to walk the red carpet, interview talent and cover the event.
For the first time, the Marché du Film, the annual film market that happens alongside the festival, is launching a dedicated Creator Economy Summit, focused on the intersection of cinema and the creator economy.
We’re excited to take the stage with Louise Holmes, director of creator and media partnerships at Meta. After that, we’ll close out the summit and give our predictions and analysis. If you’re curious about Meta’s role in the film industry—and whether the company is going to suddenly start creating movies—stay tuned for our follow-up coverage.
If you’ll be in town, please let us know. We’d love to say hi! Check out the full schedule here.
The Round Up
OnlyFans’ parent company sold a 16% stake to Architect Capital for $535 million at a $3.15 billion valuation. The sale of the minority stake comes after the death of OnlyFans owner Leonid Radvinsky last month.
TikTok will allow users over 18 to pay for an ad-free subscription plan in the UK. Users who don’t opt for such a plan will still continue to see personalized ads. This follows similar moves by Meta and is likely a proactive measure by TikTok to protect against the UK’s strict data protection and privacy laws.
Target has announced two new creator shopping programs. Club Target, which is for creators with at least 500 followers on Instagram or TikTok, offers weekly challenges and rewards such as gift cards. The retail giant also partnered with creator commerce app LTK on a new influencer program, Target Ambassadors. The program is for established creators on LTK’s platform and allows them to work directly with Target within the LTK app, offering higher commissions and other benefits like bonuses.
Snap and Perplexity ended their deal, which was announced in November. Under the agreement, Perplexity’s AI search engine would have been directly integrated into Snapchat. The companies didn’t elaborate on why, but said the decision was “amicable.”
ICYMI: James Murdoch’s Lupa Systems is in discussions to acquire parts of Vox Media, which owns New York Magazine and a podcast network with prominent shows including “Pivot,” the New York Times reported last week.
A Message from Cannes Lions
This summer, your favourite creators, social platforms and brands will be at Cannes
Lions for LIONS Creators – discussing the key trends and partnerships shaping the
creator economy. Find out who’s on the 2026 programme.
LIONS Creators | 22-26 June 2026 | Cannes, France
Creator Moves
Smosh, the long-time sketch comedy brand on YouTube, hired Cory Midgarden as its first chief content officer. Midgarden’s career has included 14 years at Paramount, most recently as vice president of digital, social and streaming content at MTV Entertainment Studios. He was also an executive producer at Viacom.
MrBeast hosted an exclusive advertiser event in New York on Tuesday. The mega YouTuber and Jeffrey Housenbold, CEO of his company Beast Enterprises, pitched their vision, including future content plans, prevalence on TV screens and the launch of Beast Membership Platform to connect brands with his fans. The event took place as TV advertisers are in the city for Upfronts, suggesting that MrBeast is serious about securing TV ad dollars.
Dhar Mann launched his first podcast called “What Happens Next.” During the weekly show, he will interview a guest, such as a celebrity or creator, for conversations around “milestones, setbacks and breakthroughs” that shape people’s identity.
• Some top publishers on Substack have privately expressed frustration with the platform and are considering possible departures following The Ankler’s decision to move off the service, the media newsletter Status reported. One major pain point for paid newsletter writers is Substack’s 10% cut of subscriptions. (Status, like Scalable, uses newsletter publisher Beehiiv, which charges a subscription fee to use its service rather than taking a cut of writers’ earnings.)
• Substack creators in the UK collectively have over half a million paid subscribers, according to company data first reported by The Hollywood Reporter. Globally, readers are paying for more than five million subscriptions to publishers on Substack.
