Content Creation University
Auditing
PLT-101 Common core Year One Platform & Distribution

The Creator Landscape

History and economics of YouTube and Instagram, major formats, how the creator economy actually works. Informs the Year 2 specialization choice.

Lectures
7
Total runtime
3h 29m
Attendance minimum
1h 45m
Prerequisites
None

Lecture Playlist

Ordered as a teaching progression, not by popularity. Attendance is recorded once half of a lecture has been watched.

  1. David Rogers on The Digital Transformation Playbook The structural shift: why platforms, not products, became the unit of competition Columbia Business School 1 Ivy League 20 min
  2. ETL Speaker Series: Kevin Systrom, Instagram Where Instagram came from: launch, viral growth, and scaling to a global platform Stanford eCorner 2 Peer institution 48 min
  3. Wharton Power Hour - Building Loyal Audiences in the Digital Age Where online video came from, and what "programming" means on an open platform Wharton School 1 Ivy League 50 min
  4. Neal Mohan, CEO of YouTube The creator economy as the platform itself describes it Stanford Graduate School of Business 2 Peer institution 54 min
  5. YouTube Search & Discovery: 'The Algorithm' and Performance FAQs How distribution actually works: ranking, personalization, and the myths around it YouTube Creators 3 Platform official 7 min
  6. When Will I Get Paid? YouTube Partner Program Payment Timelines How money actually reaches a creator: from an earning on the dashboard to a payment in the bank YouTube Creators 3 Platform official 6 min
  7. Practicum · working creator Tom Scott Answers Content Creator Questions | Tech Support | WIRED A creator who has published weekly for over a decade answers the questions first-years actually ask, putting Lecture 5's account of ranking, discovery and the myths around it into practice on a working channel WIRED P Practitioner 24 min

Every course reserves one practicum seat, listed last and marked P. It is filled by someone who has shipped the work — here, WIRED — because the university lectures establish why something works and the practicum shows it being done under real constraints.

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