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Hello, geeks!

Welcome to this week’s Geekout.

This week’s theme? It’s all about the money and politics 💰 TikTok sale, Threads Ads, Meta fines, and X Money Wallet.

But before we get into it…

The BIGGEST Social Media Study of the year is out. 21M posts. 1M accounts. 8 platforms. Download it now [ad]

And

130,000 creators get their industry insights from this FREE newsletter, including me. It’s worth checking out*

*Not an ad. It’s just a great newsletter I think you’ll love.

__________

I’m still standing 💪

I’ve been overwhelmed by the all of your emails and DMs wishing me well, over the past week.

I read all of them and they really helped lift my mood in what has been another tough week for me personally.

Things are starting to improve, so i am feeling much more hopeful every day.

…The blows keep landing on me, but i’m still standing. ❤️

__________

Geekout Newsletter is smashing it 📈

Beehiiv’s State of Newsletters report for 2025 is out.

Geekout Newsletter's open and click rate is almost DOUBLE the industry average! 🤯

Open Rate
↳ Industry Average: 37.67%
↳ Social Media Newsletter Average: 32.04%
↳ Geekout Newsletter: ✨ 59.11% ✨

Click Rate
↳ Industry Average: 4.74%
↳ Social Media Newsletter Average: 2.36%
↳ Geekout Newsletter: ✨ 8.36% ✨

This makes Geekout Newsletter one of the most popular and engaged with newsletters in the world.

Thank you for supporting my work and reading Geekout! ❤️

✨ Want to advertise in or sponsor Geekout? Get in touch!

__________

Alrighty… Let’s dive in the biggest developments in social media land from the past seven days.

This week, it’s all about the money…. 💰

21M Posts. 1M Accounts. 8 Platforms.
Here’s What’s Changing in 2025 🔥

Metricool’s second BIG annual Social Media Study is now LIVE! 🚀

This comprehensive report analyzes more than 21 million posts from more than 1 million accounts across 8 social media platforms, providing actionable insights to shape your essential 2025 strategy.

Here’s a sneak peek at what you’ll discover:

🖼️ Instagram post reach increased by 21%, while Reels reach declined by 20%. Could 2025 be the year for feed posts? 

🤳TikTok’s average watch time surged by 71%, indicating that users are more engaged than ever. 

📍 Pinterest clicks rose by 51%, making pins a powerful tool for driving outbound traffic.

One of the study’s standout features is its breakdown of accounts by follower size, allowing you to compare your performance against similar profiles and industry averages.

Download the FULL report for all the data-driven insights, trends, and strategies shaping social media in 2025. (It’s free!) [AD]

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🔥 GEEKOUT HOT 5

Geekout’s pick of the hottest headlines in social this week:

2. Meta agrees to pay Trump $25 million to settle his ‘censorship’ lawsuit [HUMBLING]

3. X announces partnership with Visa to power X Money’s wallet [MONETISING]

4. US users dumped RedNote after Trump paused the TikTok ban [FLEETING]

5. Threads starts testing ads in the US and Japan [CAPITALIZING]

The Creator Economy Decoded: 3 Must-Know Stories Every Week (Free)

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🚨 EVERYONE’S TALKING ABOUT…

What will ‘bending the knee’ do to Meta’s global power?

Much has already been said about Meta’s decision to lean into the Trump ideology, completely overhaul moderation, ditch diversity initiatives, turn a blind eye to anti-LGBT rhetoric, and all the rest of it…

But it’s worth looking at how deep this goes, and where it might go next.

Mark Zuckerberg told Meta employees yesterday he wants to have “a productive partnership with the United States government”.

If you’re Zuck, a government that will go easy on you if you just suck up to them must be appealing. It’s a lot easier than dealing with a government that thinks you have too much power and wants to rein you in.

On the dismantling of DEI programmes, Zuckerberg explained to employees that he wants to preemptively stay on the right side of however the law might change around diversity.

Meta told investors on its earnings call that it still wants ‘cognitive diversity’, but one former employee told Wired that jumping to change practices based on how the government signalled it wanted things represented “a slow, painful death” for the company.

Fealty to the government isn’t a traditional American trait, but we’re seeing it increasingly, as major media companies fold to Trump’s lawsuits against them. They want to avoid more hassle later. And we’ve seen tech giants like Google and Amazon cosy up to Trump where they at least appeared to resist a little bit last time.

But if ‘big tech’ is so keen to do what Trump says, and the US increasingly falls out of step with the rest of the world by trying to invade Greenland or whatever, major social media platforms like X and Instagram could see themselves increasingly treated abroad as tools of a problematic state, just as Chinese platforms are today.

In our increasingly polarised world, companies like Meta might find their decision to fall in line behind Trump makes it harder to do business in other parts of the world who are baffled about how the guy got elected… twice.

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✨ NEW & NOTEWORTHY

Everything else you need to know from the past seven days…

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🤖 SOCIAL A.I.

The newest social media A.I. features spotted this week:

• Mark Zuckerberg says Meta will plough “hundreds of billions” into AI

• Instagram has added the Meta AI Imagine feature to the photo selection screen

• Instagram is introducing a new ‘Rewrite Bio with AI’ feature for enhancing your profile bio

• xAI’s Grok 3 seemingly went live for some users, and they were impressed

• The standalone Grok iOS app is scheduled for release outside the US on February 28

• Grok: You can now analyse PDF files using the Grok app

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😆 LOL

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📈 MEMES

It’s great to have Severance back on our screens. Bring on the memes…

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🪧 BRANDS

Meanwhile…

• Leaving X can be a tricky decision for brands. Here’s why

.

🙊 WHAT DID YOU SAY?!

“Everything I say leaks”

– Mark Zuckerberg says… in leaked Meta internal staff Q&A meeting audio 😀

• "User growth is stagnant, revenue is unimpressive, and we're barely breaking even" – Elon Musk reportedly admitted X is in trouble, in a memo to staff

• “Let’s put respect for the highest and noblest part of our humanity back in the centre of our hearts, let’s avoid filling it with what rots and makes it rot” – the Pope says too much online scrolling causes brain rot

• “Get back to how Facebook was used back in the day.” – Mark Zuckerberg wants to Make Facebook Great Again

• “These are American companies whether you like it or not. They shouldn’t be doing that. That’s, as far as I’m concerned, a form of taxation” – Donald Trump hits out at EU fines against US tech companies.

• “We now have a US administration that is proud of our leading companies. That prioritises American technology winning. And that will defend our values and interests abroad,” – Mark Zuckerberg keeps sucking up to Trump

• “And also, it’s not owned by you know who” – John Cleese on why he’s switching from X to Substack

• Jesse Eisenberg was warned not to meet Mark Zuckerberg: “Do not go there”, before filing The Social Network

• Meta's chief AI scientist Yann LeCunn says DeepSeek's success shows that “open source models are surpassing proprietary ones”

• Mark Zuckerberg says Meta isn’t worried about DeepSeek

.

👀 MY FAV READS

“The ‘influencer accent’ is taking over TikTok. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, scroll through your FYP page and listen.”

Also:

• What people on TikTok are really talking about when they say ‘cute winter boots’

• The secret sauce of Chinese social media apps

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😮 WTF?!

LinkedIn has removed at least two accounts that were created for AI “co-workers” whose profile images said they were “#OpenToWork.”

“I don’t need coffee breaks, I don’t miss deadlines, and I’ll outperform any social media team you’ve ever worked with - Guaranteed," the profile page for one of these AI accounts called Ella said. “Tired of human ‘experts’ making excuses? I deliver, period.”

Also:

• Frustrated YouTube viewers seek explanation for hour-long unskippable ads

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🤦 FAIL

“A child mistaking an adult actress in an explicit ad for a popular YouTuber is yet another troubling example of YouTube's ongoing bad ads problem.”

Also:

• TikTok accounts are mysteriously unfollowing AOC, in a glitch some users think is deliberate

• Meta quietly fixed a WhatsApp bug that let users see view-once media indefinitely

• Facebook has been removing Linux discussions as security threats

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📲 NEW APP

This app, building a TikTok-style experience on top of Bluesky’s AT protocol, is worth a look…

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👔 YOU’RE HIRED!

Hot new social media jobs worth checking out this week:

• Netflix is hiring a Social Media Manager for Netflix is a Joke [Los Angeles, CA, USA]

• Eventbrite needs a Social Media Director [remote, USA]

• The BBC is looking for a Head of Social and YouTube for BBC Children’s & Education [Salford, UK]

• Historic Royal Palaces is recruiting a Social Media Officer [London, UK]

.

👌 PRO TIPS

• Instagram image dimensions for 2025

• 5 ways that AI will change social media marketing

• TikTok has launched its 2025 marketing calendar

• A YouTube product manager has revealed Shorts secrets for creators

• Pinterest has shared a guide to key marketing moments for the year ahead

• Instagram has published a NEW guide to using Threads

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📊 SOCIAL STATS

1 MILLION

– How many units Meta’s Ray-Bans smart glasses sold last year. 
Safe to say they’re a hit.

• The average US mobile daily active users for RedNote from January 20 to 22 declined by roughly 17% compared with the week prior

• Mark Zuckerberg says Meta will have 1.3 million GPUs for AI by the end of the year.

• Meta’s Reality Labs beat its sales targets by 40% in 2024

• LinkedIn has passed $2 billion in premium revenues in 12 months, with overall revenues up 9% on the year

• 70% of scientists responding to a Nature poll use Bluesky, with many preferring it to X, which they see as “antagonistic to science”

• TikTok rivals: Since the beginning of January, approximately 250,000 new users have signed up for Flip every day

• Creator Economy: Just 4% of the estimated 50 million global creators are earning more than $100,000 a year, according to Goldman Sachs Research

• LinkedIn’s total video viewership on the platform increased by 36% YoY for the period between Oct. 30, 2024, and Jan. 29, 2025.

📈 CHARTED

US mobile app hours engaged per day: Sensor Tower’s prediction of how a TikTok ban could affect the market…

• YouTube dominates Gen Alpha's viewing

• Disney just pips YouTube in the US TV viewing in December 2024

• Threads’ user growth, charted

• Meta’s Reality Labs losses since 2020

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• Recent calls for a Meta boycott haven’t had much impact, it seems. [Business Insider $$$]

• Live translations on Meta’s smart glasses work well — until they don’t. [The Verge]

• Mark Zuckerberg says “long-term investments" are coming to make Horizon "visually stunning". [Upload VR]

• Meta is considering testing Chinese AI models in its generative AI tools for advertisers. [The Information $$$]

• Mark Zuckerberg is considering buying a house in Washington DC so he can be close to the Trump administration. [Financial Times $$$]

• Meta is transferring oversight of Reality Labs’ business operations to Meta COO, Javier Olivan, away from Reality Lab’ COO, Dan Reed. [The Information $$$]

Instagram:

• Instagram now offers 14-day trials for subscriptions to creators. [@theahmedghanem]

• Instagram has introduced a new theme, inspired by Queen Elizabeth II. [@theahmedghanem]

• Instagram has added a shortcut for “Trending Audio” within the saved music collection. [@theahmedghanem]

• Instagram has begun asking users to reactivate their Meta Verified subscription to access upgraded features and enhanced support. [@theahmedghanem]

• Instagram now lets you to create or manage your avatar directly from your expanded profile photo screen. [@theahmedghanem]

• Instagram is testing new designs for buttons. [@oncescuradu]

• Instagram is promoting ‘Captain America: Brave New World’ through a new sticker pack for Instagram DMs. [@oncescruadu]

Threads:

• Threads has moved the Instagram shortcut icon to a new position in the profile. [@theahmedghanem]

WhatsApp:

• WhatsApp has rolled out new icons in the attachment sheet. [Android Police]

The rest: Creator Studio / Adtech / Quest and more:

• Meta has updated the audience targeting options for Advantage+ Catalog ads. [Social Media Today]

• Meta is experimenting with a home theatre environment for Quest's Horizon OS. [Road to VR]

• Meta is reportedly working on a high-end Quest Pro successor alongside Quest 4. [Road to VR]

.

• The EU medicines agency has quit X and moved to Bluesky. [Reuters $$$]

• …and France’s César Academy has also quit X. [Variety]

.

• Trump is breaking the law in his handling of TikTok, say some experts. [Politico]

• TikTok has outlined its measures in place for the German federal election. [Social Media Today]

• Former US VP Mike Pence says Trump should uphold the TikTok ban for national security reasons. [Bloomberg]

• TikTok will invest $3.8 billion in a Thailand data hosting project. [Reuters $$$]

• TikTok has set up a subsidiary in Switzerland, joining OpenAI and Anthropic. [Bloomberg]

• TikTok has been announced as official partner of the EE BAFTA Film Awards 2025. [TikTok Newsroom]

New features and tests:

• TikTok is currently providing limited access to its beta iOS app. [@jonahmanzano]

• TikTok is testing an Instagram Reels-like design for the buttons in the Edit menu. [@oncescuradu]

• TikTok’s STEM feed has shown up in Australia, and it can be toggled on/off. [@jonahmanzano]

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💥 EVEN MORE SOCIAL MEDIA NEWS & UPDATES

• Meta and TikTok are set for EU stress test Ahead of the upcoming German elections. [Bloomberg $$$]

• Creator Funds are back. [The Information $$$]

• Cross-posting app Openvibe has raised an $800,000 funding round. [TechCrunch]

• YouTube and the NFL have announced Post Malone as the headliner of this year’s livestream. [Deadline]

• The UK's National Crime Agency has said it's made big progress in stamping out accounts linked to people-smuggling on Meta, X, TikTok and YouTube. [Forbes $$$]

• US senators are again attempting to ban pre-teens from social media. [Engadget]

• Australians who get most of their news from social media more likely to believe in a climate conspiracy, a study found. [The Guardian]

• South Sudan has lifted its suspension of Facebook and TikTok. [Reuters $$$]

New features and tests:

• YouTube now highlights video chapters through a new pill-shaped background. [@oncescuradu]

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📰 WEEKEND READS

Geekout’s pick of the best longer reads to sink into over the weekend:

• Why the Supreme Court’s TikTok ruling is an ominous turn for online speech 

• Meta’s free-speech shift made it clear to advertisers: ‘Brand safety’ is out of vogue

• For 'VC Twitter,' LinkedIn is becoming the place to be

• DeepSeek shows Meta’s AI strategy is working

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😳 AND FINALLY…

Want a place in the White House briefing room, to juice your TikTok numbers? Join the back of the queue…

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📅 BACK NEXT WEEK…

… And that’s your social media weekly briefing. Done. ☑️

I will keep things short and sweet this week, so you can get the hell outta here.

I’m heading off to catchup on season 2 of Severance on Apple TV. If i can make sense of WTF happened in season 1!

Goodbye, geeks!

p.s. This newsletter is edited by Martin SFP Bryant