Seems pretty simple, right? Except thanks to the power of personal brand (and our current obsession with true crime), that’s just not how it works anymore. Which is why 21-year-old musician D4vd’s career has taken off after he murdered a teen girl. Sure, he got a jail sentence for his crime. But he also built a cult following that’s made him more popular than he ever was before he killed a 14-year-old in cold blood. Yeah, there’s something wrong here. [Keep reading]

- Charlotte Ellis, Editor ♡

Fear not, AI will help you find the answers you seek about your furry friends. And Gen Z is leading the charge. Pet ownership has officially become a wellness practice, and we’ve all become experts in animal mental health. Sixty-three percent of the cohort have searched online to decode their pet’s behaviour, and twenty-nine percent have used AI tools like ChatGPT to assess their pet’s mental health. Gen Z also reported the highest confidence in reading their pet’s emotions.

Obviously paying attention to your pet's behaviour is important. But we don’t need to ask GPT if Moggy has PTSD from that time he jumped in the bath or if he hates your new bf (he does.) At some point we have to think about whether or not we’re actually just projecting our own feelings onto our pets. Does Moggy really hate him, or do you?

Or maybe you hate your job, and that’s why searches for "tired at work" are up 243%. What a time to be alive. Between the fluorescent lighting, the micro-managing manager, and the crippling anxiety you take home with you night after night, it’s no wonder your brain turns to mush at 3pm each day. But I have a solution for you. And, you have to hear me out here. Water.

You know? The free stuff? That comes out of the tap? Supposed to be like the elixir of life or whatever? A new survey of 1,017 full-time U.S. workers by Waterboy found that well-hydrated employees’ clock 1.2 more productive hours per day than those who drink little to no water. That’s six extra hours of output per week. No biohacking or pyramid scheme “get your energy and life back” course needed. Just good ol’ fashion aqua to make you hate your job (and life) little less. Who knew.

We should tell the Meta employees. Since literally everybody is unhappy there. According to Wired, who spoke with current and former employees ahead of layoffs of 10% of staff next week, the vibes are horrifically, historically low.

“Everyone is unhappy; the only people who are not unhappy are, literally, executives,” says an employee who works on Instagram. The social media giant will be cutting around 8,000 people as of May 20, which I’m sure will do wonders for the rock bottom morale and “uniquely grim atmosphere.” Yikes. Might need something a little stronger than water for that one.

-Sophie Randell, Writer

But one thing that I’ve realised is that we live in a culture where a teenage girl can be murdered to protect a product rollout. Our algorithms do not have a conscience. They have an engagement metric.

And right now, the monetisation of dangerous men seems to be a booming business.

When the Los Angeles County District Attorney announced first-degree murder charges against 21-year-old musician David Anthony Burke, professionally known as D4vd, the details of the timeline shook the internet.

According to prosecutors, on April 22, 2025, 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez threatened to expose the long-term sexual abuse she suffered at his hands. The very next day, she vanished after being driven to his Hollywood Hills home.

The legal filing outlines a horrific, premeditated effort to protect a corporate asset: Burke allegedly stabbed the child to death, ordered chainsaws, a body bag, and a kiddie pool online to dismember her, and hid her remains in the front trunk of his Tesla.

The motive? To prevent her from "destroying his rising career".

The whole thing sends shivers down my spine every time I read about it.

Instead, it has been treated as a massive true-crime marketing campaign.

Before his arrest, Burke built his personal brand on dark, melancholic bedroom pop. His breakout 2022 anthem, Romantic Homicide, featured lines about killing a lover without regret. In the wake of his arrest, corners of Discord, TikTok, and Reddit haven’t rejected or deplatformed him. Instead, they’ve gamified him. Fans treat his lyrics, music videos, and old Discord messages as structural clues in some kind of fkd up interactive Alternate Reality Game.

This is the ultimate triumph of the personal brand: the abstraction of a real child's gruesome death into passive entertainment. By turning a literal capital murder trial into a participatory content engine, digital spaces strip the crime of its humanity and keep the perpetrator firmly at the very centre of cultural relevance.

Because the music and media industries are structured to insulate profitable products. Labels, managers, and corporate partners rarely look at an abusive human being and see a moral liability. They instead, look at a spreadsheet and see a monetisable asset.

We have watched this play out for over a decade. Every time a song by Chris Brown trends on TikTok, the music industry collectively hits reset on his long history of domestic violence and felony assault convictions.

If a track generates data points that suggest it will keep users on an app, it is served to millions of listeners regardless of who bled to make it.

The media functions as an identical accomplice. Outlets offer high-profile redemption tours to figures like Shia LaBeouf, even after detailed, harrowing accounts from FKA Twigs regarding how his systematic abuse fundamentally altered her brain chemistry. HER BRAIN CHEMISTRY.

Controversial figures drive clicks, ratings, and platform metrics. The industry treats structural abuse as an edgy marketing hook rather than a disqualifying harm.

This requires shifting from passivity to active, structural boundary-setting:

The industry will keep printing money off the backs of monsters, and our timelines will continue to platform them.

Every day, 137 women and girls are killed by intimate partners and family members. There are enough good artists to listen to that don’t perpetuate this number.

Go stream them instead.

-Sophie Randell, Writer

She’s basically become a meme machine at this point, and today she’s done it again. The trending audio comes from an episode of her podcast Just Trish, where she tries to say "Brokeback Mountain" but accidentally calls it “Hunchback Mountain”, mixing it up with The Hunchback of Notre Dame instead.

Creators are using the audio to joke about those moments where you’re trying to explain something but completely butcher the explanation. Whether it’s forgetting someone’s name, or trying to explain a song with no useful details, we've all been there. The trend is about being a bit slow while somehow still expecting people to understand you.

Using the audio, turn the camera on yourself and use OST describing the moment you were struggling to explain random memories, people, situations etc. Get creative with it... the world is your oyster.

A few ideas to get you started:

-Fiona Badiana, Intern

😂Yap’s funniest home videos: "Freeze pose Trend"
❤How wholesome: "AWW... SO KEYUUTEE"
😊Soooo satisfying: "Pencil Walk Trend"
🍝What you should make for dinner tonight: Creamy Thai coconut cod curry

Hey Cece!

Creating a podcast is a great way to create content for your brand. Because not only will you have the longform version, but you can also cut that up into shorts to post on your social channels. It's also a cool way to get to know other people in your industry by bringing them on as guests. The thing about podcasts, though, is a lot of people start them and very few make more than a few episodes. So if I were you, I'd start recording your first few episodes ASAP. Then just keep getting your reps in, learning as you go. Don't spend too long in the planning phase—otherwise you may never actually start!

[You also might want to check out Your dummy-proof guide to (finally) starting a podcast]

- Charlotte Ellis, Editor ♡

We get it. Creating content that does numbers is harder than it looks. But doing those big numbers is the fastest way to grow your brand. So if you’re tired of throwing sh*t at the wall and seeing what sticks, you’re in luck. Because making our clients go viral is kinda what we do every single day.