Peggy K's Creator Weekly: Halloween, Canva Updates, YouTube Shorts Polls

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Peggy K
October 26, 2024

Happy almost Halloween! I will have candy for the trick-or-treaters, but I’m not sure about a costume. Maybe I could be something scary like social media? 
Or maybe I will just stay online with the spooky Halloween filters and backgrounds and other treats. 

This week there are also updates for YouTube Shorts, monetizing YouTube Partners, Canva, Google Photos and more. 

Top news and updates this week

  • Halloween treats from around the web. 

  • YouTube Shorts polls stickers. 

  • Google Photos shows AI edit details. 

  • New AI-powered Canva features, including text-to-image and automated caption text. 

  • Canva integration with Google Workspace.

  • Filter YouTube realtime views by format type.

  • AdSense ad blocking controls in YouTube Studio.

  • TikTok STEM feed for adults in US, UK and Ireland.

  • Spotify gives podcast creators more control over listener comments.

  • Sitelinks search box in Google Search results is going away. 

  • Threads insights stats are available on mobile.

  • New Threads for Creators site. 

  • Bluesky building premium features for paid subscribers and monetization options for creators.

  • Google Calendar has dark mode. 

  • Plus more reading from around the web.

Read on for details and additional updates!

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To Do & Try

Adobe Fresco, the pro digital painting and drawing app, is now available free to everyone. It has more than a thousand free brushes and animation tools. You can get the app for iOS/iPad or Windows. Watch the demo.

It’s spooky season!

YouTube Shorts Polls

You can now add a poll sticker to a YouTube Short. This option is available in the YouTube mobile app Shorts editor. 

Creators will be able to see the total number of votes as well as the percentage that chose each option on the sticker.

This is one of three engaging stickers you can add to a Short: Poll, Q&A and “Add Yours”. 

You don’t need to create your Short in the Shorts editor. As long as your video is under a minute, you can edit it with your favorite video editor, then upload it through the Shorts editor to add the sticker.

Google Photos Now Shows AI Edit Details

Google Photos will show whether an image was edited with AI in “Info” details. Google detects metadata that meets the International Press Telecommunications Council (IPTC) technical standards. 

That metadata is included when you use Google Photos generative AI editing tools like Magic Eraser, Magic Editor and Zoom Enhance.

This metadata is also added when you combine images, such as when you use the Best Take or Add Me features using the latest Pixel phones.

This may also label images edited with other AI-powered tools, if they have the correct metadata.

While it does add some transparency, the label probably won’t be useful to detect images trying to fool you. The metadata is editable and probably taking a screenshot of the image is enough to dissociate it from any “made with AI labels.”

New AI-Powered Features From Canva 

This week was “Droptober” at Canva with the announcement of a bunch of new AI-powered features.

  • Dream Lab is Canva’s new text-to-image generator. It’s powered by Leonardo.AI’s Phoenix model. Canva acquired Leonardo in July.

  • Automatically generate Captions on videos with speech. The captions can be edited and styled. They are available in 13 languages. This feature is still rolling out. Learn more.

  • Google Workspace integration. Install the Canva app from Google Workspace Marketplace to save designs as shortcuts in Drive, attach designs to Calendar events and invites, and embed designs in emails. (I will note that when I tried to install the app, Google blocked it, because it tried to access “sensitive info”. Hopefully they will fix that soon.)

  • Integrations with Hootsuite and Mailchimp (info).

  • Build connections using Zapier (info), Make (info), and Workato (info) between Canva, Google Workspace, social media and other apps and services.

  • AI-powered Whiteboards, that let you organize sticky notes with a click, create text summaries, vote on ideas in real time. Try it.

  • Polls and quizzes inside Canva for interacting with your team. 

  • Improved AI-powered Magic Write, with better suggestions, the option to “refine and improve” content and get results that appear as its being generated. 

  • New Interactive Charts with animations and interactive features. New options include area charts, radar charts, hierarchy charts and statistical charts. 

  • Custom Mockups that let you convert your own photo into a mockup template.

Some of these features are available with a free Canva account, and others require a paid subscription. Check your account for availability. 

Video Creator and Live Streaming Updates

Monetizing YouTube creators can now access the AdSense ad blocking controls inside YouTube Studio on desktop under Settings > Ad Categories. This lets you block ads on your own videos by category (for example alcohol ads or beauty product ads). Previously this was only available inside AdSense. Learn more from Creator Insider.

Now when you are viewing YouTube realtime views, you can filter by format type. That way you can focus on realtime views for only videos, only Shorts, or only Live. Learn more from Creator Insider.

YouTube is experimenting with a visible goal for Super Chat tips. Both the creator and audience see progress toward the goal. Learn more from Creator Insider.

Apparently YouTube is starting to more strictly enforce its policies around gun-related content, especially promoting the sale of weapons. This has some “GunTube” creators moving to a different platform.

TikTok announced a deal with music distributor UnitedMasters. UnitedMasters represents independent artists, and this deal will make their music available for use, including in TikTok’s commercial music library.

TikTok is opening up its STEM (science technology engineering mathematics) feed to all users in the US, UK, and Ireland. Previously the feed was only the default for teens.

Twitch is warning creators in the DJ program that they should not be playing newly released music posted to other platforms, because it’s not licensed for use on elsewhere.

Lightstream is launching browser-based Lightstream Studio on October 29th, with both free and (cheaper) paid subscription options. They are shutting down their Studio 2 on October 30th. They will continue to offer Lightstream Classic. Lightstream is very gamer oriented, but this seems worth checking out.

The Google Drive video player has an updated look, with “cleaner lines, intuitive controls, and less cluttered viewing experience”. It’s also easier to change the playback speed, turn on captions and fast forward and rewind.

Podcasting and Audio

Spotify is giving podcast creators more control over listener comments. English comments that do not appear “sensitive or inappropriate” are automatically published by default. With the new settings, creators can choose to hold all comments for review or let those potentially inappropriate comments publish automatically. There’s also a new option to block comments with specific keywords or phrases.

Spotify now lets you add custom cover art to playlists. On your mobile device you can upload an image, and add effects, text and stickers. 

Spotify is also rolling out official music videos (in beta) in 97 worldwide markets, but not the US or Canada.

The sitelinks search box in the Google Search results will be removed starting November 21. Why are they doing this? Since the sitelinks search box launched 10 years ago, “usage has dropped”. If this will affect your site in the search results, you don’t need to do anything or remove sitelinks search box structured data from your website.

Glenn Gabe: Google just updated its favicon documentation. The favicon image (the one you see in search or on your browser tab) no longer needs to be at least 48x48 pixels, but larger images are recommended.

Social Media

Threads Insights stats are now available in the Threads app, in addition to Threads on the web (www.threads.net/insights). 

There is a new Threads for Creators site with explanations about how Threads features work and best practices. Access it here.

Bluesky now has more than 13 million users, and has raised more external financing. While the lead investor is Blockchain Capital, Bluesky emphasizes that they will not be using blockchains or cryptocurrency, NFTs or the like. They are working on a subscription model for premium features (like higher quality video uploads), and are developing payment services so that creators can monetize their content.

Communication and Collaboration

Features are available to free accounts unless otherwise noted.

Google Calendar has an updated web interface, and now lets you use dark mode on your computer.

Google Workspace customers with a Gemini AI add-on will see conversation summaries on the Google Chat home tab.

More AI Updates and News

Google Deepmind’s SynthID is now open source. SynthID detects and watermarks AI-generated content.

More Reading (and watching)

Are you deep enough into internet culture to understand meme costumes? Taylor Lorenz writes Halloween has gone full brain rot.

Thanks for reading! 🌼