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Read our latest daily deep dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the entertainment world. Check out the latest insight from your favourite analyst, or search by coverage areas - music, entertainment and fandom, creator economy and social.

The creative generation wants its own soundtrack

Kriss Thakrar

21 May 2026

Clients only

Business Strategy Streaming Fandom

Most music fans are musically creative. This doesn’t necessarily mean they aspire to be artists or producers, but simply that they are engaged in at least one of the musical creativity behaviours tracked by MIDiA, such as producing music, learning or playing an instrument, writing music, performin...

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Instagram Instants hint at Meta’s changing aspirations

Hanna Kahlert

19 May 2026

Business Strategy Instagram Social media

As of May 13, Meta has announced the rollout of Instants: a new feature for Instagram that doubles as its own app. Instants are quick snapshots that can only be viewed by followers once and disappear after 24 hours.

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The three challenges YouTube must overcome to become TV

Ben Woods

13 May 2026

Business Strategy YouTube Streaming

YouTube’s case to be classed as TV in the eyes of advertisers is not bulletproof. TV advertising does not just buy reach and premium content. It buys into a regulated ecosystem built around measurement standards, brand safety, discoverability rules, and public-service obligations.

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What official UK industry recognition means for the future of Audio and Podcasting

Laura Fisher

13 May 2026

Clients only

Product Strategy Audio Podcasting

On 11 May, the UK government announced that podcasting and audio will be assigned dedicated codes under the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) 2026 framework, the system used to categorise businesses by economic activity.

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Is AI the biggest threat to social platforms?

Hanna Kahlert

12 May 2026

Business Strategy Social media Social

Social media is becoming less social. You may have noticed this in your own life, as the endless scroll of short-form video becomes default. Users are more likely to turn to ‘social’ platforms for entertainment than to communicate with friends, according to MIDiA’s quarterly consumer survey .

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Answering questions from MIDiA’s "The State of AI and Music" webinar

Olivia Jones

7 May 2026

Business Strategy Spotify Streaming

Last week, MIDiA’s public webinar “The State of AI and Music” explored AI’s role in reshaping consumption, creation, and value in the music industry. For those who were unable to attend, a recording of the webinar is available here .

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Social media bans: boom or bust?

Hanna Kahlert

6 May 2026

Cultural trends Social media Australia

In November 2024, Australia passed regulation aimed at social media platforms. From December 2025, children under the age of 16 could no longer legally hold accounts, with platforms held liable for infringements.

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From answers to influence: How AI is reshaping social platforms’ role in search

Ben Woods

5 May 2026

Clients only

Business Strategy Creators Content

AI is not only disrupting search engines but dismantling the way people search across the internet. MIDiA’s Q3 2025 consumer survey reveals that 52% of those who reported using generative AI leveraged these tools to find information.

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Roblox, social media, and the future of AI integration

Hanna Kahlert

30 Apr 2026

Cultural trends Roblox Social media

The AI race is well underway, with social media companies going all-in. Meta’s triple-digit-billion investment in the space has pushed its AI developments across the board, from a recent partnership with Overview Energy to power servers with satellite solar (per Social Media Today ), to Instagram�...

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Teens are skipping release week – here’s why the music industry can’t ignore it

Tatiana Cirisano

30 Apr 2026

Clients only

Business Strategy Music music industry

The persistent growth of “catalogue” music listening is a familiar topic to the industry. In this context, the results of MIDiA’s Q4 2025 consumer survey may not seem so surprising. Just 24% of all consumers report listening to new music the week it is released, on at least a monthly basis, as...

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Multi-dimensionality in music isn’t new – but it’s overdue for a comeback

Olivia Jones

23 Apr 2026

Business Strategy Spotify Streaming

Multi-dimensionality in music – that is, engaging in ways beyond simply listening to a song – has existed for decades. In the vinyl era, fans could read liner notes and look at album artwork while listening.

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IMS electronic music business report 2025/6

Mark Mulligan

22 Apr 2026

Cultural trends Fandom Music

It’s that time of year again for the definitive annual assessment of the global electronic music market: The IMS electronic music business report . Premiered at the annual IMS conference in Ibiza, this year’s report paints the picture of a healthy industry with thriving scenes but also a few war...

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Social media doesn’t feel social anymore – so where does online community go from here?

Laura Fisher

21 Apr 2026

Cultural trends Social media Podcasts

A curious divergence is emerging in the UK's media habits. Earlier this month, Ofcom published its latest report on adults' media use, and one finding stands out. Social media usage remains high, with 89% of UK adults using at least one platform daily.

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Music and AI: What happens when quality is no longer a differentiator?

Tatiana Cirisano

16 Apr 2026

Cultural trends Music streaming Music

For most of recorded music history, quality was scarce. Recording, producing, and distributing a song that sounded “good” required significant investments of time, money, and skill, along with access to gatekeepers, who carefully filtered what entered the system.

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How the creator economy is changing traditional entertainment's discovery, distribution, and supply

Ben Woods

15 Apr 2026

Business Strategy Streaming Creators

The creator economy used to be an adjacent entertainment ecosystem to traditional entertainment. Those days are numbered – if not over already. Creators are now a foundational component in how traditional entertainment produces and distributes content at scale.

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Podcasting’s next growth frontier: tackling the unconverted

Laura Fisher

14 Apr 2026

Business Strategy Podcasts consumer

A lot of attention is being paid to the “rules of engagement” for podcasting: format preferences, video versus audio, and platform battles like YouTube versus Spotify. The industry is deeply focused on how and where audiences are consuming podcasts, and rightly so.

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Breaking the language barrier: AI’s next disruption in music

Adham Nazir

9 Apr 2026

Business Strategy Fandom Artists

American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow once proclaimed that music is a universal language. Ironically, perhaps the only part of this universal language that isn’t universal is language itself. In the streaming era, it may seem easier than ever for musicians to reach listeners around the world, a...

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Beyond the song: Why artists need transmedia storytelling

Olivia Jones

2 Apr 2026

Fandom Marketing Strategy Streaming

In today’s fragmented marketing world, artists have to promote more than just their music – they have to build dedicated fandom. To achieve this, more artists are implementing transmedia elements – that is, adapting a brand story across multiple platforms – into their marketing strategies.

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From feeds to events: How content creators are reshaping TV strategy

Ben Woods

1 Apr 2026

Business Strategy Creators Content Creators

The playbooks for streaming TV services and creators are collapsing into one – but even so, misconceptions remain. Large parts of the traditional entertainment industry consider the engagement techniques in two lanes.

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How music’s ‘Instagram moment’ led to its fast fashion era

Kriss Thakrar

27 Mar 2026

Business Strategy music industry Music creators

The music industry is seeing unprecedented democratisation in both consumption and creation. Leading execs often point to the rise of consumer creation and the ‘Instagrammification’ of music as a growth engine.

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