Have you heard? ‘Ask a Ninja’ revived, scambaiters in the spotlight, and Twitch staff says Adin Ross unban big L

Each week, we handpick a selection of stories to give you a snapshot of trends, updates, business moves, and more from around the creator industry. This week, a beloved web series returns to YouTube, Nintendo says no to a VTuber, Best Buy wants in on cash from creator recommendations, and Balatro gets a blessing.

Creator commotion

One of YouTube’s oldest web series is back in action. Ask a Ninja first spun its shuriken on YouTube way back in 2005, had its heyday in 2010-2011, but vanished into the mist in 2015. Never fear, though: This week, after years of radio silence, it’s offiically returned. The cult beloved series features, of course, a ninja (played by host/channel co-creator Douglas Sarine) who answers the world’s queries with a dash of sage advice. His new episode is eight minutes long and has inspired nearly 2,000 comments from fans excited about his grand return. Next in line for hokage?

Dude Perfect’s going steady with BODYARMOR. The five-man creator group has been cozy with bev brand BODYARMOR for a year now–part of its ongoing effort to secure long-term sponsorships that go beyond just paying for videos. Now it’s following up custom flavor Perfect Pop with a sour punch. Expect to find Sour Apple on Walmart shelves for a buck apiece now through June.

MrBeast is suing a former employee, and it’s not DogPack404. Instead, it’s a former IT contractor, Leroy Nabors, who MrBeast says committed misappropriation of trade secrets, breach of NDA/contract, and unauthorized surveillance within Beast HQ. That resulted in Nabors allegedly having access to “thousands of Beast’s most confidential files.” Yikes. In other MrBeast news, he’s partnered with a Ghana nonprofit to build a free surgical center in West Africa.

Dobrik’s cashing in his health kick. After his fitness-focused return to vlogging, David Dobrik is launching his own potato chip brand, with bags ringing in at just 60 calories. And, to get the health-conscious crowd interested, he’s handing out 1,000 bags at Coachella this weekend.

Pop culture minute

Nintendo is at it again. The Japanese gamemaker behind cultural icons like Pokémon, The Legend of Zelda, Mario, and more is known for its antagonistic attitude toward content creators. Its latest target? Hololive VTuber Pekora, who streamed herself trying to catch a Shiny Mew in the 2004 game Pokémon Emerald. The problem is that Shiny Mews are exceedingly rare, so Pekora bought a bunch of used game cartridges, looking for one that contained the rare item needed to encounter Mew. She apparently ended up streaming herself using a cartridge that was hacked, and Nintendo was not happy about it. Hololive apologized profusely, which isn’t surprising, since it’s the biggest VTuber agency in Japan and probably wants to stay on Nintendo’s slim good side.

Scambaiters in the spotlight. Scamming has reached new heights. We here at Tubefilter get texts almost every day from people claiming they found our profiles on LinkedIn and really truly honestly have a fantastic job offer for us. We just have to fork over $5K for “startup supplies.” But as scamming gets more prolific, costing Americans an estimated $12.5 billion last year, so do scambaiters. And lots of them are making their livings by sharing their best baits on YouTube.

Mariah Carey may be one of the world’s most famous celebrities, but she’s also a mom–which means when she got the chance to embarrass her kid while he was livestreaming on Twitch, she took it. 13-year-old Moroccan invited Carey and his sister Monroe to make a quick appearance while he was broadcasting, but Carey’s renown ended up distracting the chat, and despite Moroccan’s efforts to urge her offscreen, Carey stuck around to give him a hard time. Ah, motherhood.

The biz

Hitting the beach with a brand. Tanning lotion brand Jergens Natural Glow just ferried a group of influencers from the U.S. to the sunny shores of Tulum, a sunny resort town on Mexico’s Caribbean coast. Attending creators included Halley Kate, Bonnie Wyrick, Jaz Smith, Soo Youn Lee, and Bran Flakezz. The adventure was part getaway, part biz dev: influencers all got professional photographs posing with Jergens products, along with luxury accomodations and peer networking.

Tariffs at NAB. The National Association of Broadcasters‘ annual trade show had a lot to do with artificial intelligence this year, but though that was the big-ticket item for many presenters and attendees, there was something else on everyone’s minds: The Trump tariffs, and how they’ll affect American industries–and thus American brands’ advertising budgets–in the coming months…or years. (Another NAB Show tidbit worth noting: Webtoon made an appearance this year, hyping up its growing presence in Hollywood.)

Face cream, home decor…groceries? We know lots of products do well in ecommerce and digital ads. Brands like e.l.f. cosmetics have managed to reach Gen Z’ers on TikTok, and TikTok Shop is selling the same users millions of dollars in trendy products. But what about home basics like groceries? Well, thanks to a new investigation from Grocery Dive, we can see exactly how companies like Kroger, Whole Foods, and Aldi are performing with The Youths Online–and why it recommends influencers team up with these brands. The tl;dr? Groceries may not be the sexiest product on paper, but everyone needs them.

Best Buy gets busy with creator storefronts. Speaking of legacy brick-and-mortar stores pairing with influencers, Best Buy‘s new program is giving creators like Linus Tech Tips their own storefronts. It’s basically the same as Amazon‘s creator program, where they can make public lists of recommended products and get a kickback every time someone buys. Not a bad gig for YouTube‘s bevy of tech-savvy creators.

Platform headlines

TikTok Shop restructure. As we said above, TikTok Shop is raking in millions. But its numbers aren’t satisfying the company, because it just laid off a portion of its U.S.-based Ecommerce Governance and Experience team. Employees told Business Insider this is part of an overall restructuring of the team. The layoffs follow February cuts to TikTok’s Global Trust and Safety Team, as well as some executive exits.

Twitch staff says Adin Ross unban big L. Twitch’s CEO Dan Clancy has spent the past two years establishing himself as a cool guy who listens to creators’ needs. He’s put in a lot more face time than previous CEO Emmett Shear, and has spearheaded some significant changes to things like monetization, multistreaming, and bans. But he’s also walked back some decisions from before his time–one of which is Adin Ross‘s ban. Ross, an Andrew Tate devotee, was banned for hateful conduct. Clancy allegedly told Twitch staffers who were unhappy with his decision that unbanning Ross was about giving him a “second chance.” Who knew you could be banned eight separate times and still qualify for a second chance?

YouTube has to keep up with the times. The internet’s latest favorite neurodivergent catnip game is Balatro, a randomized dungeon-crawler in card deck form. Players advance through rounds by playing poker hands and collecting special ability cards. Developed by one person, LocalThunk, it costs around 15 bucks on Steam, but you don’t put any additional money into it. It’s not real poker. This was apparently difficult for YouTube to understand, because it started age-restricting videos of gameplay, saying they were showing gambling. After complaints, YouTube reversed the decision and said it’s “conducting a platform-wide review” of what happened, but sheesh! Keep up with the culture, YT!