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Today's Hungry starts with a battle and ends with cake. It couldn't get any better than that. Enjoy!

Meta Wants Dominance of Our Attention and Shopping

On Thursday, Meta announced that Amazon shoppers can purchase products on Facebook and Instagram without leaving the apps.

This is a huge declaration, and I'm not sure Jeff Bezos is happy about it because Amazon also wants your undivided attention. That is the goal of every platform you use, but Meta is making the hard play to keep people focused on them.

Earlier this year, Meta announced that in April 2024, people who sell through Instagram and Facebook but use a third-party e-commerce platform like Shopify or Big Cartel will no longer be able to sell through their website. To continue using Facebook Commerce, they must do it natively through the social platform.

Sales will still get recorded through third-party apps, but the control is given to Facebook because they want to keep eyeballs on them.

This will create ripples that disrupt everyone, even if they do not use Facebook commerce. First, if you share external links from Facebook, Instagram, and even Threads, those posts will likely get ghosted more often.

Second, any people or businesses that use Facebook commerce will see their content get preferential treatment over those who don't.

Any customers you have will now be the property of Meta.

This is why it's more important now than ever for you to build your own network that attracts people and allows you to capture their information, allowing you the ability to contact them directly. That means a place to sell your work, collect email addresses, and reach out to your people when and how you want instead of catering to all of Meta's various algorithms.

This doesn't mean leaving or ignoring the platforms but using them to your benefit and then pulling those people to your spaces for further interaction.

Why You Should Care About Google's Top-Searched Products?

Google just announced its Holiday 100, which are the top 100 products searched during the early shopping season, and big surprise, visual art is not on the list.

So, why should we care if art isn't on the menu? Because success leaves clues, and in these top items, there's information about what people are interested in.

Looking at this group of products pictured above, things seem benign and not of much value for artists. These things matter not because of their inherent purpose but because of the interests behind these products.

• You see a dog leash. I see a dog lover.
• You see luggage. I see a traveler.
• You see a kid's instant camera. I see a budding photographer who might need inspiration to create.

Dog lover is too easy, but going deeper, that leash is meant to keep the pet parent's hands free, which makes me believe they want their hands for other things, like browsing dog art on Etsy.

That Bogg Bag makes me think of Crocs, and people love to adorn their Crocs with charms. If you make Croc charms, maybe this is a new opportunity.

Holiday travel is no secret, but maybe those people aren't visiting Grandma's house. Perhaps they're going to Aspen or Athens and love their Skymiles. Airportag.com has made a killing catering to wanderlust, and travelers love showing off their travel experiences.

If you're a Polaroid photographer, could you take one of these kid cameras and show how a pro uses them? Parents would love that, and maybe they get interested themselves. That's an opportunity to sell ideas through courses or your inspired work.

The point is that behind every trend post, there is a subtext to what's being shared, and as creative people, we should be able to take advantage of that opportunity if we think about it creatively.

Art Snacks: Braxton Fuller

Focused, driven, and not held back by the scarcity mindset that plagues many emerging artists, Braxton Fuller is a Kansas City, MO artist who mixes his abstract aesthetic with thoughts and phrases meant to question our perceptions. I met Braxton through Threads and quickly realized he believes many things I do about art and entrepreneurship, which I'm pretty sure makes me cooler now.

​Website | Instagram​

Biz Bites

• ​TikTok kills off its Creator Fund and replaces it with something new, probably making earning money on the app difficult.
• Have you thought about selling digital products on Etsy? Printify has one of the most in-depth posts to help you.
• Very few people can adequately tell you precisely what you need to kickstart your creative business, but Entrepreneur Magazine knows 19 things you do NOT need.​
• Skillshare must have been losing market share because they returned to a monthly paid option after moving to the annual plan a few years ago. That will be great for some, but now it'll cost you a whopping $29 a month.
• I've talked a lot about content creation for artists this week, which makes this post from Copyblogger about coming up with content ideas when you're stuck an appropriate article to share. Warning: #1 on the list is REALLY hard for artists.

Art Bites

• Edward Hopper faked it until he made it... into art school.
• Can corporate art facilitate a thoughtful exchange of ideas?
• ​Screenprinting at home the easy way? Is this even real if you don't have emulsifier and paint splattered everywhere?
• Got a magazine idea? Here's your chance to get it made for free.​
• ​12-year-old punk rocker interviews Ian McKaye of Fugazi and Minor Threat, and it might be the best interview I've ever seen of the punk legend.
• Roy Scholten uses legos to create beautiful block prints of birds. Every artist parent will now show this article to their kids.

Desert

• ​Alana James-Mann makes some of the most beautiful cakes ever. Sure, but how do they taste?