Happy Friday, and welcome back to The Daily Courant, your afternoon digest of Puck’s best new reporting.

First up today, Julia Alexander digs into the meteoric rise of microdramas—telenovela-style feature films, sliced into 30-to-90-second installments on YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram. With the category on track to generate more than $3 billion this year, Netflix, Disney, and the rest of the legacy media establishment are trying to determine whether this is actually the next frontier for the content economy. And yet, behind all the positive data, there are a few red flags giving Hollywood insiders pause…

Plus, below the fold: Julia Ioffe profiles Pete Hegseth’s rival inside the Pentagon. Matt Belloni reveals former Bieber manager Scooter Braun’s short-lived bid for OnlyFans. Ian Krietzberg explores the A.I. hyperscalers’ feverish push into nuclear energy. And exclusively for Inner Circle members, Lauren Sherman scrutinizes Skims’ $225 million funding round.

Meanwhile, on the pods: Dylan Byers and Julia Alexander examine the prediction market frenzy during New York City’s mayoral election on The Grill Room. On The Town, Matt is joined by Crunchyroll’s Rahul Purini to discuss the global anime boom. And on The Powers That Be, Peter Hamby and Dylan dissect the drama engulfing Condé Nast after the shuttering of Teen Vogue.

They’re the new street drug of the content economy—telenovela-level action parceled out in 90-second clips designed to make viewers fork over in-app dollars for the next hit. Can anyone make them work in the American market?

Instagram Teen Accounts default teens into automatic protections for who can contact them and the content they can see.

Nearly 95% of parents say Teen Accounts help them safeguard their teens online. And we’ll continue adding new protections, giving parents more peace of mind.

Explore our ongoing work to keep teens safe online.

J.D. Vance’s man in the Pentagon is a rare Trump appointee who commands bipartisan respect and affection. Naturally, this doesn’t sit well with his boss, Pete Hegseth, who doesn’t.

The former Justin Bieber manager was in talks to take over the porn-friendly video platform, but abruptly walked away from the deal.

In pursuit of boundless energy to meet their growth targets, A.I. hyperscalers are cutting deals and throwing resources at yet another industry moon shot: a second nuclear energy renaissance. Ironically, their own technologies might jeopardize the push.

Yes, Skims’ new $225 million capital raise, and $5 billion valuation, is a fabulous headline. But why is the company searching for new funding on the private market in advance of a presumably forthcoming I.P.O.? Is it a sign of strength or distress?

Last year, Instagram launched Teen Accounts, which default teens into automatic protections. Now, a stricter “Limited Content” setting is available for parents who prefer extra controls. 

Instagram will continue adding new safeguards, giving parents more peace of mind.

Learn more.

Julia and Dylan break down the week’s buzziest media flash points: prediction markets muscling their way into politics, punctuated by the $420 million frenzy over New York City’s mayoral election; the BBC tiptoeing toward a legal cage match with Trump while clinging to its nonpartisan halo; Jim Bankoff’s plan to spin off the Vox Media Podcast Network; Bob Iger’s flirtation with A.I.-fueled, user-generated content at Disney; and more.

Matt is joined by Rahul Purini, the president of Crunchyroll, to discuss the anime boom both globally and in America, the rise of global streaming services and its role in spreading anime and manga content, and what it is about anime content itself that appeals to audiences.

Dylan Byers joins Peter with intel from two embattled media empires facing existential reinvention: MSNBC, which officially rebrands tomorrow as MS NOW, is embarking on a risky new chapter amid the network’s streaming-era identity crisis; meanwhile, over at Condé Nast, four unionized employees were abruptly fired after protesting the shuttering of Teen Vogue. (Incredibly, even many people who are typically pro-union seemed to agree that the union had gone too far…)

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