--- title: ‘Coolhunters,’ explained - The Hustle description: YouTube once had a collective of “coolhunters’ who scoured the platform for potential hits. image: https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/hubfs/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/706390125-HS-News-Brief_2022-09-08T214227.341Z.webp --- # ‘Coolhunters,’ explained ![Juliet Bennett Rylah](https://53.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/53/assets/hubspot.com/web-team/WBZ/HubSpot%20Media/Blog%202021/Images/Nav/Optimized/TheHustle_Icon_Dark.svg) [Juliet Bennett Rylah](https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/author/juliet-bennett-rylah) [Juliet Bennett Rylah Twitter profile ](https://twitter.com/JBRylah) Published: September 09, 2022 Updated: October 11, 2023 We’ve all got that friend who sends us the latest, greatest TikToks, right? ![‘Coolhunters,’ explained](https://hs-sbup.thehustle.co/hs-fs/hubfs/The%20Hustle%20News/Assets/Images/706390125-HS-News-Brief_2022-09-08T214227.341Z.webp?width=595&height=400&name=706390125-HS-News-Brief_2022-09-08T214227.341Z.webp) Well, YouTube once had a collective of those types known as “coolhunters,” [per](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2022/09/youtube-homepage-editor-google-algorithm-book-excerpt/671339/?scrolla=5eb6d68b7fedc32c19ef33b4) *The Atlantic*. #### **Back in late 2006…** … both Verizon and Apple wanted a curated YouTube homepage for their mobile phones (the iPhone would debut in ‘07). YouTube, which had been recently acquired by Google for [$1.65B](https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/09/business/09cnd-deal.html), hired former iTunes manager Mia Quagliarello to make that happen. She built a team that would hunt for viral potential for the “Featured Videos” banner. They updated it every four hours, and found hits by: - Scouring blogs and other websites - Encouraging YouTubers to email submissions (Justin Bieber’s mother was one of them) Early picks included videos of actor/musician Donald Glover and indie band Peter Bjorn and John. #### **But it didn’t last** It was hard to measure the team’s impact, and algorithms turned out to be cheaper than human labor — especially as YouTube expanded globally. YouTube’s coolhunters were disbanded in 2010. #### **So what do coolhunters look like now?** Today, most of our YouTube recs are chosen by algorithms based on our viewing history. Same with TikTok’s “For You” page. But the term “[coolhunting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coolhunting)” (AKA trend spotting) was actually coined in the ‘90s, and coolhunters are everywhere. - **Example:** Websites that repost content, like Bored Panda and Boing Boing, and newsletters like Kat Angus’ [*Stuff I Saw On The Internet*](https://katangus.substack.com/) or David Nichols’ [*The Land of Random*](https://thelandofrandom.substack.com/). There are also ways to find unknown gems. To be your own “coolhunter,” try [Forgotify](https://forgotify.com/) for seldom-played songs, or [Astronaut](http://astronaut.io/) for unwatched YouTube videos. 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