A big surprise of the last ten days has been the sheer amount of video and photos from Artemis II, and how inspiring it’s been to follow them. For the past week, astronauts were making the best content in the known universe.

Unlike the last time humans left low-Earth orbit fifty years ago, we now have the Internet and social media, and things like iPhones, GoPros, and digital SLRs, which means the crew has been sharing livestreams, vertical videos, and photos of their journey on every platform (except TikTok).

Hank Green made a video breaking down the incredible photos taken by the Artemis II crew, and the impulse people have to capture those moments, and it’s a fantastic watch about what it means to have people, with cameras, out in space instead of the probes and landers we’ve mostly been sending out.

The Artemis II crew are of course the most experienced and skilled pilots and engineers in the world, not professional content creators — but astronauts have always served as the public faces of NASA, and that’s taken on a whole new level with the ability to livestream in 4K thanks to brand new laser-based comms and immediately post mind-blowing photos of Earth from their iPhones.

As we gear up to build permanent bases on the moon and send the first people (and mascots) to Mars, cameras and social media will be going with them, and we’re likely to have an amazing amount of space content in our future—low-G stunt videos, 360 VR walkarounds of lunar and Martian surfaces, and probably some fun food videos (I’ll happily watch someone make the first bowl of ramen on Mars). And we’re just beginning to see what artists and filmmakers can make beyond the full force of Earth’s gravity, like last month’s amazing video from The Dorothy Project.

Recent sci-fi underplays the role online media will have in space. The Expanse explored a time hundreds of years from now when people live out in the Kuiper Belt, but it seemed to be a future where most people don’t make or share content, or prop their transparent hand terminals against the nearest wall in Ceres Station to record a TikTok dance.

No phones allowed at work in Severance. None needed anymore in Pluribus, though it would be fun to have a scene where Carol gets bored and asks the whole world to start making Shorts again. For All Mankind, a show I love, just started its fifth season, now taking place in the 2010s of their alternate timeline—peak YouTube era in ours —and introduced a bunch of new teen characters, but it’s not clear yet if they’re on social media. Whenever we actually put teens in space, they’ll be the most famous humans in the universe.

That said, beyond the complexity and dangers of getting there, and the effects long term low gravity could have on our bodies, especially developing ones, there’s still one big unsolved problem—galactic cosmic rays—that would make it pretty unethical to send kids to space anytime soon. Until we solve that, Moon Joy will have to just be for consenting adults.

Other good things this week:

When Ian Schafer told me last year that Issa Rae, who made the first great breakout series on YouTube before going on to film and TV, was working on microdrama scripts, I got unreasonably excited. She’s calling them “minute soaps” and doing them directly with TikTok, as opposed to the mobile game industry-derived, paid marketing-driven business model most microdrama apps use, is a game-changer. Hats off to Ian, Issa and the HOORAE team. Here’s their first trailer.

FRED GRAVER explained why the new WGA contract won’t change the reality for working scriptwriters — and why he’s building in public, making a new web series with AI.

Natalie Jarvey has your shopping list if you’re looking for video podcasts to buy post-Open AI buying TBPN, while Emily Sundberg has an emergency press conference with TBPN president Dylan Abruscato.

Been completely missing out on Yasi Salek and her podcast Bandsplain. 4+ hour episodes on the Stone Roses, Portishead, Elastica, Jesus and Mary Chain? Guests like Geoffrey Rickly? Incredible. Also she sells things like this Robert Smith + Mary Poole t-shirt. Enjoy.