The American Film Market, the annual Los Angeles dealmaking event where independent films get financed and sold, is adding a creator economy panel to its lineup this year. That might not sound important, but it signals that Hollywood is starting to pay attention to content creators.

AFM’s 47th edition opens on November 10 with a new half-day program, the New Global Screen Economy Summit, produced by the Independent Film & Television Alliance. IFTA president and CEO Jackie Brenneman will give one keynote, and media analyst Evan Shapiro, known for mapping how technology, capital, creators, and audiences fit together, will give another. The creator session, “Where the New Hits Begin: The New Rules of Discovery & Audience Building,” runs from 1:00 to 1:35 p.m. that day. The panelists include creator attorney Tyler Chou, Spotter founder Aaron DeBevoise, Kynetic Media Ventures founder David Freeman, and Bamboo Bridge founder Joel Savitt.

The most interesting name on that list is DeBevoise. Spotter advances money to creators against the value of content they’ve already made, so they can invest in better production without waiting on ad revenue. That’s a financing model, and putting it in front of film and television dealmakers could be huge for creators. The panel offers a brief look at content creation in an industry built around production incentives, intellectual property, and a “new studio system,” suggesting AFM is starting to treat creator-driven discovery as a force comparable to traditional development and financing. A separate panel the same day, on the “new IP value chain,” focuses on stories reaching screens outside studio channels. 

“We’re expanding AFM to bring new voices and perspectives into the conversation,” Brenneman said. In other words, the crowd that built careers on festivals and sales agents now has to share the room with people who built theirs on YouTube.

AFM is hardly alone. The creator economy’s event calendar has become crowded enough that one trade publication needed nine entries to cover the second half of October. CreatorIQ’s Connect conference gathers more than 1,000 marketing leaders in Los Angeles with YouTube as presenting partner. The Influencer Marketing Conference & Expo returns to LA after a multi-year absence, built around dealmaking. In New York, ALZA Festival debuts as the first festival devoted entirely to micro-drama and vertical storytelling, and partners with the mayor’s office on a “Made in NY Award” that, for the first time, goes to a content creator. Social Commerce Festival in Santa Monica expects more than 90 brands and 1,000 creators, with Estée Lauder, L’Oréal Paris, MAC, and Samsung on its sponsor roster. Add FoodieCon at the Food Network’s New York festival, an affiliate-marketing festival in London, and the Association of National Advertisers’ conference in Orlando, with a TikTok executive on its main stage.

Then there’s the one that spells out the intent most clearly. On October 21, The Hollywood Reporter and Access Media are holding UP NEXT: The Creator IP Market, a one-day event in Los Angeles built to connect development-ready digital creators with studios, streamers, broadcasters, agencies, brands, and investors through curated one-on-one meetings. THR’s editor-in-chief, Maer Roshan, says the idea is to bring the creator economy and Hollywood together as creators increasingly feed studio talent pipelines and brand marketing.

It’s hard to argue the industry isn’t paying attention, as CAA launched a $250 million venture earlier this year to acquire creator businesses, while Live Nation started Creator Nation and is hiring across strategy, commerce, and touring. Even FOX is making moves, having built a creator studio. Adweek opened entries for a creator economy power list, and universities have started offering degrees in the subject. Hollywood isn’t treating creators as a novelty anymore. It’s treating them as a pipeline.