It’s been a big year for The Hustle; we launched a podcast and a YouTube series! We couldn’t have done it without you, and we thank you for reading. Today, we’re revisiting the year’s top stories, episodes, and GIFs.
In today’s email:
GIFs: Our faves of 2022
The most popular Sunday stories
The most-clicked email subject lines
The Hustle Daily Show’s top episodes
🎧 On the go? Listen to today’s podcast to hear a “best of” episode, where we’ll be discussing how millennials are changing sales and rom coms.
The big idea
Our favorite GIFs from 2022
In case you haven’t noticed, we like making GIFs. We like how they tell stories just like the words underneath them, and hopefully, some mornings, they get you to do a nose laugh. Here are some of our favorites.
Celebrity jet tracking became a popular (and controversial) internet pastime in 2022. In July, Kylie Jenner got panned especially hard when it was discovered her private plane takes 17-minute flights. As did Taylor Swift — and the memes were *chef’s kiss*.
It was a rough year for Meta. Investors lost confidence in Zuckerberg’s pivot to the metaverse and the company conducted significant layoffs. Since this GIF aired in February, Meta stock has dropped another ~50%.
Amazon’s media empire had a landmark year in 2022 between airing the most expensive TV show ever, streaming Thursday Night Football, and acquiring MGM. “Wanna watch James Bond? Oh look — toilet paper!”
TikTok struck the right chord in 2022, cementing itself as the challenger to Instagram, YouTube, and Netflix, and in some ways Spotify and Google Search — so long as it isn’t banned in 2023.
Influencers have had a great run. But with the economy slowing and ad spend dropping, we wondered — What happens to them in a recession? Hopefully not a shark attack, though that may actually be good for business.
GOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL. Maybe the craziest moment at this year’s World Cup — aside from pretty much every moment in the final game — was Qatar declaring its stadiums alcohol-free on the eve of the tournament.
2022 was a year of nostalgia. Sure, we had some futuristic mindfucks like ChatGPT, but Claire’s is mounting a comeback, people are wearing Crocs, and there’s lots of recessionary talk… What are we, living in 2009?
CHART
Zachary Crockett
Most popular Sunday stories
This year, to bring you fresh long-form reads every Sunday, we visited the OG ballpark nacho business and a convent of nuns who challenged an altar bread monopoly. We talked with a real-life castaway and a real estate agent who sells more homes in a day than an average agent sells in a year.
These were our top 10 most popular stories based on page views:
We covered a lot this year, from celebrity private jets to Linkedinfluencers to inflation to dating apps, using four subject lines for each email as part of an A/B test. That led to hundreds of different subject lines.
These 10 had the highest open rates.
(Note: The headline on the linked version of the email may appear different than the popular subject line):
We launched The Hustle Daily Show this year and have been releasing five episodes pretty much every week since February. These episodes had the most downloads.
What’s driving the debt crisis? With Ray Dalio (link)
