Thomas Brok
Thomas Brok is an online maker, entrepreneur and presenter. In addition to his own YouTube channel Korthom, Thomas is the brain behind Teenmag, the largest teen celeb/gossip platform in the Benelux, and founder of the popular boy group Spaze. Combined, these brands reach about 2.5 million Dutch people per month. Thomas is packed with energy and always brings some humor. You can book Thomas as a presenter, host and social media expert. His expertise includes social media algorithms, data collection & media literacy.
While studying New Media & Digital Culture (BA & MA) at the University of Amsterdam, he started his first YouTube channel KORTHOM. What started as a hobby quickly got out of hand. Gradually, more and more subscribers were added and two other online brands followed: Teenmag & Spaze.
Meanwhile, the channels have combined about 580,000 subscribers and millions of views per month.
With Teenmag, Thomas managed to build up a larger reach in about 1.5 years than all the traditional girls’ magazines in the same target group added together. The topics discussed vary from celeb & gossip news to body and lifestyle. Teenmag is active on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and on teenmag.nl . Teenmag’s reach is about 800,000 unique people per month, with 15+ Million monthly views on Instagram and Tiktok alone
For his theses he researched, among other things, YouTubers, intimacy, authenticity and the reason that young people prefer to watch YouTube over television. Thomas understands what Gen-Z wants to see and knows how the algorithms of social media platforms work. He likes to share this knowledge and his experiences, and he can also talk about data collection and privacy issues that come with the consumption of online content.
Thomas talks about what happens behind your screen when you use social media, from the perspective of an active user and an online maker, using his MA in New Media & Digital Culture. He also talks about media literacy: are your kids at risk on Tiktok and Instagram? What should you pay attention to when using those platforms? What happens with the data that you provide? How are we paying for the “free” social media platforms that we’re using? Thomas shows relevant examples. For example, did you know that at the “traffic lights” you click on at the Google CAPTCHA you provide “free labor” to Google and train their algorithms to better sort out photos? And that if you say car to your computer often enough, that you’re automatically shown commercials from cars?