India, July 25 -- India's streaming sector remains chaotic. The struggle to increase paid subscribers, the grind to entice advertisers for the free content, the labour in keeping the existing audiences engaged while trying to expand the viewership base is real. Despite the two mergers (MX Player and Amazon's miniTV and Jio Cinema and Disney+Hotstar), more than 40 services--both homegrown and foreign-- ensure stiff competition. OTT video's race isn't just with TV or theatres but with the highly popular and pervasive social media content, especially on YouTube, generated by millions of creators or influencers. YouTube content is being watched increasingly on smart TVs transcending mobile-first viewing and hence deemed a serious threat to streaming. To entice this young, mobile-first audience watching YouTube and Instagram Reels, platforms like Netflix, JioHotstar and Amazon MX Player are bumping up creator-led content on their services. During Netflix Inc second quarter earnings call last week, its co-CEO Ted Sarandos said the platform was open to working with the best creatives across geographies including creators who distribute only on social media platforms. Few months ago, in the US, it picked a creator-led YouTube dating show Pop the Balloon and put it on its platform. India's largest streaming service JioHotstar read the room early. In February, it launched Sparks, a vertical for social media influencers on its platform, blending traditional shows with creator-led content. "In a world where attention is the most expensive currency, Sparks is our response to evolving viewer behaviour," said JioHotstar. Under Sparks, it conceptualizes snackable and immersive content with the creators. "From 'The Society' with Munawar Faruqui to 'Behan Darr Gayi Naa' with Kusha Kapila and Srishti Dixit, or 'Engaged: Roka Ya Dhoka' with Uorfi & Harsh Gujral, Sparks is not just about discovery or reach, it's about giving creators a platform to bring their dream ideas to life," it said. Besides, it opens newer, more relevant formats for viewers, helps democratize the scale of content giving space to new voices and storytelling styles, JioHotstar said. Amogh Dusad, director and head of content at Amazon MX Player said they have been casting creators in their shows. "Our approach is about embedding creators in stories where they bring authenticity and cultural relatability," he said. 'Playground', featuring YouTuber Elvish Yadav, is a show with multiple returning seasons that brought together "digital creators in a fiction-meets-reality setup," Dusad said. It featured Ahsaas in 'Half CA' and Munawar Faruqui playing the lead in 'First Copy'. "Creators' massive fandom has a direct positive bearing on engagement on our owned channels," he said. Advertisers win as the format allows them to speak to young, mobile-first viewers in a more organic way, Dusad added. JioHotstar said Sparks offers advertisers a way to associate with top creators in a high-quality environment where audiences actively seek differentiated content. In a Linkedin post analysis on Netflix onboarding YouTube's 'Pop The Balloon' on the service, Devo Harris, CEO of New York based interactive video technology startup Adventr, said the US streaming giant will continue to spend on creator content which costs a fraction of the big budget traditional shows and films and yet gets higher viewership. He said he expects all the big streaming companies to partner with creators as the creator economy isn't niche any more. Back home, Netflix, like Amazon MX Player, has featured established influencers in its shows - Prajakta Kohli in 'Mismatched', Sumukhi Suresh in 'The Royals' and Kusha Kapila is expected to join Season 2 of 'Maamla Legal Hai'. Keeping viewers hooked is a constant fight for streaming platforms. JioHostar said the challenge is not just about competing with another entertainment platform, "it is about earning a meaningful place in the user's daily digital routine." "We see different use cases emerging in content consumption. While binge-watching continues, new opportunities are emerging with people consuming content in bursts across multiple times of the day and/or between chores," Dusad said, pushing the platform to build formats like Amazon MX Fatafat to deliver sharp, serialized storytelling in under two minutes per episode. JioHotstar said it's not that the audiences cannot engage with long stories, it's just that they have zero tolerance for irrelevance. It said it wants to be a platform which isn't just scaling content but building cultural connection....