Addis Ababa is increasingly becoming part of global digital conversations as creators, livestreamers, and online storytellers share the city's culture, energy, and transformation with audiences around the world. (Photos courtesy of the creators' social media channels)
Tadias Magazine
June 2026
New York (TADIAS) — Earlier this year, Ethiopians at home and across the diaspora helped propel IShowSpeed’s visit to Addis Ababa into a viral online moment. More recently, British creator Dylan Page, known to millions as “News Daddy,” arrived in the city to an equally enthusiastic reception. The growing attention surrounding these visits suggests that Addis Ababa is becoming an increasingly visible stop on the global creator circuit, drawing digital storytellers eager to share the city’s culture, transformation, and energy with audiences around the world.
Now, a new video by the travel and culture channel Gize Travels, titled “The World Is Watching Ethiopia: Why Every Major Creator Is Flying to Addis Ababa,” argues that Ethiopia’s capital is no longer attracting attention solely because of its history, diplomacy, or status as the seat of the African Union. Instead, it is increasingly becoming a place where creators come to document transformation, culture, technology, and a rapidly evolving urban landscape.
The video points to a growing wave of international attention surrounding Ethiopia, fueled not by traditional media outlets but by social media creators, livestreamers, and digital storytellers with audiences numbering in the millions.
Watch:
In the case of Dylan Page, the story traces back to the online mobilization that accompanied the inauguration of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). Ethiopian social media users flooded his channels with comments and requests to cover the historic event, helping bring the story before his global audience.
The campaign demonstrated something many Ethiopians already knew: social media has become a powerful tool for amplifying stories that might otherwise receive limited international attention.
The video also highlights the role of Ethiopian creators such as Brook News and Adonay, whose growing digital audiences have helped connect local conversations with global platforms. Their interactions with international creators eventually led to collaborations, visits, and livestreams that introduced millions of viewers to contemporary Ethiopia.
For many observers, however, the significance extends beyond internet personalities.
Over the past several years, Addis Ababa has undergone visible transformation through new parks, public spaces, corridor developments, infrastructure projects, and technology initiatives. Visitors frequently document landmarks such as the Adwa Victory Memorial Museum, riverside developments, and emerging institutions including Ethiopia’s Artificial Intelligence Institute.
The result is a stream of images and videos that often contrast with long-standing international perceptions of the country.
For decades, stories about Africa in much of the global media were frequently framed around conflict, poverty, and crisis. While those realities cannot be ignored, many African creators argue that they represent only part of a much larger story—one that also includes innovation, entrepreneurship, culture, technology, and creativity.
What makes the current moment different is that Africans increasingly have the tools to tell those stories themselves.
Through YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and livestreaming platforms, creators are reaching global audiences directly, offering perspectives that bypass traditional gatekeepers. In Ethiopia, this shift is becoming increasingly visible as local creators, diaspora voices, travel vloggers, and international influencers share their experiences with audiences around the world.
The phenomenon reflects a broader transformation taking place across the continent, where a young, digitally connected generation is helping redefine how African cities are seen and understood.
Whether Addis Ababa ultimately emerges as a major hub for the continent’s creator economy remains to be seen. Yet the growing international interest suggests that the city is increasingly becoming part of global digital conversations.
As Tadias observed during IShowSpeed’s visit, visibility today often arrives not through traditional media institutions but through livestreams, creator collaborations, and social platforms capable of reaching millions within hours. The tools may be new, but the impact is profound: people around the world are discovering Ethiopia through the voices of those who live there, visit there, and share their experiences directly with global audiences.
Perhaps the most notable takeaway is not the arrival of any single influencer but the growing confidence of Ethiopians themselves in shaping their own narrative.
As the video concludes, the world may indeed be paying closer attention to Ethiopia. But this moment is as much about who is telling the story as it is about the story itself.
If the internet age has created new forms of cultural diplomacy, Ethiopia appears determined to participate not as a subject of the conversation, but as one of its storytellers.
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