A dumb smartphone built with Cursor, and a Grok bot that reads the morning news

Karen X. Cheng's 87-day-old phone invention has passed five million views, while her one new upload sets up a bot to deliver a morning newspaper.

Channel: karenxchengStory of October 4, 2026Trari Newsroom

Why this story? The channel's weekly summary: what went up this week, what is drawing views now, and where the channel stands among similar channels.

invented a dumb smartphone - built w/ cursor

Karen X. Cheng sums up her channel in one line: inventing things to cure her smartphone addiction. The video doing most of the work right now takes that line literally. "invented a dumb smartphone - built w/ cursor" went up 87 days ago, has passed five million views, and still draws more each day than anything else she has posted lately. Cursor is the AI coding editor, so the invention here was built in conversation with software rather than in a workshop.

Her one new upload of the week stays with the same idea from another side. "morning newspaper grok bot instructions" shows how to set up a bot on Grok, the AI assistant from Elon Musk's xAI, that gathers the news into a single morning read instead of an endless scroll. It had a modest first day and is picking up pace slowly. In the comments, several viewers ask whether Grok means the one from Twitter, and one wishes for a longer making-of video showing how the bot was built.

The channel as a whole is moving well below its usual pace, which tends to happen when a viral run settles down. Still, among the art, craft and photography channels closest to her in size, she gained the most views of the week, about 2.3 million, just ahead of Create by K.

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More from karenxchengMilestone passed 10M viewsKaren X. Cheng's 'positive film': ten million views, ten commentsThe Google Chrome collaboration got there about eleven weeks after upload, almost exactly where the channel's videos usually stand at that age.Channel: karenxcheng · Story of September 27, 2026

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The videos drawing views on karenxcheng right now

morning newspaper grok bot instructions16,142 views · 2026-09-30 how I invented the world's dumbest smart phone w/ cursor38,832 views

The numbers

Here is how Karen X. Cheng's channel moved over the past seven days.

views gained this week, compared with similar channels

karenxcheng

2,279,333

Create by K

2,200,216

Holly Auna

1,514,436

HappyBerry Crochet

260,855

Truegreen7

205,053

JD THECAMERAGUY

98,242

Saurav Sinha

76,974

Tomorrows Filmmakers

60,887

subscribers

1,060,000

no significant change in the last 7 days

total views

680,309,736

views per day

133,392

typical day: 393,955

this week's videos (first-day views)

morning newspaper grok bot instructions

1,435

compared with similar channels (subscribers)

JD THECAMERAGUY

1,190,000

Holly Auna

1,110,000

karenxcheng

1,060,000

Truegreen7

1,060,000

HappyBerry Crochet

1,060,000

Tomorrows Filmmakers

966,000

Create by K

962,000

The Koalas JJ

952,000

Saurav Sinha

951,000

As of October 4, 2026 · Data source: Trari Social News, Trari Traffic Trends and Ranking Platform, Google YouTube

Subscriber, view, like and comment counts are YouTube's. Rates, usual days, rankings, comparisons and categories are Trari's own calculations.

Where next?

Also in Art, crafts, magic and photographyThis week on the channel +205K views this weekEpisode 8 of '4 Artists Evolve Eachother's Pokemon' brings Bonny John back to the tableTruegreen7, CuriousChaos, Bonny John and ErtDoesArt pass their fakemon around for three rounds until each one becomes a full evolution line.Channel: Truegreen7 · Story of October 4, 2026 A different discovery todayVideo taking off 13x its usual first dayFlyDubai captain Smit Machchhar, stabbed in the cockpit, speaks to Imtiaz TyabThe short interview from his hospital bed drew about 200,000 views in its first day, where a CBS Evening News short usually ends near 15,000.Channel: CBS Evening News · Story of October 4, 2026