Why Pakistani creators are copying instead of innovating

How a video series breaks through in a crowded space

Khizeee came to Islamabad from Riyadh after spending his entire life in Saudi Arabia. The move meant starting university and rebuilding his online presence in a completely new market. “I’m making content around like eight years or something,” he recalls. His earliest work was product photography in Riyadh, where he was the youngest commercial photographer in the city. But standing behind the camera didn’t satisfy him. “I was shy too,” he says, so he eventually moved in front of it.

By 2017 and 2018, Khizeee was making a video every single day. Then came an insight. “I thought, what if I put it on the same script, almost the same script, but expressionless? How would it be?” That experiment became the “Batsura Sachaiki” series. At first, friends told him to stop. People didn’t like it. But within months, he watched the videos go viral. “After that, my videos started getting viral. At that time, followers were around 15K. In five or six months, I crossed around 60K.”

Why Pakistan’s creators copy each other

Despite the growth, Khizeee noticed something troubling about the broader creator landscape in Pakistan. “There are a lot of creators, but still, in my mind, there are thoughts that this has not been made in the world. It has not been made in digital media.” The problem isn’t opportunity. It’s risk aversion. “As a content creator, we have lost topics. But when it comes to a place where this content has not been made in Pakistan, if it is made, there is space left. But there is a lot of competition right now.”

Muzamil presses him on this. “Do you think there is a problem? And this thing is not just in content creation and on digital, but even in dramas?” Khizeee agrees. Most creators look at what worked and try to replicate it. “If that is viral, make it a video. Try and test it. Yes, the same thing, the same thing is, just gain views from that. Don’t try something new.”

The root cause, Khizeee suspects, runs deeper than just laziness. “Our community or our content creators are just going before viral things.” Without a platform to experiment or fail safely, creators default to imitation. And audiences, Muzamil points out, “will consume what is given to them. And unless something better is given to them, then it will be fine.”

Moving between worlds: Saudi Arabia versus Pakistan

When Khizeee first came to Pakistan from Saudi Arabia, he carried a mental image shaped by news coverage and secondhand stories. “When I was watching Pakistan, I thought you’d go out of the house and you’d kill me.” But reality surprised him. “Pakistan is better than my expectations. I would say, in a funny way, people here are very fast, but it’s fun.”

What struck him most was the intellectual curiosity. In Saudi Arabia, he says, young people rarely questioned systems or asked big questions. “In Saudi Arabia, these things I didn’t get a spark.” But in Islamabad’s university classes, he saw peers asking about physics, the universe, philosophy. “They are so intelligent. I feel good that they keep these thoughts.”

Muzamil has spent significant time reflecting on this shift. “In your experience, do you think that those young people, who are now basically teens, teenagers, they’re smarter than let’s say, when you were an 18-year-old?” Khizeee nods. “Exactly. They are very smart.”

When online exams became the new normal

The pandemic forced universities into a difficult compromise. Online exams became widespread, but the model created perverse incentives. Students who struggled on campus suddenly excelled online, while others complained about internet access or felt isolated. Khizeee watched this unfold in his own classes.

“I was a first semester band, but then it happened, then I got online exams, then I went to 3.4-3.5 GPA,” he explains. The format suited him. But when universities tried to return to on-campus exams, students protested. “People don’t like it. They don’t support. What are you doing?” The protests felt reactive rather than principled. Students wanted flexibility but also quality education. Universities wanted tuition revenue but also academic integrity. “If you close the university, then every faculty member will be jobless.”

Why young people avoid commitment

Khizeee observes something unexpected about relationships among his peers. Many say they want to date, but few actually do. “If I want to ask you, out of 10 boys that you have friends, right? How many boys are actively looking at the relationship? Actively? Oh, seven. If we talk about voice, then seven. And how many relationships with them can actually get in? Yeah, we’ll get into it.”

The mismatch comes from immaturity, he believes, not lack of interest. Young people rush into relationships without understanding the commitment. They expect partnership but bring expectations formed by family dynamics rather than genuine connection. “I would say understanding. I don’t have any understanding, I don’t have any mature understanding, just like that, they come to a relationship.”

Muzamil points out a cultural paradox. Marriages in Pakistan are treated as business transactions, loaded with dowry and status markers. Yet young people avoid the institution because it seems unaffordable or constraining. “We’ve made it very, very difficult. We’ve made it very, very inherently capitalistic.”

Building a brand when nothing local exists

Khizeee decided to solve a different problem: the absence of affordable, organic grooming products for young men in Pakistan. Most premium hair products cost 3,000 to 4,000 rupees and relied on chemical compounds. “I made this hair volumizing powder. It is like 100% organic.” His K-Cube brand launched the product at 399 rupees, undercutting premium imports by nearly 90 percent.

The goal wasn’t luxury branding. “I would say hardly you will cost 1,000,000 means you are so expensive. I made this product and my friend told me to keep this price. I was like, when I was in college I didn’t have 500 rupees.” He wanted young people to access quality without compromise, and he handled manufacturing, packaging, and marketing in-house. The brand became a case study in solving real problems instead of chasing trends.

By doing the work himself, Khizeee avoided the pitfall that traps many creators: treating their audience like a transaction instead of building something they genuinely need.