The Oscars are Headed to YouTube

0:00Josh, can you believe we have been doing this podcast for almost six years? Lauren, seriously, it only feels like, what, 20, 30? More like 50, am I right? Definitely 50, definitely 50. Well, in anticipation of our sixth anniversary happening this February, we actually want to hear from you, our audience. That is right. We're officially plugging and pushing the Creator Upload Survey. It's here. It's happening. For the first time ever, we are interested in something other than ourselves. helps in partnership with Deepwater Strategies, who put this together for us. Thank you very much. We want to learn about you.

0:35It's truly historic. Please head to bit.ly slash creator upload survey. That's bit.ly slash creator upload survey and tell us all the things. What you want more of me, what you want less of Josh and everything in between. We'll be talking a lot about it. So So just go to bit.ly slash creator upload survey and make our lives way easier. Exactly. Thanks for being with us all these years. Now go fill out the survey. Bit.ly slash creator upload survey. That's B-I-T dot L-Y slash creator upload survey. Welcome to Creator Upload, your Creator Economy podcast. I'm Lauren Schnipper. And I'm Joshua Cohen.

1:14Lauren. Yes. You're looking festive. Oh, well, thank you so much. Happy Hanukkah, Josh. Happy Hanukkah. We're in the middle. It's been a rough week for Jews, but you know what I'm not going to do? I'm not going to let my fucking light be dimmed. I think it's probably going to be backwards in this video, but can you read my sweatshirt? Oh, shoot. Wait, hold on. Hold on. Can you read my sweatshirt? Oh, God, why isn't this working? Your AI-generated background is... Okay, ready? Quickly, read it. Deck the halls with matzo. Deck the hall with matzo balls. Deck the halls with matzo balls. Oh, yeah, I missed the balls part.

1:51You know who gave me this sweatshirt? Zach Galifianakis Hannah Hart oh that's great Hannah Hart of beloved of beloved My Drunk Kitchen fame early days YouTuber had a you know was around for a long time she's I don't know I don't know what she's doing right now but she's great love her one third of the original triumvirate of huge YouTube stars Hannah Hart Grace Helbig and Mamrie Hart yes they did movies no relation they did no relation they did all sorts of things and years and years ago, like 10 years ago, she gave me the sweatshirt and it's still, it's like the best. When I've looked for other Hanukkah sweatshirts or sweaters, nothing compares.

2:29I don't know where she got it. I don't care. It hasn't faded. It's great quality. That's how you do merch kits 10 years later. Yep. Gave me the sweatshirt. There you go. That's fantastic. I'm so happy for you, Lauren. Thank you so much. You got to like name drop a creator and show off your wardrobe in the same sentence. Yeah. No, it feels really, it feels right. um it feels really good and uh this is very on brand very on brand yeah no that's yeah i'm not gonna argue with it i'm not gonna argue with it yeah were you at a party at like tyler oakley's house you know with casey nice tattoo when this happened i did one time um uh share a first class cabin with a tyler oakley or business class i guess going to vidcon australia um he was like right in front of me we had a good time we had a good time i had i had some time.

3:18I had some days. I had some moments with Tyler Oakley. He's a good guy. Those Facebook Instagram dollars. My God, it was so great. It was great. My kid was like, I don't know, six months old and they're like, you need to go to VidCon, Australia. I'm like, oh no, I'm gonna be so far away from my baby. You get on that plane, you have enough time to like eat a full meal, watch a full movie and sleep a full eight hours. I was like, you literally could have taken me anywhere and I would have been like, this is great. Yeah, that's amazing. Anyway, yeah, so I just came back from my kid's holiday party and I was representing dude.

3:46That's where I'm at. My kid's wearing a shirt that says like professional dreidel player or something. Nice. Something like that. It's pretty, it's cheeky and cool. Nice. I like that. Actually, yeah, Tom Hanks gave that one to me. Okay. That's not, nope. And Barack Obama. There was a joint gift. Yeah. Yeah. Nobody kind of believes that. Do love my background today, though. That is literally Chachi BTV. I mean, like, I need a fun, wintry vibe background for Riverside, which is the program. shout out to her side that we used to record and i feel it i had no notes i had no notes i thought this was incredible it looks true i can even tell it's not real i know you're in the wonder winter wonderland environment it's amazing you don't need you don't know where i am and you don't need to know anyway we've got really big stories to talk about this is actually probably going to be i mean we should probably know this but i think it's going to be our last episode of 2025 right josh last episode 2025 next year yeah calendar is in the lining for us next next year we'll be back.

4:48Next week will be Christmas and the following week will be New Year's. New Year's. And we will be heading into our sixth anniversary in February. Don't forget to fill out our survey. So we can do all the things that you want to do. Should we do some predictions? Should we do some predictions for next year? I have some predictions. I'm so excited to hear them. So. I think, and this is going to go later in summer, I think there's going to be a lot of traditional media companies trying to not just get into this ecosystem but like trying to buy it all up like i think so we're so we're doing them now real quick these predictions oh sorry do you not want to do that right now let's just let's just get into some news and we'll do some predictions at the end that's code for josh hasn't thought about this at all um in all fairness i didn't i we didn't plan this we should have planned all right should we get to big stories the big let's do it okay the big story coming up uh just came out basically today was that the Oscars are going to move to YouTube in 2029, leaving the longtime home of ABC.

5:48I don't know if you knew this, Josh, but the Oscars, minus like a couple years, which it'll be 100 years in 2028 that the Oscars have been around. But basically, all but a couple years they've been on ABC. And, you know, it's no secret that like the numbers have been declining for years. You know, they had a little bit of a boost last year. But starting in 2029, YouTube will retain the global rights to stream the Oscars through 2033. YouTube will effectively be the home for all things Oscars, including red carpet coverage, the Governor's Awards, and the Oscar nominations announcement. Academy President Lynette Howell-Taylor said, we are thrilled to enter into a multifaceted global partnership with YouTube to be the future home of the Oscars and our year-round Academy programming.

6:31The Academy is an international organization. And this partnership will allow us to expand access to the work of the Academy to be the largest worldwide audience possible, which will be beneficial for our Academy members and the film community. Here's the thing about this. I feel like anybody who's ever loved film, there's a bit of a clutching of the pearls moment, like, how dare they take this away from us? And then you know what I realized? You know what YouTube is, Josh? YouTube is TV. So the fastest growing services, as we've been saying for many, many years, is television, is connected TVs for YouTube.

7:05And I think they're up like YouTube will, according to Nielsen, YouTube accounted for 12.9 % of all television and streaming content consumed in November 2025. Netflix ranked second with 8.3 % market share. So that number is just going to continue to go up. So I feel like once we all like calm down, I feel like what this is actually going to do is kind of what that the president of the Academy was sort of saying, sorry, it was Bill Kramer and Academy President Lynette Howell Taylor. So it was two people that released that statement, just to clarify. But what they were saying is like, they need, in order to stay relevant, they've got to go where audiences are.

7:40And audiences are on YouTube. That's where kids are watching things. That's where the younger generation is watching things. But chances are you're going to actually watch this on your TV. And so it's just, it's expanding. And I think ultimately it's going to be a good thing for film, even though like there's a, obviously there's a piece of you that's just like, these are two separate things. But I have to practice what I preach when I think about these things, because I'm sort of preaching into our community that it's all media and creators is just one aspect of it. And if you're not kind of leaning into that, you're missing kind of the growing piece of media.

8:10So I'm actually kind of excited about this after clutching my pearls. Lauren, I love this announcement. I think it's going to be great for a number of reasons and really interesting to unpack for a number of reasons. But first off, let's look at this in some historical context. So this isn't the first time that the Oscars has dramatically shifted the medium on which it was distributed. So it first started off in hotel ballrooms in 1929, where a bunch of top industry executives, studio heads, big agents, and more were having a nice luncheon and or dinner. And they were honoring these individuals that were in their ecosystem.

8:49them. Then in the 1930s, it started airing on radio, but largely was still relegated to these hotel ballrooms and then these radio broadcasts. And for more than 20 years, the Academy was intent on keeping with radio and using that as its main promotional and distribution vehicle. The first Oscars to be televised was in 1953. And that's for two main reasons. One, just wide television distribution and the technology to enable that wasn't available in a big way before then. But also more importantly, studios didn't want competition from TV. There was this big disconnect between movies slash film and television and Hollywood studios saw television as a threat.

9:34So in the 1940s, the movie attendance was declining for the first time and executives worried that putting their biggest night on TV would make people stay home instead of buying movie tickets. Many actors and directors also had anti-TV clauses in their contract at that time, where they vowed not to work in television so that they could continue to work in the studio system. And these studios would keep giving them work because television was seen as such a huge threat. It's just fascinating to think about that environment in Hollywood with this new fangled technology. Well, it's fascinating because I've heard that thing, like movie, you know movie attendance has been declining for on forever and so it's like it's really interesting and i and i think that like that still remains to be the the concern is like are people not going to bother to go to to to theaters to see movies i'm actually like really excited to see some movies over the holidays by the way in the theater um so i still like going to the theater i really do i just i just don't get a lot but yes um i i that's not the first time i've heard that that that's been like a thing since the 40s that's really interesting and then let's also look at just Oscars ratings over the years.

10:36So in the 1970s, solid high 40s, low 50 millions in terms of viewership for the night. In the 1990s, it peaked in 1998. We've talked about this before. Do you remember why? In 1998? Yes. You probably saw the movie like seven times. Titanic. Correct. Yeah. So it peaked at 57.25 million viewers in 1998, largely because of the popularity of Titanic. And then, you know, has this slow decline since then to an all time low in 2021, a pandemic year of 10.4 million. Immediately before that in 2020, it was 23.6 million. And then has never really recovered. In 2025, got 19.7 million. That includes the numbers on ABC and streaming numbers.

11:29But still, like, Lauren, those kinds of numbers don't even put it in the top 20 or 30 of biggest live broadcasts over the last year. The Super Bowl got 121 million viewers, the NFC Championship game and AFC division playoffs got 56 and 50.7 million viewers, respectively. It's mostly football and other major sports related that just are dominating the charts on most viewed live television broadcasts for the last decade or so. So the Oscars is up there, but it's nowhere near the top 10 or 20. And I think to the point of the Academy, if the Academy really in their ethos and they're like one of their defining principles is getting as many people interested in the art of the film as possible, obviously you want to be on the biggest distribution platform.

12:21It just makes total sense. I also think that like creators still want to be, many of them still want to be in that sort of upper echelon and have the respect and get the access. So I think that's like, it's a very exciting prospect for many folks. It's also just like insane that that's happening. I just think there's going to be a big I think reckoning with the fact that not many creators I don't think at that time there will be more are going to be nominated for any of these kinds of awards and I think that just because it's on YouTube doesn't necessarily mean that they will be or that a bunch of creators are going to be incorporated into the show in any meaningful capacity in fact after thinking about it for five minutes sure I may change my opinion later on but Like if I was going to produce this show on YouTube, I was going to produce the Oscars on YouTube in the next couple of months.

13:12I wouldn't actually change much about the actual show itself. I would have it largely look and feel like the Oscars of the past, but with all these YouTube trappings kind of like on the periphery of it. So you can make the red carpet more fun with creators. You could have this whole Oscars lead up and tie in like the roadshow of PR that these actors embark on pre Oscars to get votes from the Academy and just press around their movies. I mean, it already is all starting to be on YouTube anyway, but YouTube can amplify this in a greater capacity because they're working hand in hand with the Academy.

13:49And so I think you'll see obviously just like the regular trajectory that we're on is going to see more of that. But I think this just accelerates that trajectory and makes the incline way more steep. We're going to see way more of that because of this. But other than that, I don't think I wouldn't change a whole lot. And I'm wondering if the Academy is going to be down with changing much more and incorporating creators throughout all components of this show. Well, I think we have to also recognize this isn't happening next year. This is happening in 2029. So it's like three years away. So I think there's a lot of kind of prep work and obviously and then but there's a lot of like time to quote unquote integrate.

14:27Like I think there's a lot of opportunity for education, filmmakers and creators. Like you're going to see like all these packages during the broadcast of like Guillermo del Toro sitting down with like I was just thinking, you know, came to mind quickly was a Joe Pena, Mystery Guitar Man, who was like an old school YouTuber who's become like a very legit filmmaker. And you're going to see probably they're going to probably pluck out those stories of folks that they are making like quality narrative and probably unscripted or documentary kind of work and stuff like that. So you're going to see that maybe not like nominated and stuff, but they're going to have to like do some sort of integration, I feel like.

15:02But do you think that like the people presenting the awards are going to try to incorporate creators into that? If I'm an Academy member and I'm someone who could be up for winning one of these awards, best actor, best director, best set design, best whatever. Sure. Part of the appeal of that and part of the memory of that is going up and accepting your award from one of your peers who has operated at the highest level of this industry in the past. Yeah. Yes and yes and no. But because I feel like there's been there's plenty of people who have, you know, you know, been presenters at the Oscars that have never been nominated for an Oscar.

15:35You know what I mean? Like I think about like Will Ferrell and Kristen Wiig always do bits together. They've never been nominated for Oscars. But they're totally respected by other people. 100 % but there's probably some dramatic actors that are like who are these jokers I don't know I'm just saying like I don't I think they're gonna do a lot of integration and I know I think that it's people are gonna have to get over it I don't know we'll see apparently you need to get over it and Lauren you're totally right three years is a long way away there is a ton of time to think about this Tara Walpert Levy who is VP of the Americas for YouTube said this on LinkedIn quote you've seen the news the Oscars are coming to YouTube in 2029 the hard part is done getting one of the world's most prestigious shows to reimagine how it reaches a global audience.

16:16Huge props to the DL team for that. The fun part starts now. We've seen creators fundamentally change how people experience live moments from sports to awards to culture-defining events that once lived exclusively on linear TV. The Oscars is the latest and biggest proof that this works. Creators don't amplify these moments, they transform them. Free global broadcast, creator-led red carpet, backstage access to the governor's ball. That's a great start. The ongoing question, what would make this feel less like television on YouTube and more like something only YouTube could do. We have until 2029 to get this exactly right.

16:47Curious what you're seeing that I'm not. She's got questions too. She's got questions too. And like YouTube's NFL game in Brazil, it's just going to be really hard to throw the mule here. You have to really satisfy hardcore fans of the Oscars, the Academy, the people that are entrenched in that ecosystem and bring some YouTube-iness to it all. I know. I'm just thinking about that. like that first meeting with like the, like you can just imagine like the old school, like Oscars folks sitting down with like the like, hi guys. Hey, what's up you guys. So we're YouTube. That's your YouTube voice. Yeah.

17:24Okay. I think it's worth noting as an X-Big Story, Instagram is bringing reels to your big screen. They're starting with Amazon Fire TV. So obviously, as we've mentioned, YouTube is like taking a very big market share of the connected TV space. So Instagram is sort of looking to get into this. Adam Massori said that he is actually a little bit regrets not getting into this sooner. He said we're exploring TV. This was back at Bloomberg Screen Time event. TV is an increasingly important surface. It's been very important for YouTube. It's been very important for TikTok. So we'd like to figure out how to make sure that we show up in a compelling way on the relevant devices.

18:02And then he got noted that it was a mistake for the company not to explore TV sooner. And this is not to be confused with IGTV, which was the app that I think went away deprecated in about 2022, which was their attempt to make like a sort of separate app that was like all vertical video. You know, I was still there when they were thinking about developing this. And for the record, I thought it was a bad idea. I was just saying. And that did not last. They were just really focused. That was when everybody was obsessed with like just the vertical video of it all. And like now nobody cares. Anyway, so IG4TV is personalized to each user.

18:34It shows up as it shows reels based on the content and creators that you enjoy on the Instagram app. Reels will be optimized into channels and categories based on topics such as comedy, music, and lifestyle, making it easier to explore different types of videos. This feels like something that should have been like a leak and not an actual announcement because it feels very want-wise relative to all the other things happening with like connected TVs and the other platforms, especially specifically YouTube. Like, it just feels like this is an announcement that you would have made like three or four years ago or like just pretend like, oh, this just leaked and we have a bigger thing coming soon.

19:07Do you know what I mean? Like, it just feels very like. It just also feels like, yeah, Adam Masseri keeps talking about these developments and then apologizing for what they've gotten to it so late. He said the same thing about launching Reels. He said they were talking about whether they should make it a standalone app or have it inside of Instagram. and that really detracted from the development and bringing that feature to the public, which let TikTok have a huge head start on them. And now it's just wild that in 2025, leading into 2026, there's no way to watch Instagram on your television in any meaningful capacity.

19:40And same thing with TikTok too. How have they not had apps that have come out years ago for this? It's fascinating. I don't know. I don't know. It's fascinating. I think it's good for them to do this for sure. YouTube is always going to have a leg up in this ecosystem because of the long form nature of the content on that platform. Although there are definitely sessions when my kids are at other people's houses. We don't let them do this at our house anymore. When they are scrolling through shorts on the television for hours, for sure. I've seen that. It's just like a big phone. I get it. So maybe IGTV and TikTok will command that market.

20:17but for lean back experience of viewing something on your television i mean these other platforms just don't have the content or the supply that are going to provide viewers with that kind of experience in any meaningful capacity to kind of scare youtube i think anytime soon so you let them watch just hours and hours of short form i don't let them when they're at like their cousin's house for Thanksgiving. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Hours. Wow. Wow. All right, Josh, do you have any predictions for 2026? You're not a podcast if you don't have a prediction for 2026. I have some predictions for 2026. We're going to be canceled in every way that that means canceled if we don't have a prediction for 2026.

21:01Go. I think 2026 is just a dramatic increase in the spend that we're seeing from major brands into the online video ecosystem and into the creator economy. And the big winners of that are going to be the platforms, most notably YouTube. I think YouTube's annual revenue has increased every single year. In 2025, it'll probably end up somewhere in the low 30 millions of advertising revenue on the platform. I think we'll see not like a hockey stick like growth, but a noticeable uptick at the end of 2026. As again, creators are just more part of culture. They're more part of everyone's daily lives.

21:44And YouTube is becoming a more dominant force. So YouTube is going to be the biggest benefactor of that increase in brand spend into this space. And I think creators are going to get more of those dollars, too. This is going to be a year that bigger brands get into this space in a more meaningful, high-touch capacity. So this feels like a very large schnipper prediction. So it's more of the same is basically what you're predicting. No, I respect the prediction. I think an increase in the trajectory. I think a notable increase in the trajectory. So it's the same, but more of it. That's a very large schnipper prediction.

22:17Very large schnipper prediction. I want everybody who's playing the creator upload-like sort of jerking game to go back to the end of the episode of last season. at last season. I think we have seasons last year. And I guarantee that is what Josh said about my prediction. Lauren was like, creators are a thing. I think they're going to like still be a thing. I think what you're saying, and I do agree with this, is that there's been a very like, you know, one-off kind of like notion about how you work with a creator. And it's now starting to be like a more meaningful, like there's the, somebody said it somewhere, like would you have Michael Jordan wear like basketball shoes for one, you know, game or the whole season?

22:52So like, you know, perhaps we're going to see more of that. I work in a lot of different capacities in M &A and corporate development, helping folks figure out, you know, companies to buy in the space and in both traditional media companies and creator economy companies. what I can pretty confidently predict is that there are going to be a flood of buyers on the market really looking actively to acquire YouTube or I should say creator businesses, right? And, but I do think that the, what is going to always be a barrier to entry is just the key man risk of it all. Like if you are a creator company or I should say a digital first, you know, YouTube production services, you have IP and you have IP that doesn't rely on like one person, you are going to be the hottest commodity in the next like 12 to 18 months.

23:46Like even if you're not on the market. And I already sort of seeing indicators of that. And there's just more and more. It's like there's just a lot of opportunity for folks. So if you aren't that and you're thinking about starting something like that, this now is the time to do it. It would be my my prediction and my suggestion um all right well we've done our predictions so we are now allowed to continue podcasting uh so josh do you have any um uploads or downloads uh end of the year i have one quick upload here um home depot is starting their own creator program and i as we've talked many um retail brands are doing this you've got the sephoras and you've got the all the beauty companies that have been doing it and i love and i love lowes was doing this lowes started did something with beast um i think dude perfect perfect is home depot's kind of um new lineup and i just think it's it's the opening line i went on the website welcome to the home depot creator program this isn't your typical club of influencers it's a crew of doers this is where people who are serious about their passions come together to create and build community around the things they love i love this i'm into it all brands should be doing it it's all about niche and connecting with like your super fans and the folks that can connect you with your, connect the brand with their super fans as well.

25:02So I'm very excited about that. Big upload at the end of 2025. Another big brand that's going to be working more with creators. You're going to see a noticeable increase in the quantity of time, money that they're putting into this space. All right, Josh, do you have anything? One of YouTube's biggest gaming personalities, Markiplier, has this passion project movie called Iron Long. It's based on a horror video game of the same name the event went viral in 2022 and mark's movie follows a convict tasked with exploring an ocean of blood on a desolate moon after a cataclysmic event called the quiet rupture and he made this movie and now it's getting some wider distribution by amc cinemark and regal they're going to be showing iron lung starting january 30th 2026 and with some theater showing a screening a few days earlier.

25:50It'll be interesting to see how this goes mainly like independently produced and distributed. And we'll see what the audience's reaction to this, if this has any likes. I'm excited. I'm excited for him. It's a big deal. Maybe there will be creators at the Oscars in 2029, Lauren. Yeah, maybe there will be each other. Why don't you think a little positively? Okay, Josh, I think we did it. That's enough. Happy almost birthday. Thank you, Lauren. Happy birthday to us. Yes, Josh and Lauren have the same birthday. Same birthday. I am infinitely younger in all ways, but specifically in outlook and life and spirit and joie de vivre.

26:32Lauren, that's it. I'll see you buying a new Amazon Fire Stick so you can scroll through some IG videos just to get ready for that 2029 YouTube Oscars look. Can't wait. If not there, next year on Creator Upload. Today's show is produced by Lauren Schnipper, Joshua Cohen, that's me, and Adam Conner. It's edited by Adam Conner too. Original music is by London Bridge. You can check him out on Instagram at London Bridge Music. Make sure you subscribe to Creator Upload right here on YouTube, on Apple Podcasts as well, Spotify, or wherever you're listening. While you're there, give us a rating and leave us a comment.

27:05If you want to talk, hit us up at info at creatorupload.com. If you like our show, recommend it to a friend. If you love it, just tell everyone. Thanks for listening to Creator Upload, and we will be back next week.