TV Changed Forever in 2025: The Oscars....on YouTube?
Did you see this coming?
Imagine twenty years ago in 2005, when a little video startup called YouTube began above a pizza parlor in San Bruno, California, telling the first employees to dream big—that one day, one of its videos might win an Oscar.
They would have laughed.
Or how about this: that the little start-up would become so big and powerful, that people would one day turn to it to watch something like the TV show with the biggest worldwide audience, the Academy Awards.
That would been pretty funny too.
If you needed any more proof that the TV world had totally changed within your lifetime, without you realizing it, well, that happened this week.
Now pinch yourself: this week YouTube and the Academy of Motion Arts announced just that: beginning in 2029, the Oscars are moving to YouTube, to be viewed on phones, laptops, tablets and yes TVs, in a bid to reach a younger, hipper audience.
Netflix gets most of the press for coming in and decimating an industry, as it looks to take over Hollywood’s crown jewel: the Warner Bros. studio and it’s library of franchises: Batman, Superman, Harry Potter and all those classics like “Casablanca” “42nd Street” and “Cool Hand Luke.”
But just as Netflix changed the way we watch movies and TV shows, by making them easily accessible via the remote control, and developing an ingenious algorithm that fed us shows we like, YouTube is an even bigger deal.
What was once a place to see funny cat videos and original content by young creators has turned into the digital version of Amazon: the everything channel. Whatever it is that turns you on, YouTube is likely to have it. Tutorials targeting every conceivable niche, music videos, comedy clips, movies and TV shows and on and on.
Most people don’t realize this: YouTube is the most viewed streaming network, hands down. More people tune in to YouTube than Netflix, HBO Max, Amazon Prime or any of the other services that demand a monthly subscription for viewing.
As smart TVs have become standard fare in most living rooms, with streaming apps built right into the remote, viewers have ditched their local news and broadcast stations, which still schedule shows as appointment viewing. Meanwhile a YouTube app on the TV lets people watch whatever they want to see, whenever they want it, for free.
YouTube has quietly become the most watched “network” in the 125 million American television households, with 12.9% of TV viewing, more than any broadcast TV network, per Nielsen. Rival Netflix is at 8%.
Even when ranked with all their corporate holdings, the network’s aren’t doing as well as YouTube. Disney (which owns ABC, Hulu, ESPN and others) is at 11.4%, to 8.6% for NBC Universal, 8.4% for Fox and 8.2% for Paramount, which owns CBS.
And remember the day when cable companies controlled what we wanted to watch, and made us rent bulky cable boxes and multiple remote controls to see news, sports and entertainment? In 2017 parent company Google gave us YouTube TV, a pay service offering many of the same channels and sporting events as a cable alternative. Similar programming with no odious cable box, to appeal to cord cutters.
The service has been wildly successful, growing to the no. 3 pay TV operator, with 10 million monthly subscriptions, after no. 1 Comcast and no. 2 Charter Cable, which markets its services as Spectrum. Analysts expect YouTube TV to catch up and take over the no. 1 mantle within the next two years.
Certainly it will be there in time for the first Oscar telecast in 2029.
(I don’t subscribe to YouTube TV because it’s ridiculously expensive, at $85 a month, basically on par with cable. I’m also not a sports fan, so I don’t need access to games. I’m fine with clips on regular YouTube.)
Remember the way we used to turn on the TV, go to the menu for the listings and then scroll? YouTube has replaced that with its Google smarts following your searches to figure out your interests, and thus my YouTube home page is always a mix of tech, travel and music videos. The Home page for me is the new TV dial.
My original thought when the Oscars deal was announced: how will older viewers find the Academy Awards on YouTube. Then it dawned on me—it won’t be hard. Along with everyone else, they’re already watching every day.
On my little travel show, 44.8% of my audience for Photowalks on YouTube comes from TV viewing, compared to 27.8% for mobile and 20.4% for computers. Which says to me that YouTube viewing on TVs is way more prevalent than most people realize.
FYI: I wrote an article in November, 2005 where I interviewed the young founders of YouTube from their perch above the pizza parlor about what they were trying to do, and I’d love to share it with you, but my former employers at USA TODAY have seemingly wiped out the archives!
Instagram on TV too
This week Instagram announced it was stepping its toes into the TV water too, but in a much smaller way. The network that was once known for sharing photos has morphed into a short-form vertical video first place, and that’s just what it hopes people will want to watch on TV. While YouTube Shorts are very popular, I bet that the majority of YouTube TV content viewed is traditional horizontal video. Who wants to see video clips with both sides cut off? Not me. Instagram is starting slowly, with a test app available to Amazon Fire TV users.
Ultra-Closeup Portraits
Did you see the photos photograher Christopher Anderson’s shot of President Trump’s team for the Vanity Fair profile of chief of staff Susie Wiles? They are super, ultra-closeups that to some might be very off-putting. They have attracted much criticism. Anderson defended his work on Instagram. This is worth a look.
Sunday on Photowalks: Christmas in Japan
When in Japan last week, Alexandra Zuckerman from Scripps News urged me to knock out a Christmas episode of Photowalks and I was initially reluctant. I just didn’t think I could do it.
Yes, the Japanese revere Christmas like we do, playing holiday music seemingly everywhere, they hang trees, buy presents and have this odd habit of eating at Kentucky Fried Chicken on Christmas Day.
But how could I make a full 22 minutes episode out of that?
But thanks to Alex, I did it—with great interviews, some history and a fabulous sitdown at KFC to see what the fuss was all about. You can see the show Sunday at 10 a.m. ET. I hope you’ll tune in and check it out.
The clip below isn’t Christmas related, but I thought you’d enjoy seeing how food is delivered at some restaurants in Japan.
Thanks as always for taking the time to watch, read and listen!
Jeff