The goal, one might extrapolate, is to keep its top creators content enough to remain on the platform, even as other offers tempt them away. And those offers are coming: Streamers from Netflix to Tubi to Roku are all working to reshape their platforms to more closely resemble YouTube, signing deals with creators to create original programming or sometimes simply to license their content.
YouTube has no objection to its creators signing these kinds of distribution deals, Abram told me. In fact, having its top creators’ content reach new audiences on other platforms will ultimately only funnel those viewers back to YouTube.
But as the talent wars for creators mature, the language of Hollywood contracts—with their carve-outs, windows, and non-competes—will likely find its way into these negotiations. Creators might enjoy freedom of movement between the various platforms now, but in the near future they will likely come to resemble showrunners, with the rights and restrictions thereof.
At the moment though, top creators on YouTube value the platform most for its breadth of reach and fullness of creative freedom. None of the talent I spoke with would give up those benefits in exchange for a payment guarantee and a Hollywood studio.
But as other platforms come to more closely resemble YouTube, that calculus could shift, and when it does, YouTube will have new questions to answer. How committed is it to allowing its top talent complete freedom, for instance, and would it ever consider paywalling some of its most premium programming?
Until then, YouTube can keep doing what it has always done best: build the careers that everyone else wants to buy.
Talking Heds
Byron’s BuzzFeed: Digital media marked the end of an era on Monday, not with a bang but an acquisition. BuzzFeed, the vaunted millennial publishing brand that turned down a $650 million offer from Disney in 2013, sold to budding media magnate Byron Allen earlier this week for $120 million, only $20 million of which was due in cash on signing. As part of the transition, Allen will replace founder Jonah Peretti as CEO. Under its new ownership, BuzzFeed will set its sights on the latest theater of war in the battle for your attention: the living room. Allen plans to prioritize video and transform BuzzFeed, which has a sizable YouTube following, into a new entrant into the streaming wars. The tactic means sizable layoffs are on the horizon for the company, but the pivot might be just what the iconic brand needs in order to secure its second chapter.
Morse’s Coda: In November, when ADWEEK hosted its annual Brandweek event in Atlanta, I took the opportunity to meet Andrew Morse, the new president of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Morse had joined AJC following leadership stints at blue-chip outfits like CNN and ABC, and had convinced the owners of the AJC, Cox Enterprises, to pony up $150 million to turn the news brand into a regional powerhouse. Morse sunset AJC’s print product to grow digital subscribers to 500,000. But just three years into his tenure, that number has barely topped 100,000. On Monday, Morse stepped down. In an industry thin on moxie, I appreciated that Morse swung for the fences. And as a native Texan, I agree that there is room for a regional news brand to better reflect the concerns of the South. But the AJC is not immune to the headwinds buffeting the media industry, which now appear to have stalled, if not scuttled outright, the grand ambitions of the outlet.
