The YouTube Oscars and the Rise of Social Media

I completely agree with Robert Young and the whole gang at the GigaOm Networks. As less and less Americans tune into the Oscars every year, you really have to start to question the relevancy of Hollywood. In an age of blogs, podcasting, and YouTube, I don’t have to settle anymore for Hollywood to get my entertainment. Why should I, especially if there is something else that better appeals to my interests?

Hollywood has to appeal to the lowest common denominator because they make their money by attracting the biggest possible audiences at the box office or at the prime time television time slots. Every week I watch technology programming like Diggnation or DL.tv or listen to the podcasts from the TWiT network. These are shows that would never make it onto mainstream television or radio because they don’t draw a big enough audience. On the web, they are hugely successful.

This revolution isn’t just happening in technology. There is internet-based audio and video programming about every topic imaginable. It must drive Hollywood crazy that I give the same value to this niche market programming that I get off the Web as I do watching the television show 24 on Fox.

As I mentioned earlier, even with diminishing numbers, a fair number of people are tuning tonight into the Oscars to see which celebrities are going to be honored with various awards. Why don’t we have some type of awards for the social media celebrities who were able to use their medium to touch our lives?

If you could pick one player in social media to win an Oscar, who would it be?