Adam Conover explains how YouTube ruined everything

Today, I’m joined by comedian, podcast host, and YouTuber Adam Conover. Adam is a familiar face to anyone who’s spent time on the internet. He got his start, like so many successful comedy writers, at CollegeHumor back in the day. That was before transitioning into cable TV with Adam Ruins Everything, then onto Netflix, and all the way back to YouTube again, where he posts videos and hosts a podcast called Factually! That is exactly the kind of career path that fascinates me, and it also happens to touch on basically every major Decoder theme there is. You’ll hear upfront that Adam does not in fact like the word “creator” — he’s got a unique perspective on it that speaks to how he sees tech platforms and their leverage.  Verge subscribers, don’t forget you get exclusive access to ad-free Decoder wherever you get your podcasts. Head here. Not a subscriber? You can sign up here. We get deep into what Adam thinks really happened to the TV business — that Hollywood ceded whole categories of TV programming to YouTube in the chase to become Netflix and HBO. Adam also pushes back on the idea that any of this was democratizing — YouTube, he argues, is in fact a worse gatekeeper than the networks, because you can’t actually argue or negotiate with a recommendation algorithm.  I think you’re really going to enjoy this conversation, I know I did. Remember to please subscribe to our YouTube channel for new episodes every Monday and Thursday.  Okay: comedian Adam Conover on YouTube, gatekeepers, and the business of making things online. Here we go.  This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity. Adam Conover, you’re a comedian, you’re a podcaster, you’re a YouTuber, you’re a board member on the Writers Guild of America West. I’m sure you have additional titles. Welcome to Decoder. I’m also a standup comic. That’s often how I describe myself, my identity as a comedian. But yeah, thank you so much for having me. I’m a fan of the show. I have so many questions for you about this moment in media and entertainment. You have a view into all of it. Live comedy is a thing that is successful in America in 2026. Sitcoms don’t exist, which is a video I just watched that you made. There’s some disconnect with how we make this stuff, how we distribute the stuff, and how we pay for the stuff. Like I said, you have a view into Hollywood, you have a view into television, a view into YouTube.  Let’s just start at the very beginning. I listed off a bunch of things and you said you identify as a standup comic. How many roles do you have? How many things do you do? I’m a standup comic. I’m a comedy writer. I’m a television host. I’m a member leader in the Writers Guild of America. I also now basically run a small business as a YouTube podcaster. I recently hired my first full-time employee to help me do all the things I do, but beyond that, I have a bunch of freelancers. I’m one of many people trying to make my way in this new, massively disrupted media landscape, where the companies that used to make media seem intent on destroying themselves and their businesses, giving up large swaths of the industry to tech giants, which are trying to crush us under their heel. So, it’s an interesting time to be a comedian, to say the least. I’m interested in all that. That dynamic between the tech giants, the people who make content for those platforms, and Hollywood — let’s just call it the Death Star of Hollywood — seems as fraught as ever. I want to start with a really basic question. You describe yourself as a YouTuber and a podcaster. Do you think you’re a creator or an influencer? God! I mean, I don’t like those words. I think a lot of people don’t, but I do use them because that’s the terminology we’ve started to use. I feel the word “creator” was created by the social media companies as a way to trick people into entering an extremely inequitable economic bargain. Basically they promise, “Hey, Mr. Beast makes a billion dollars. You could be Mr. Beast. Why don’t you work for us basically for free for the rest of your life in the hopes that one day, we’ll break off a little chunk of ad revenue for you?” That is what they mean by creator.  We used to be writers, performers, talent, Hollywood labor, or media labor. Creator is like when Avon or Mary Kay calls you an entrepreneur. [Laughs] “Oh, you’re an entrepreneur, you’re starting your own business.” Am I? Or is that an illusion that you want me to buy into because it obscures what you have done to the industry I work in? We’re just going to get into it. This is why I wanted you here. So my thesis on Decoder and now increasingly on anyone else’s podcast who will have me, is that the entire entertainment complex —  all of Hollywood and now the music industry to some extent — could not acknowledge that their real competition is the army of teenagers who work for free on YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram. These platforms really do not pay any money. Instagram will literally pay yo