The Media Leader Podcast | Cannes 2026
Is YouTube TV? It’s a question that pretty much everyone in this industry has an opinion on. YouTube, surely, would benefit from receiving TV budgets from advertisers. And, after all, more people are watching YouTube on TV sets.
At the same time, YouTube isn’t exactly leaning into TV measurement standards. It’s been in a back-and-forth here in the UK with TV measurement company Barb, most recently sending it a cease-and-desist over Barb’s effort to measure TV set viewing of a specific subset of YouTube channels. Before the measurement initiative was shut down, it had revealed that much of YouTube viewing on TV sets was clearly being done by very small children, with viewership in the UK relatively light and limited to shows like Peppa Pig and Bluey.
Of course, whether YouTube should be considered TV is just one question for YouTube, which has been wrapped up in social media bans for under-16s and has been found by a US jury to have designed its platform to be harmfully addictive.
For brands, though, one of the biggest challenges they have with their YouTube strategy and managing its fragmented nature – there’s long-form, there’s TV set viewing, there’s Shorts, and there are creators working across it all, many of whom marketers may have no idea who they are, even as they’re microcelebrities within their own community.
Kim Larson is the global managing director and head of YouTube Creators. She sat down with host Jack Benjamin in Cannes last month to discuss the platform, how it works with creators, and how the latest news of bans and concerns around measurement might impact the business.
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Thanks to our production partners, Trisonic, for editing this episode. Discover how Trisonic can elevate your brand and expand your business by connecting with your ideal audience.
Highlights
3:20: Reaction to social media bans for under-16s and how it might impact young creators.
5:32: Is YouTube TV? ‘Absolutely’ – even if measurement standards are under question.
8:09: Why YouTube is the best for creators wanting to earn a living.
11:20: Ad disclosure standards.
12:43: How advertisers can deal with YouTube’s own fragmentation of long and short form.
15:00: Professionalisation of the creator economy
Related articles
Google hands cease-and-desist letter over YouTube measurement
Barb’s first 7 weeks of YouTube channel data reveals over-indexing of child audiences
What YouTube sees that you don’t: The future of media is a system, not a bunch of channels
YouTube isn’t social media. So why is it being banned?
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