Follow the money and you find YouTube. ABC keeps the Oscars through 2028, but the next contract starts in 2029, and the Academy chose reach over old broadcast habit. That is a rational bet if the goal is a younger global audience, because distribution is leverage. Still, a free stream is not a free enterprise, someone is paying for the infrastructure and someone is collecting the data. The danger is that artistic judgment gets bent by whatever metrics advertisers and platforms value next. If the agreement runs to 2033, the Academy should build safeguards now: stable voting procedures, clear eligibility rules, and limits on platform meddling. A republic of taste should not be governed by an algorithm.