Fewer than 16 months into the production of “The Oprah Podcast” and approximately 15 years after ending her historic 25-year run on television, Oprah Winfrey has signed a lucrative licensing deal with Amazon.
Amazon announced Monday that it has secured a multiyear contract to distribute, repurpose and repackage Ms. Winfrey’s vast collection of intellectual property (IP) content (i.e. her podcast, the original television show episodes, the book club and more). Technically the IP is owned by Harpo Productions, Ms. Winfrey’s company.
According to The New York Times, the deal is in the $100 million range and has Oprah Winfrey committing to host two podcast episodes each week per the agreement. These podcast episodes run approximately an hour in length and are using formats increasingly similar to the original talk show format that catapulted Ms. Winfrey to the ranking of highest grossing and longest running talk show host of all time.
Will The Oprah Podcast be available on YouTube now that Amazon has this licensing deal?
In late 2024, more than 13 years after ending her television talk show, Oprah Winfrey began hosting “The Oprah Podcast” via YouTube. To date, the podcast has more than 914K YouTube subscribers, and the channel has published approximately 932 videos of content.
- What happens to the podcast YouTube channel and episodes that are already on YouTube?
- And, will future podcast episodes be available exclusively on Amazon? Or, will they also be available on YouTube?
The answer, according to The New York Times, is that all of “The Oprah Podcast” episodes (past, current and future) will continue to be available on YouTube. Nicole Sperling with The Times writes:
Those shows will still be available on YouTube, as will all her new content. But beginning in July, the podcasts will also be available across Amazon’s services including Prime Video, Amazon Music, Fire TV Channels and Audible. Amazon executives are hopeful that the popularity of her podcast will get supercharged as a result.
Steve Boom, a vice president with Amazon, celebrates the booming world of podcasts and told The New York Times that, “This is the ultimate validation of where the world is going.” He went on to say, “You have the most influential talk show host in history, by orders of magnitude, leaning heavily into this new world. Now we see where the world is going, and we at Amazon are just happy to be along for the ride.”
Oprah Winfrey is 72 years old and has spent her life in media. She says she is happy to continue the work that she “is called to do” via the podcast and applauds the arrangement with Amazon as an opportunity to expand the podcast’s reach globally.
What will Amazon do with Oprah Winfrey’s original talk show episodes?
“The Oprah Winfrey Show” spanned 25 years, from September 1986 to May 2011. This new Amazon deal gives the company legal licensing rights to all 4,561 episodes from the original talk show. The New York Times says, that
The two parties haven’t yet figured out how the old talk show episodes will be used. But Mr. Sandler said he imagined a lot of different possibilities: from clipping together interviews she has done on a particular subject to rereleasing an interview with an influential figure who has returned to the current culture.
Amazon is celebrating the deal to license the collection of Oprah Winfrey’s intellectual property.
Matt Sandler, the general manager for creative services at Amazon, posted this message on LinkedIn in celebration of the event.
“Every so often, something comes together that you don’t take for granted. Oprah – along with her show The Oprah Podcast, Oprah’s Book Club, Oprah’s Favorite Things, and The Oprah Show TV catalog – is coming to Amazon. Oprah is the original “creator”. Creators are reshaping entertainment, and Oprah continues to pave the way. Lots ahead. For now, it’s just thanks. To Harpo Productions, to our Amazon teams, to CAA Creators, and most of all, to one of the special humans and friends, Oprah.”
Recommended Reading
Oprah Winfrey: Authentic and Transformational Leadership Personified
Stop Saying ‘Mistakes Were Made’—Say This Instead
4 Surprising Ways You’re Sabotaging Your Own Career Success
