Remember when Elon tweeted that “AI video generation is advancing at the speed of light”? Well, turns out he wasn’t being dramatic for once. Google just dropped Veo 3, and it’s basically the death certificate for traditional Hollywood.
Here’s the deal: You can literally type “A cartographer discovers a lost island on an ancient map” and Veo 3 spits out a cinematic masterpiece. No actors throwing tantrums, no directors going over budget, no craft services bills that could fund a small country. Just pure AI magic.
Think about how bonkers expensive making movies is. You need writers, directors, actors, set builders, sound engineers, costume designers, editors, and probably someone whose only job is to hold the director’s coffee at the perfect temperature. It’s like the most complicated, expensive way to tell a story ever invented.
But Google? They’ve got the whole stack figured out. Gemini writes the script, Veo 3 creates the movie, YouTube distributes it, and ads pay for everything. It’s like they built a movie studio in the cloud and forgot to tell Hollywood.
Here’s where it gets really unfair for traditional studios: While Hollywood executives are still trying to figure out what people want to watch, Google actually knows. YouTube has been collecting data on 2.7 billion users for years. They know exactly when you get bored, what makes you click, and probably what you’re thinking about having for lunch.
So while Disney is gambling $200 million on the next Marvel movie, YouTube could test 10 different versions of a story, optimize everything based on real data, and release the winner by dinner time. It’s like bringing a supercomputer to a knife fight.
The crazy part? This isn’t some distant sci-fi scenario. The next Spielberg might be some teenager with a Chromebook and a good WiFi connection. We’re talking about democratizing content creation on a scale that makes the printing press look like a minor upgrade.
Imagine getting home and asking, “What did YouTube make for me today?” instead of scrolling through Netflix’s same 47 suggestions. Personalized shows based on your viewing history, creator-led studios scaling ideas into franchises, viewers shaping plots in real-time. It’s like Netflix, but if Netflix actually paid attention to what you wanted.
Now, before you start feeling bad for Hollywood, remember that disruption creates winners and losers. And if you’re holding Google (GOOGL) stock, you might be on the winning side. While everyone’s worried about ChatGPT eating Google’s search lunch, they’re missing the bigger picture: YouTube could become the new Hollywood.
The old studio model can’t compete with AI that works 24/7, costs pennies on the dollar, and has direct access to billions of viewers. It’s like watching a horse race where one horse is actually a rocket ship.
Meta, Amazon, and Netflix are all making similar moves, but Google’s got the full ecosystem already built. They’re not just changing how movies get made – they’re rewriting the entire entertainment industry’s playbook.
So yeah, Hollywood as we know it might be toast. But your portfolio? That’s a different story entirely.