The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' 51-member board of governors unanimously approved a series of reforms late Thursday to "begin the process of significantly changing our membership composition", Boone Isaacs said, following a weeklong storm of criticism and calls for an Oscar boycott because of the lack of diversity among nominees. Previously, lifetime voting rights were given to all members of the Academy. The group will also add new non-Board members to its executive and board committees in order to "allow new members an opportunity to become more active in Academy decision-making".

Boone Isaacs said she expects the three new seats on its governing board to be filled in the next few weeks.

When the Oscar nominations revealed a second consecutive year of all-white acting nominees, it lit a fire under film academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs, the first African-American to lead the organization.

Director Spike Lee, a long-time critic of the academy, and actress Jada Pinkett Smith both said that they will not attend this year's ceremony in protest. The nominations prompted the revival of #OscarsSoWhite on social media, which pointedly called out the homogeneity of the Academy Awards.

Anne Buchanan of Buchanan Public Relations said, "When an organization is in the middle of a full-blown crisis, as the academy was, it must take swift and immediate action to stem reputational loss".

Still, I don't think it helps anyone to point fingers and make accusations. "The Board's goal is to commit to doubling the number of women and diverse members of the Academy by 2020". "I woke up in the morning thinking, 'What is the right way to do this?" he said.

If they have been active in the past 10 years in the industry, only then their memberships will be renewed for the nest 10 years.

"But we still need to put pressure on the Hollywood studio heads to make more inclusive and diverse films, because the academy can only nominate quality work that has been made".

NEW YORK (AP) — The widespread outrage over two straight years of largely white Oscar nominees coalesced behind three damning, viral words: "OscarsSoWhite".

Visual effects specialist James Knight, a member of the academy's science and technology council, commended the changes unveiled Friday but said Oscar voters cast their ballots based on the quality of movies they have to choose from, not on racial factors. If a member isn't active in the industry, they will still be a part of the academy, but will not engage in the voting process. "And let's not even get into the other branches", Lee, the outspoken director of such racially charged films as "Do the Right Thing" and "Malcolm X" wrote on Instagram. "Slumdog Millionaire" would not have won Best Picture if white people only voted for movies featuring white people.

Members vote for people that they think should get an Oscar, so by having more non-white members it's hoped more non-white actors and filmmakers will be nominated. "We are living in a country that discriminates and has certain racist tendencies, so sometimes it manifests into things like this and it's illuminated".