MTV has a vision for video, eight-minute scenes on the Internet, three of
them stitched together for a half hour TV show, and a feature length
movie based on the TV series. The New York Times has a story The Rise of Web Video, describing the move beyond two-minute clips. David Gale,
creator of MTV Films, and EVP of MTV Networks sat down with me to
discuss his vision for the evolution of video on the Internet.
Web video is different. David Gale’s MTV division led the development of $5 Cover,
a scripted reality show based on the music scene in Memphis, following
upstart bands trying to make it in the city. The TV show airs Fridays
on MTV.
They have several other shows under development that will use
the same formula; eight-minute Web clips, half-hour TV show, and
potentially a feature-length movie. This model requires a different
approach to screen writing and story development. Mr. Gale said the
format works well for comedy, horror, and other forms because the
audience expects to laugh every few minutes in a comedy, or see horror
every couple minutes. Building the story from the ground up with a
couple scenes in an eight-minute sequence works well for the web, and
easily transitions to the 30 minute TV format. However, trying to work
backwards from a 30 minute show and break it into web length clips
doesn’t work so well, for obvious reasons.
The New York Times story says Web video viewing trends are changing slowly;
“While online video is not going to replace television anytime
soon, it is now decidedly mainstream. About 150 million Internet users
in the United States watch about 14.5 billion videos a month, according
to the measurement firm comScore,
or an average of 97 videos per viewer. Although the Web lacks a
standard for video measurement, comScore says average video durations
have risen slowly but surely in the past year, to an average of 3.4
minutes in March.”
Sponsorship for Web video has been a problem for
most producers. MTV has a major advantage here with their TV sponsors
and other network assets. However, YouTube has been unsuccessful to
date with traditional advertising applied to web video. There are major
copyright and other “rights” issues with much of the User Generated
Content (UGC) on YouTube. Quality of the video is another issue. Web
viewers are not very keen on pre-roll or post-roll video ads. The jury
is still out on what advertising model will work with short form web
video.
Product Placement – Ashton Kutcher and Jason Goldberg of Katalyst Films
are experimenting with new approaches to Web video. Rather than use
pre-roll or post-roll ads they are using product placement within the
video and premium sponsorship for their professionally created web
video shows. Check out KatalystHQ,
their office based reality show. Cheetos is a sponsor of the show, and
Cheetos are integrated into the storyline of each episode. Obviously,
to do this you need a sponsor up front before writing and shooting the
video. Easy for a film company like Katalyst Films, but usually not the
case with garden variety web video.
Jason Calacanis is also experimenting with Web video with his show This Week In Startups, also known as TWiST. Jason built a professional studio at his Mahalo
office in Santa Monica. This Week in Startups is an interview style
show with viewer call in questions. Jason has three sponsors who have
the startup community as their target audience. A perfect match between
sponsor, content, and audience.
Sponsor, Content, Audience – The key to making
video work on the Internet is good alignment between sponsors, the
content of the show, and the audience. To achieve this alignment the
content must be very targeted and focused. This is the problem with UGC
style content, while it may be funny or topical, it rarely lines up
with a sponsor or audience demographic, making advertising sales nearly
impossible.
In future posts I will dig deeper into each of these issues and provide other examples of successful Web pioneers.
(Image source: Imgsrv)
