by Marc Hustvedt on February 1st, 2011
Web series and online video news worth clicking today:
Syfy’s popular steampunk web series Riese may be heading into Space, or at least close to it, as it has scored a deal with Canadian pay cabler SPACE, set to make it’s TV broadcast premiere April 9 at 9PM. But it’s not just jumping ship from the web, as new mini-episodes of the 10-part series are set to stream on SPACECAST.com every Monday and Friday through to Friday, April 8. [CTV Press Release]
Kevin Rose has a whole handful of web series running these days, even if it’s Diggnation that gets all the attention. His semi-regular polished interview series Foundation just released its second episode—for subscribers only this week—but there’s another, less publicized series that’s essentially the same thing dubbed The Random Show. Rose interviews his cadre of interesting buddies like bestselling author and lifehacker Tim Ferris (below). [Random Show on Vimeo]
by Joshua Cohen on February 1st, 2011
A half hour web show. It’s a simple premise. It makes sense. You don’t want to sit down after a long day at work and watch four minutes of something. You want to relax and engage in a passive entertainment experience that at most requires your active participation in scrolling to the next episode and hitting play once every 22 minutes.
And the reason I say a 30-minute web show makes sense isn’t simply intuition supported by hypothetical, anecdotal evidence. Hard facts show online video consumers seem to be ready for a half hour web show, too.
Lunch time used to be web TV primetime, but in the past two years peak online video viewing hours have shifted from Noon – 3PM to 8PM – 11PM. Viral videos and uber-short-form web series haven’t gone out of vogue, it’s more that a combination of technology, content quality, and exposure to the medium has made consumers more comfortable watching web TV at home than during their lunch breaks or when they should be working on TPS reports.
But even if the market’s ready for it, executing a half hour web show is the tough part. You need a premise with long enough legs that it can sustain a full season of 30-minute episodes, a killer cast, a web savvy production company, and a talented crew that can create something that looks at least as good as what you can find on Hulu, but for a fraction of the cost.
LoveMakers just might be able to pull it off.
The series is written and created by Yuri and Vlad Baranovsky (Break a Leg, 7-Eleven Road Trip Rally, Slurpee Unity Tour), produced by Happy Little Guillotine Films and Mark Gantt (The Bannen Way), stars Gantt and a handful of Break a Leg regulars, incorporates a number of smart social media elements, and is about a premiere matchmaking service whose principals and employees are having issues figuring out how to manage their own physical and romantic relationships. It also has a super sexy trailer.
