Tubefilter News

Only a couple web series have made it to episode 1,000. And by couple, I literally mean two. The aberrant and educational daily news program Rocketboom and the thunder show that continues to shock the oenophile community Wine Library TV.

Rocketboom celebrated the milestone on September 15, 2008 and pondered a future with Sarah Palin as president. Wine Library TV commemorated the achievement on March 14, 2011 with its effervescent creator and host Gary Vaynerchuk proclaiming the program’s 1,000th episode would be its last.

The talented media individual who’s caught the attention of the mainstream more than anyone else in the industry (with too many personality profiles in publications like Time Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, and Slate to count, palate-training sessions on Conan and Ellen, three best-selling books, and a SiriusXM radio show) thanked his fans and the people that made one thousand episodes of WLTV happen before explaining he’s shutting down the show to start a new one.

Vaynerchuck will now educate and entertain the wine-drinking masses with metaphors second only to Charlie Sheen’s via daily episodes on Daily Grape. The online destination and mobile application serves as a new home for Vaynerchuk’s wine reviews, which he hopes will make for more timely episodes and give viewers are more usable experience.

Comedian David Koechner (Anchorman, Saturday Night Live, The Office) is hosting Always Open, a new celebrity chat web series that takes place in a booth at Denny’s.

Denny’s teamed up with Will Arnett and Jason Bateman’s digital studio DumbDumb and Ben Silverman’s Electus (part of Barry Diller’s IAC) as a part of Denny’s nationwide campaign “America’s Diner is always open” developed by New York based ad agency Gotham. The first episode, featuring Bateman as Koechner’s guest, launched Monday at CollegeHumor.com.

All episodes take place on premise in a live, working Denny’s restaurant, where Koechner meets up with his comedic celeb cohorts for an anything-goes, 3-minute interview. Arnett, Sarah Silverman, Amy Poehler, Will Forte and Kristin Bell are scheduled for upcoming episodes.

“We at DumbDumb are excited to be partnering with Denny’s in delivering a talent like Dave Koechner within a format that’s perfectly suited to showcase his unique comedic slant,” said Arnett and Bateman. “Going forward, we hope that Always Open establishes itself as a natural destination for many of today’s top figures in the entertainment industry. Frankly, we think this show is a grand slamwich.”

“Major forward-thinking brands like Denny’s recognize that the traditional advertising model has transformed significantly over the last few years and are embracing new ways of reaching their consumers online,” said Laura Caraccioli-Davis, EVP of Advertising Solutions at Electus. “As one of America’s most iconic brands, we are excited to team up with Denny’s to not only create great content, but to help the brand express its values and personality to a broad audience, and to truly enhance its presence nationwide.”

The first episode is currently out with the following two episodes scheduled for

When it comes down to it, it’s all a matter of supply and demand. In many ways SXSW is the land of plenty. Plenty of diversions. Plenty of parties. And plenty of drink. But when it comes to food, the opportunities were few and far between.

That is why Squarespace’s marketing approach for SXSW was so brilliant. Opting not to throw a huge bash, Squarespace enlisted the expertise of Vendr.tv street food critic and “king of carts” Daniel Delaney to curate a four-day food extravaganza in which he selected the best of Austin’s food vendors to feed the SXSW masses out of a custom branded Squarespace food truck, capitalizing on the urban food truck mania and the corresponding food criticism craze.

SXSW attendees lined around the block on 5th and Neches right across from the Hilton and the Convention Center, placing the truck at the epicenter of SXSW activity. The menu changed daily with Delaney working around the clock to prep, open, dismantle, and clean out the food truck every day of SXSWi. Here’s the lineup, with Delaney’s mouth-watering descriptions:

Fri: Man Bites Dog “Artisanal hot dogs served on a signature sweet and decadent Kolache roll”
Sat: Gourdough’s Donuts “Big, fat doughnuts hand fried to order, then covered with either brisket, bacon and maple syrup explosion, or crumbled brownies”
Sun: Franklin BBQ “Voted by Savor the 3rd Best BBQ in America, serving brisket sandwiches and pulled pork sandwiches”
Mon: East Side King “James Beard Award Winning chefs that put out an interesting take on modern Japanese cuisine, offering a fried chicken and pork belly sliders”
Much of the Squarespace Food Truck’s success is owed to the Delaney’s passion and enthusiasm. “The Food truck is fantastic. Food is one of these great things, it’s a tell all, it’s very honest—and when food is awesome, people know it and they come for it,” Delaney told Tubefilter. “We worked long and hard on the truck to put together a kick-ass list of the best vendors in Austin. They are all my personal picks, which we’ve covered on VendrTV.”

Each vendor included an item from a “secret menu” each day. Delaney estimated 12,000 meals were served over the course of SXSWi, with a daily average of about ten times as much business as each vendor would sell on a good day.

I cannot conclude this post without giving a well-deserved shout-out to The Fast Company Grill presented by Lincoln and Zazzle. For the entire duration of SXSWi, Fast Company transformed the outdoor patio of The Moonshine Grill into a relaxing retreat from the SXSW bustle replete with

Let’s face it, University of Southern California (USC) film Cinematic Arts school kids have it pretty well. Just getting in to what is arguably the most competitive graduate film program is a badge of respect in an industry littered with standouts amongst its alumni. George Lucas, Robert Zemeckis, Ron Howard, not to mention The LXD director Jon M. Chu.

Now the famed feeder school for Hollywood the fast track is turning its students on to the digital side with a little help from Subway. It’s a first for both school and brand here, the former looking to prepare its latest breed of filmmakers for actually making a career in the emergent medium of web originals and the latter looking to polish its ‘fresh’ image amongst the film crowd. (Something other brands like Stella Artois and Audi have done in spades.)

A few months back, Subway approached USC, with some help from LA-based Content & Co., with an offer to fund two premium web series selected from pitches by teams of the school’s graduate filmmakers. From around fifty teams, ten semifinalist teams were picked to come in an pitch the brand reps with their concepts based on guidance that included little more than a brand brief.

One of the two teams selected—Andy Landen, Giles Andrew, and Alice Mathias—got ballsy, playing a little prank with the pitch right out of Good Will Hunting sending in two comedians in to the pitch in place of themselves. The two plants were protoypes for their leads in Do Whatever, about two friends who ditch their corporate jobs to take on random ‘whatever’ assignments such as this. The gutsy move paid off, with the six-person room laughing as soon the ruse was up.

From there the two series were given ample budgets to cast and shoot their three-episode projects. And we’re not talking about just grabbing a few college buddies. The teams cast working actors like Squatters star Brendan Bradley, Julia Cho, Barry Rothbart, Chris Dotson, Marian Mathias and Both series used the AFTRA new media contract to cover its actors, instead of the blanket SAG contract that covers most of the school’s student films.

Before Kevin Pollak had me at “Hand me the keys you #$%^ing @#$% sucker!” he had me at his stand-up. The comedian’s comedian self-deprecating style, uncanny ability to imitate others, and spin said imitations into compelling routines is a special kind of entertainment that rarely ceases to engage.

Pollak’s stand-up routine is a special kind of entertainment for Pollak, too. It’s one of two times in his professional career (which spans 50-some-odd movie roles and a handful of television appearances) where he’s had 100% creative freedom, control, and ownership of an idea.

So, when’s the other time Pollak’s conceived a project, kept the project safely guarded, and executed the project exactly per his vision instead of reluctantly handing it over to studio execs to later lament how much the whole thing got mucked up under the purview of a design-by-committee Hollywood bureaucracy? On the web.

At the Banking on Big Brands / Celebs for the Web panel at SXSW, Pollak emphasized how he loves the web for the same reason he loves his standup. He can do whatever he wants. “It wasn’t until I found this web space that I found the energy again to live and die by my own wits in front of strangers in an audience in a strange new land,” said Pollak. It’s a sentiment showcased by his work on The Writers Room, Vamped Out, and Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show and a sentiment shared by his fellow panelists, including Innovative Artists’ David Tochterman, AOL’s Amber J. Lawson, Digitas’ Paul Kontonis, and Rick Fox.

The former Los Angeles Laker said he brought his project to the web because he “was tired of waiting…I wanted to create a story and have a voice that doesn’t get caught in development.” After years of playing hurry up and wait in Hollywood, Fox’s buddy comedy about a professional athlete who’s looking for his lost mojo in the off season scored a partnership with Michael Esiner’s new media studio Vuguru and is scheduled to start shooting in April.

Despite the 9:30 am call time and an hour lost the night before due to daylight savings, SXSW attendees turned out in droves for Tubefilter’s panel Decision Trees: YouTube’s New Breed of Interactive Storytellers.

Tubefilter Co-Founder Marc Hustvedt led a stimulating discussion with Rafi Fine of Fine Brothers Productions and Tony Valenzuela of BlackBoxTV and DeFranco, Inc.—two of the best and most creative of YouTube’s new breed of interactive storytellers.

YouTube’s annotations tool opened up a whole new way telling stories, with the rise of interactive videos that let viewers “choose-their-own-adventure” as they navigate through the story.

The panel jumped right into a demo of TheFineBros’ interactive 2010 Year In Review Shooting Range, during which Hustvedt prompted audiences to call out their choices. We navigated through the Antoine Dodson storyline, answering questions (incorrectly at first) in an 8-bit video game featuring a lo-fi version of Auto-Tune the News’ Bed Intruder song. The interactive story was comprised of 22 videos, Fine remarked, but some of their games, like The American Idol Interactive Experience, featured over 50 videos.

BlackBoxTV creator Tony Valenzuela shared his process in creating dramatic interactive narratives. In Green Eyed World, YouTube’s first project that employed Facebook Connect to integrate live Facebook comments on the show page, featured annotations that aided in the creative decision process—leading to a bigger storytelling experience. Valenzuela explained that he decides to use narrative interactivity “when the story demands interaction to propel itself forward.”

Valenzuela shared an interactive video he made with Shane Dawson called Haunted House Party *Interactive Game* which Featured Tay Zonday, iJustine, and a host of other YouTube superstars. “The important thing is to include clear instructions,” Valenzuela noted.

Both Fine and Valenzuela agreed that what they are creating is just the tip of the iceberg. “20% of our views are on mobile, which doesn’t feature annotations” said Fine. “So we need to find new ways to engage audiences. Valenzuela gave us a sneak peek of Find Me, a new live interactive series starring Taryn Southern. “I was inspired by lonelygirl15,” said Tony, “where viewers thought they were interacting with a real person.” The ambitious project features an opportunity for fans to actually get in their cars and drive out to witness the finale live.

A send-up of obsessive food culture, Foodies pits everyman Porter (Sean Hankinson) against his fiancee Moose’s overbearing, hipster friends, who gather each week to eat snooty food together, largely so they can go home and blog about it later. A show about a group of pretentious jerks who meet weekly to fawn over exotic recipes sounds promising, but based on the pilot, I’m not sure I have any desire to spend more time in this world.

This show is, to but it bluntly, filled with hate, and to be honest, I found it off-putting. Porter hates these ludicrous hipsters and doesn’t want to be there. The hipsters hate Porter because he’s an uncultured swine. And there you have it. There’s nothing redemptive about it, and it just starts to feel mean-spirited.

It seems like having Moose present – the go-between who is friends with all these people – would balance things out and make everyone more sympathetic. But she’s oddly absent. (She’s in future episodes…why not this one?)

My first keynote experience at SXSW Interactive was a memorable one. Sarah Lacy used her 2008 interview with Mark Zuckerberg as a platform on which to advertise a book, her own brand, and a personal friendship with the then 23-year-old Facebook Founder, which amounted to an hour’s worth of audience anarchy, small talk, and non-questions about a company now sporting a $50 billion dollar price tag.

My latest keynote experience at SXSW Interactive was a memorable one, too. Not because interviewer Liz Shannon Miller constantly injected herself into the conversation with Felicia Day (she didn’t) or asked questions more self-serving than engaging (they were good). But because you came away with a vivid picture of Felicia Day the gamer, the fangirl, the online video content creator, the actor, the woman, and the person than you did before you watched the keynote with exactly one bajillion other people in the main room, in one of a few dozen supplemental broadcast rooms, or from your laptop by way of the live stream.

You got to know Felicia. I know that sounds kinda cheesy, but it’s true.

A good chunk of the SXSW world is already aware of a good amount of what Day discussed. The Guild’s backstory, how the first two monthly episodes were self-funded and the rest of the 10-episode first season was financed by audience donations from some 500 individuals. How the show got picked up by MSN, became sponsored by Sprint, spawned iTunes top-sellers and comic book iterations, and how and why Day’s maintained control and ownership of all the associated intellectual property. The fanboys and girls in the audience and on the web also probably know about her upcoming Dragon Age series, Season 5 of The Guild, and her appearance in a werewolf-themed Syfy action/fantasy flick.

But the internet-at-large may or may not have been aware of the idiosyncrasies behind Day’s personality and her success. How she’s a violinist, loves cupcakes and animals, prefers fans and passers-by to come and say hey rather than tweet, “OMG! I just saw the redhead from that web series. She’s short!”, is incredibly supportive of advancing women’s roles in the tech, gamer, and entertainment industries, but prefers to show that support by practice over preach, and how she’s spent more than eight hours a day for the past four years crafting her projects and building up a “rabid” fanbase through genuine interaction and appreciation.