Hollywood-Flavored Brain Juice about Viral Marketing, Venture Capitalism, and Online Networking.
Day or night, it's always flowing, so put on your rain jacket and wait- Did you hear that? It was a crackle of thunder. We're gonna have a brain juice storm.
At the healthy age of 24, I have multiple, successful entrepreneurial ventures under my belt. My belt is so large I am forced to use the last notch. You know, the one that extremely weight-challenged people use.
By the way, EMAIL ME. I promise I'll respond. Boy scout's honor. (No, I wasn't technically a boy scout. But just trust me.)
Just arrived into San Jan airport for a much needed vacation. Cab drivers, protesting unfair labor conditions, are on strike and angrily beating on the patrol cars of policemen. Still, only twenty or so policemen are on the scene, and the cabbies number in the hundreds.
I’m off to my hotel - hopefully, the violence will end here soon.
Developing…
As I’m sure everybody reading this post has noticed, the Internet is becoming an increasingly popular place for creative folks to tell their stories. More and more money is being thrown at the Internet, from no name shmoes in North Dakota to slick-haired execs in Hollywood. But just when you think the tides are truly and definitively turning, a group of investors throw their support behind luxury movie theaters, betting that audiences will be down for paying $35.00 for a single ticket.
This week, Village Roadshow Ltd., Act III, Lambert Entertainment and the Retirement Systems of Alabama pension fund have partnered to bring the luxury cinema circuit Village Roadshow Gold Class Cinemas to the U.S. They’re planning to spend $200 million to build 50 theaters nationwide over the next five years. The first two theaters will be erected in some backwater suburbs of Chicago and Seattle, and others are planned for Fairview, Texas, near Dallas-Fort Worth, and Scottsdale, Ariz.
From what I understand, the theaters are going be pretty baller. They will include 40 reclining armchair seats with footrests, digital projection, and the capability to screen 2-D and 3-D movies, as well as a lounge and bar serving cocktails and appetizers, a concierge service, and valet parking.
Although this investment in luxury cinemas might seem counter-intuitive, in light of our economy’s looming recession, it certainly has precedent: when Hollywood encounters new and threatening mediums of entertainment, it typically responds with its own novel (and often dramatic) innovations. This dynamic is most clearly exemplified by the growth of television in the 1950s, to which Hollywood countered with mechanical chairs (think: subdued roller coaster ride) and odor effects (think: smells floating through the audience like powerful flatulence.)
The cinemas will also offer culinary offerings — made-to-order meals like sushi and quesadillas. The investors hope to attract 10 million “upscale and affluent” consumers, and each complex will typically house eight screens.
“It’s a new way to go to the movies,” said Graham Burke, managing director and CEO of Village Roadshow Ltd. “It’s… like flying first class in an airplane.”
Sounds good, Graham. Let’s hope we don’t have any turbulence.
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Facebook announced a few days ago some news that’s sure to rock the socks of its users worldwide – the number two social networking site will be introducing an instant messaging service, in addition to new privacy options, within the next two weeks.
This announcement comes in the wake of a Facebook backlash, spurred by all the spamming that went along with their recent Beacon advertising model. Facebook is clearly looking for ways to win back their users – and it seems to me like they’re on the right track.
The instant messaging service will be a default application in every user’s account, enabling friends to check which of their friends are online. And of course, friends can chat with each other live, or more aptly, “instantly.” This service will be yet another step forward in Facebook’s effort to make their network more addictive than crack cocaine. New Facebook groups related to the IM service are already springing up, such as: “Facebook Introduces Instant Messaging: I’ll NEVER Be Productive Again!!!”
As for the new privacy options, users will now be able to limit the viewing of their profiles to friends and friends of friends. This is a similar scenario to LinkedIn, where information is only visible only to first degree, or second degree contacts. Essentially, Facebook is empowering users with a great ability to filter who can and who cannot access their information.
Keep up the good work, Facebook. We’ll be watching.
How much time do people really want to spend in front of their computers?
This is the golden question that will be answered in the coming weeks by Hulu.com, a video portal, backed by NBC and News Corp, that opened to the public yesterday - after several months of private beta. The site lets users view clips and full-length episodes from TV shows and movies. The videos are completely free, but advertisements are scattered throughout them.
Jason Kilar, chief executive at Hulu, said: “With full-length episodes of current and archived television shows, feature films, sports and news, we believe Hulu is a step forward in giving consumers entertainment on their terms. ” The site currently features about 250 TV shows and 100 feature films. TV shows include:
Hulu is the latest attempt by corporate Hollywood to catch onto youtube’s coat-tails. Currently, over 100 million views are recorded every day on youtube, accounting for 27% of the online video market. However, the vast majority of youtube videos are under five minutes - a nice compliment to the tiny attention span of the typical user. Hulu, on the other hand, is obviously featuring much longer content, but since it’s all professional produced, we can assume the content is, generally speaking, of superior quality (or at least superior production value).
So, what’s the fate of Hulu? Personally, I’m not sure, but I hear “The Big Lebowski” is already uploaded, so I’m eager to stop writing and visit the site. The dude abides.
In a sprawling interview on Sunday at the South by Southwest Interactive Conference and Festival, Facebook founder/CEO Mark Zuckerberg talked about his company’s massive growth and future monetization strategies. The interviewer was a writer for BusinessWeek magazine, Sarah Lacy, and she got completely clowned by the audience for asking rambling, unsubstantial questions. At one point, after asking Zuckerberg whether he burned his notebooks (in which he routinely brainstormed ideas longhand), an audience member shouted, “Talk about something interesting!” Also, after one particularly non-direct, semi-question, Zuckerberg murmured, “You have to ask questions,” and he received wild cheers of agreement from the crowd.
A video of the most juicy moments can be found here.
The interview was filled with only a sprinkling of new, interesting information - like that Facebook is planning to launch in France this Sunday. But what’s the deal with Sarah Lacy? Why was her performance with Zuckerberg so sub-par? Beats me. Maybe she was distracted. Maybe she wanted to poke him.
Exciting news out of Hollywood today: the town’s oldest and most prestigious talent agency, William Morris, has joined up with a couple venture capital firms (Accel Partners and Venrock), as well as AT&T, to form a vehicle for investing in Internet-based businesses. For those of you living outside Lala land, William Morris represents a huge portion of your favorite celebrities: everyone from Quentin Tarantino to 50 Cent to Jesus Christ - yeah, even Jesus needs Hollywood representation.
The goal is to discover, fund, and help build these businesses, which include social networking sites, platforms for mobile devices, video services, and advertising applications.
With this dip into new media, William Morris is expressing a particular interest for innovative systems, rather than innovative content creators. This distinction represents a change for the agency that has forged Hollywood’s path into web 2.0 talent – signing youtube stars like blamesociety films and bloggers like stuffwhitepeoplelike. At the same time however, the “innovative systems” are a way to encourage more web 2.0 talent to blossom – providing a stage for the Steve Shmoes of yesterday to morph into Steven Spielbergs of tomorrow. We live in an age when the power to disseminate information and entertainment is more and more democratized, and William Morris’ new endeavor will only speed along this process.
According to the Hollywood trade paper Variety, the fund is rumored to consist of “tens of millions of dollars, with the average investment in startups said to range from $300,000 to $500,000.” Other top Hollywood agencies are also starting to demonstrate an interest in new media. The United Talent Agency (UTA), for example, owns a significant stake in the digital entertainment studio 60Frames.
“It’s something we’ve talked about for a long time as a way of expanding our business,” said Jim Wiatt, chairman-chief exec of WMA. “It’s an opportunity for us to help foster growth, as well as help our traditional clients.”
What goes up must come down.
The expectations for “Quarterlife,” the first web-based series to receive a network broadcast, were monstrous heading into Tuesday night. The NBC show premiered at 10pm EST and received the worst ratings for that slot in at least 20 years, according to Neilsen Media Research.
“Quarterlife” was created for the Internet by Marshall Herskovitz and Edward Zwick. the producers of “My So-Called Life” and “thirtysomething,” The show has circulated around popular video-sharing sites like myspace and youtube for the past three months, packaged in episodes of seven to nine minutes. It details the lives of six twentysomething friends and their angsty struggles with life. By web standards, the show has proved a remarkable success- drawing in tens of thousands and sometimes hundreds of thousands of viewers each week. However, network TV is a different beast with drastically different standards.
Tuesday’s broadcast received an average of 3.1 million viewers and a rating of 1.3 among the audience from 18-49 - the lowest in NBC history since Nielsen started measuring TV viewing by age in 1987. By comparison, the usual Tuesday 10pm show, “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” typically brought in 12 million viewers and a 4.5 rating.
NBC’s plan was to take the show’s 36 “webisodes” and turn them into a 6 episode season. But now there are doubts that NBC will even air the second episode. NBC Entertainment co-chairman Ben Silverman said on Wednesday that the series didn’t live up to expectations, but was “so worth the try.” Translation: it was cheaper than a Czech prostitute.
I don’t think that “Quarterlife”’s flop means the death of the Internet to TV crossover, but it certainly will be looming in the minds of network execs for at least the immediate future. At the same time, however, I personally don’t believe the flop was due to inferior production value or any other Internet stigma. Rather, the show just kinda sucks – lukewarm plot, clichéd characters, and abysmal acting. Check it out for yourself here.
More discussion on other Internet series phenomenon next week.
Do you remember that feeling when you realized that Santa Claus was actually your overweight cousin or uncle? Or when you discovered that your father, your idol through infancy and childhood, was just an ordinary dude, capable of making mistakes?
I personally never believed in Santa Clause or in the perfection of my father (I was a cynical kid, I confess), but I honestly did believe Kevin Rose, the Founder of Digg, was a real-life superhero…until recently.
Rose has consistently maintained a popular ratio (percentage of articles that reach Digg’s front page) of at least 99%. Like a superhero, or at least a superhero of the Internet, he can pull a lever and initiate massive floods of traffic.
However, the recent Digg algorithm change, which is intended to create a more level playing field amongst Digg’s users, might be a mild form of kryptonite. Rose’s popular ratio has recently dipped to 98%, with four articles in the past three weeks failing to reach the front page. To give you some perspective, Rose has submitted a total of 347 articles since he birthed Digg in December 2004, and a whopping 341 of them hit FP.
So which articles have come up short? I’m glad you asked. I’ve dug them up (no pun intended) and compiled them for your curiosity and viewing pleasure. Check it:
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So what’s the deal? Why are Rose’s submissions underperforming?
Well, for one, the algorithm change seems to be making a discernible impact. It’s no longer as easy for a top Digger, like Rose, to reach the front page at will. Many armchair Digg experts and bloggers now point to the need for an increased diversity of diggs. In other words, the new algorithm puts even more weight on diggs that come from users who do not typically digg each other’s submissions. 10 diggs from strangers, for example, is more meaningful than 25 diggs from friends- now more than ever. This change displaces power from those users with tight-knit followings, often built up through track records of quality submissions.
But the algorithm encompasses more than vote diversity: the number of submissions, and the number of submissions that reach the FP, are also widely accepted as important factors. Both these numbers feed into a user’s popular ratio, which many consider to be the preeminent factor. This ratio is lowered for every submission that does not reach the front page, creating a negative snowball effect for a user who continues to submit articles that come up short. In this light, I ask the following question: is it a coincidence that Rose’s valley in FP success occurs simultaneously with a peak in the number of his submissions?
Since the algo change came into effect on January 22nd/23rd , he has submitted an uncharacteristically high 16 submissions. As JD Rucker, a popular Digger and blogger, pointed out in a recent Soshable column, “that’s more than [Rose] submitted in November and December, 2007, combined.”
Below are two graphs that illustrate Rose’s submission activity for both 2008 and 2007. Take note of the activity’s recent elevation.
Rose submitted a personal high of 22 submissions this January, closely followed by 21 subs in August of 2007 - when the algorithm change wasn’t even a bleep on anyone’s radar.
Of course, it’s possible that the only reason Rose isn’t making FP as consistently is a decline in the quality of his content, or perhaps in the gusto of his popularity. However, my bet is that the algorithm is simply leveling the playing field, exactly how Rose and his Digg homies intended.
But at the end of the day, even if Rose isn’t a superhero, he’s still pretty awesome. I mean…. he did invent Digg.
* By the way, we’re running a caption contest for the following Kevin Rose picture (courtesy of his Facebook profile). Please submit the best/funniest captions to me at brian.zafron@gmail.com, and we’ll let you know the cream of the crop next week.
[Your Caption Here]
Variety, the premier source for Hollywood news and editorial, today launched the first social networking website for the entertainment business.
“The Biz” serves three primary functions: to connect colleagues already in the entertainment industry, to facilitate job searching and recruiting, and to foster a community with an open exchange of entertainment-related ideas (ie, “Yo! What do you think of this TV pilot idea: Desperate Housewives meets Golden Girls.”)
Users will be able to upload profiles, photos, resumes, portfolios and videos starting today.
Hollywood is a notoriously insular community, which is the primary reason, I imagine, its first social network is springing up so late in the game. In 2007, according to eMarketer, 70% of teens and 37% of adults in the United States used online social networking at least once a month. That equals about 13.6 million teens (ages 12-17) and 56.9 million adults (ages 18 and up).
Jeff Seely, the CEO of Jobster (which is partnering with The Biz), said today, “Variety is on the cutting edge of vertical online networking.” I don’t know, Jeff. Seems like more of a dull edge to me. Currently, only a handful of bloodsuckers and bloodsuckers of tomorrow have signed up on the site.
Do you ever wish your favorite things in the world could be magically combined?
Ice cream sundaes and beer? California weather and New York culture? Sex and corned beef sandwiches (Seinfeld reference, anyone?)?
Well, yesterday, for a boat-load of people, such a combination occurred: Apple became a signature sponsor for “American Idol,” acquiring exclusive audio and video download rights to the hit Fox show.
Apple’s iTunes store will now feature “Idol” episodes for download, and it will sponsor online streaming of performances on the show’s website. Plus, the Apple brand is going to receive strategic (read: backdoor) integration into the show.
Don’t be surprised to find: Paula scrolling through her iphone during a performance, Ryan talking about his iphone when he thinks his microphone is off, or maybe, if Idol is feeling particularly frisky, an iphone accidentally dropping out of a contestant’s pocket.
Word is that the close relationship between Simon Fuller and Apple superman Steve Jobs was integral in green-lighting the deal. Personally, I’m surprised Steve could be friends with such a complete prick like Simon - but then again, we’re all friends with pricks, aren’t we?
Beginning this week, performances from the top 24 “Idol” semifinalists can be purchased on iTunes for $.99 a pop. Then, beginning March 11, performances from the top 12 finalists will be sold for $1.99.
Other major Idol sponsors include: Coke, AT&T and Ford.
