posted by Bina | Monday, July 16, 2007
The clips found on user-generated video sites can be entertaining to watch, but they're just as often inane, stupid or of questionable taste or legal status. So it's no big surprise that many advertisers remain leery of associating themselves with the stuff.
What, then, is a video-sharing site like Sony Pictures Entertainment's Grouper.com supposed to do? Sony is betting that the answer lies in going upscale.
To this end, the company is unveiling today a complete overhaul of Grouper, which it acquired last August for $65 million. Rechristened "Crackle," the revamped site aspires to become a "streaming entertainment network" that will focus on discovering and developing promising new video talent.
Crackle's new animation, short-film and "sketch variety" channels will hold quarterly contests through which winners will get the opportunity to pitch their projects to television and film executives at Sony Pictures. A new stand-up comedy channel will spotlight the best submissions every month, with the winners getting the chance to appear at an improv comedy club.
Crackle will also provide production funding and marketing support for some of the best submissions. By offering the prospect of working with professionals at its animation, film and television divisions, Sony is hoping to generate a polished stock of exclusive video content that will be appealing to both viewers and advertisers.
During a conference call last week to discuss Crackle, Sony Pictures Senior Executive Vice President Sean Carey said that "given our pedigree as a producer and distributor, it just made all the sense in the world" to transform Grouper into a site featuring higher-quality content. He said the company had viewed traditional user-generated video "as a short-term phenomenon."
Crackle co-president and Grouper co-founder Josh Felser acknowledged that traditional user-generated video is "not a business for us," noting that the content is rarely exclusive and is hard to pitch to advertisers. Advertisers want predictability and don't want their ads appearing next to a video of someone jumping off a roof and landing on their head, Felser said.
News Corp.'s (nyse: NWS - news - people ) Fox, CBS (nyse: CBS - news - people ) and General Electric's (nyse: GE - news - people ) NBC Universal have been busy building online distribution networks to distribute their TV programming online. But Felser said Crackle isn't interested in distributing film and TV content because it wouldn't be able to get it exclusively and because it "won't have the same viralty that the content we are securing will."
What, then, is a video-sharing site like Sony Pictures Entertainment's Grouper.com supposed to do? Sony is betting that the answer lies in going upscale.
To this end, the company is unveiling today a complete overhaul of Grouper, which it acquired last August for $65 million. Rechristened "Crackle," the revamped site aspires to become a "streaming entertainment network" that will focus on discovering and developing promising new video talent.
Crackle's new animation, short-film and "sketch variety" channels will hold quarterly contests through which winners will get the opportunity to pitch their projects to television and film executives at Sony Pictures. A new stand-up comedy channel will spotlight the best submissions every month, with the winners getting the chance to appear at an improv comedy club.
Crackle will also provide production funding and marketing support for some of the best submissions. By offering the prospect of working with professionals at its animation, film and television divisions, Sony is hoping to generate a polished stock of exclusive video content that will be appealing to both viewers and advertisers.
During a conference call last week to discuss Crackle, Sony Pictures Senior Executive Vice President Sean Carey said that "given our pedigree as a producer and distributor, it just made all the sense in the world" to transform Grouper into a site featuring higher-quality content. He said the company had viewed traditional user-generated video "as a short-term phenomenon."
Crackle co-president and Grouper co-founder Josh Felser acknowledged that traditional user-generated video is "not a business for us," noting that the content is rarely exclusive and is hard to pitch to advertisers. Advertisers want predictability and don't want their ads appearing next to a video of someone jumping off a roof and landing on their head, Felser said.
News Corp.'s (nyse: NWS - news - people ) Fox, CBS (nyse: CBS - news - people ) and General Electric's (nyse: GE - news - people ) NBC Universal have been busy building online distribution networks to distribute their TV programming online. But Felser said Crackle isn't interested in distributing film and TV content because it wouldn't be able to get it exclusively and because it "won't have the same viralty that the content we are securing will."
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