Re: “saving the web series.”
I ignored “Let’s Save The Web Series” when it was first written as I disagreed to such a large degree that I was worried about contributing anything constructive to the conversation. The past month has given me time to better consider what I wanted to say. In light of the resurgence of the conversation (at least across my little slice of the internet) and while I could probably go on at length, all I will say about Yuri’s opinions is this:
No business has ever succeeded by actively striving to be the “minor leagues’ of anything else. That’s a great way to have your successes marginalized, your stars disappear, and for you to perpetually be thought of as an inferior product. Branded entertainment is advertising by another name; Burger King (to use your example) isn’t gonna create LOST. It damn sure isn’t going to create The Godfather (or anything that could potentially alienate a portion of their customers for any reason at all.) Neither of these concepts are conducive to creating art, and for a medium to exist it requires a certain amount of artistic intent and integrity.
Your goals are mutually exclusive. Something can either be good - to use your words “(not) good for the web but just good” - or it can be the minor leagues/branded entertainment. Having web video be the minor leagues means that it will never mature beyond the bottom entry-level rung of other media. The Departed is good (arguably, it’s “great”) but there’s no way to massage the brand messaging from Kellogg’s into the plotline.
The internet is the largest, most democratic, and most internationally conscious communications and entertainment medium the world has ever seen. In the few short years of its existence it has shattered an untold number of longstanding businesses and created countless new ones. The full effects of widespread connectivity (economic, sociological and otherwise) are so unfathomable that they won’t be understood for years if not decades; and you’re already prepared to call the death of independent web video? I can’t even confidently say which studios will still be around in five years or who the prevalent financiers of “mainstream” entertainment will be. Hell, a year from now, who will own NBCU?
Web video doesn’t even have a standard consumption unit, or an understanding on what constitutes a “view.” We’re still “filming radio” by making short TV shows and short films because no one’s yet developed the genres of web video which will stand apart from film and television, and define the medium in the coming decades. Perhaps you’re intending solely to speak on your own behalf, about your own confidence, or about your own products, but anything else is extremely shortsighted.
Web video isn’t over, it’s not on life support and its imminent death has certainly been greatly exaggerated. It’s still warming up for the big fight, waiting for the bell to ring so it can come out swinging. You want to “save” web video? Differentiate it from what people already see around them; make it unlike anything they’ve ever experienced before.
Here, here.
Apparently, someone else is paying attention to the fact that there’s no such thing as “web video.”
Don’t worry, kids, I’ve got something on the horizon. Oh, and Steve, when it’s done, you can use it too. :)
