Next Great Thing

There’s no doubt that web video is where it’s at. ComScore reported yesterday that 75 percent of Internet users in the United States watch an average of three hours of online video a month. YouTube is still UGC monster, with 2.4 billion views on the site in July. Now brands are sinking ad money into niche shows over traditional network fare. Next up, interactive web shows will be changing the way we watch.

Next on Bebo…
First, LonelyGirl15 caught our attention with her girl-next-door-gets-a-webcam shtick. Turns out she was faking it. But that didn’t diminish the show’s popularity; in fact, it got a spin-off: Kate Modern on Bebo, the UK social network. That show upped the ante on web video by making it interactive—allowing fans to post comments, help solve puzzles and upload video responses. Sofia’s Diary, a new series premiering this Fall, will include daily videos and text updates that will be posted on Sofia’s Bebo profile. The show will weave real and fictional events and let viewers interact with characters in real time to help direct the storyline.

Get a QuarterLife on MySpace
Now this formula has made its way over the pond with “QuarterLife,” a new show on MySpace from
Edward Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz, the brains behind the teen cult classic My So-Called Life. It’s about vloggers (how meta). Debuting on November 11, the 8-minute minisodes will air twice a week–perfect for the today’s attention spans. It will also have a social networking site, quarterlife.com, and the characters will have MySpace profiles. The SNS is making a serious investment in web video. Not only did they shell out $400,000 an episode for Quarterlife, but they are stocking up on more. Theyshop just launched the “Storyteller Challenge,” which is asking for 5- to 7-minute television pilots to be submitted and voted on.

ARGs for TV
These interactive shows are like Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) for TV. They viewers in ways the passive television experience does not. They blend of reality and fantasy, puzzles, and social collaboration within a deeply engaged, niche audience. They can be customizable in real time and fully-integrated with SNS–and soon mobile. Three-screen experiences with text-to-vote campaigns, like Cingular did with the WB’s One Tree Hill (an FH Youth and Mobile program), show that youth love to interact with their entertainment. Web video will take this model and make it a make it a truly seamless, rich experience.

Product Integration
Brands will have an opportunity to get involved just as they did on TV programs—through product placement. With the web, however, viewers will be able to click on an item to get background info or buy it. As first incarnation of this is ShopVogue.TV, a new offering from Vogue magazine that offers links to purchase the products featured in their print ads with broadcasting runway shows, ad campaigns and original series like “60 Seconds to Chic.”

You tag Youtube
Soon, all videos on the web will be tagged, searchable, and e-commodified. Coull.tv has a “Video Activator Tool” that allows users to tag video contents, making images within a video clickable like a link on a webpage. With SceneMaker from Gotuit, anyone can tag scenes from inside videos on YouTube, Metacafe and other sites.

Interactive online videos are changing the way young people consume entertainment. Producers and content creators love the freedom the web affords them, so expect more big names to get online. With products from Sony and Vudu that bring web video to your television set, who’ll need cable?