America loves it some clips shows, at least when those clips shows air on TV. ABC recently renewed America’s Funniest Home Videos for the series’ 21 season, Comedy Central signed Tosh.0 up for its third year, and G4 extended Web Soup‘s sophomore run.
Clip shows on the internet, however, are prone to fail. From NBC’s Dot Comedy or Jim Kirk’s The Clip Show, to The Daily Reel’s The Daily Reel or Yahoo’s The 9, piecing together online programming with pieces of other online programs simply hasn’t been successful. Clip shows operate effectively only when they are A) showing the viewer a piece of content the viewer hasn’t seen before, B) showing the viewer a piece of content the viewer has seen before in a manner that’s more entertaining than the piece of content itself, or C) a combination of both A and B. Simple concepts, for sure, but concepts no one on the web has fully realized.
America’s Funniest Home Videos operated for the better part of its 21 years in an economy where funny homemade movies were a scarce commodity. It survives today because it works off a brand name that successfully supplied that scarce commodity to the marketplace. YouTube, your Twitter stream, and Urlesque are now the suppliers, effectively eliminating funny homemade movie scarcity. Tosh.0 and Web Soup realize this. These programs aren’t successful because they bring unwatched online video awesomeness to the masses, they’re successful because they’re awesome shows in and of themselves. Their added context and clever commentary makes the clips more entertaining to watch. When viral videos are just a click away, you must give your clip show a Daniel Tosh or Chris Hardwick-like treatment to make it more watchable than the viral videos themselves.
All this brings me to MSN’s latest site launch, The Bubble, and its accompanying web series, Daily Bubble. MSN partnered with Grind Networks to make the online video comedy destination. The site showcases interactive visualizations (which look like they were resurrected from a different, more notorious bubble) and a daily web show hosted by Will Greenberg. Both the site and the show suffer from the same problem. Neither one is more usable than my online social network as a discovery mechanism, nor more entertaining than the clips they’re attempting to highlight. The site left me craving a more efficient, easily digestible mode of consumption and the show made me want to watch the viral videos without Greenberg’s interruptions.
MSN and other production companies looking to make the online video clip show work need to amp up production values and host appeal if they want to compete with my go-to sources for finding what’s funny. Until that happens, I’ll stick to the internet’s tried and tested method of clicking on links.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Tubefilter, Web Series Directory. Web Series Directory said: Online Clip Shows Don’t Work; MSN’s Bubble Doesn’t Pop http://fltr.tv/bASNpJ [...]
For an example of an online clip show that IS working, to the tune of 100s of millions of views, check out http://www.youtube.com/raywilliamjohnson – he has the right combination of rare clips, snarky commentary, and audience engagement.
@gstrompolos Good call! RJW’s got a decent clip show. I think his commentary isn’t always on, but definitely more hits than misses, and sometimes the dude just kills it.
Online clip shows don’t work [i]because[/i] of all the additional content they add. All I want is a daily digest of viral videos; something no more than two minutes that just has 10 second clips of some of YouTube’s best, both popular and obscure, that doesn’t have annoying branding or unfunny presenters. Is that too much to ask?
@Random Exactly! Nearly all the online clip shows don’t add enough value to the videos to make it worthwhile for me to watch. In the time it takes me to watch an episode of Daily Buble, I’d rather click on a bunch of links that I find through Urlesque, Buzzfeed, Twitter, Facebook, etc. Unless the clip show is awesome, that’s a much more efficient/enjoyable way to find funny stuff online.
[...] Online Clip Shows Don’t Work; clip shows on the Internet — such as NBC’s Dot Comedy, Jim Kirk’s The Clip Show and Yahoo’s The 9 — are prone to fail. (TubeFilter) [...]
Break.com is where you go if you just want the viral videos of the day. RayWilliamJohnson gets his content there every day and just adds his hack “fake and gay” troll fodder commentary. Steer clear.
[...] Online Clip Shows Don’t Work; clip shows on the Internet — such as NBC’s Dot Comedy, Jim Kirk’s The Clip Show and Yahoo’s The 9 — are prone to fail. (TubeFilter) [...]