We’ve explored online video from a ton of angles during our most recent Tubefilter Meetups. We’ve discussed how YouTube and its Partner Program program have opened a clear path to online video monetization. And as we’ve learned from our Beyond YouTube event, advertising revenue share on YouTube is just the tip of the iceberg. Producers are maximizing their online video businesses with their own websites, platforms like Blip.tv, smartphone apps, merchandising, licensing, flavored carbonated beverages and more.
Being a successful online video producer is about being both a creator and a marketer. And in our Social Video on Steroids panel, the experts shared how to engage and drive audiences using best practices in social media marketing and promotion.
Now it’s time to discuss another component of online video.
Join us now, LIVE, as we explore the seedy underworld of “cheating” – a controversial practice among online video producers that may or may not even exist. We’ll be surveying the most ingenious techniques in use to draw more eyeballs to your content and decide whether they qualify as “cheating” or “ingenious.
By discussing and defining “cheating” we can more successfully identify the industry’s best practices in online video distribution. It is our top priority to ensure Tubefilter continues to be a platform for constructive dialogue and a safe environment for opposing views of both attendees and panelists.
From category jacking and bait-and-switches, to alliances and straight-up bribery, we’re going to get answers to the questions above and more from top YouTubers and online video savants Benny and Rafi Fine of The Fine Bros and TheWillofDC.
There are a select fewonline video networks that have been inducted into the elite Billion Views Club. Machinima is one of them. And now the distributor of content geared towards young male video game enthusiasts garners enough pairs of eyeballs worldwide to make it a member of said elite club month after month after month.
Machinimaannounced this week over “116 million unique gamers viewed in excess of 1.11 billion videos in November 2011.” 277,330,000 of those views came from 17,750,000 individuals living in the United States who tuned into Machinima’s programming on YouTube. The other 822.6+ million views came from Machinima’s global YouTube audience, as well as those watching Machinima on its various worldwide distribution platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, iOS, and Android.
Web Therapy is an original web series from Lisa Kudrow, Don Roos, Dan Bucatinsky, Lexus’ LStudio, and Intelligent Life Productions. Its fourth online season debuted in November, and features Kudrow’s overcompensating, insecure, and not-so-friendly Fiona Wallace conduct short-form therapy sessions by way of video chat with an array of celebrities making in-character and kinda-in-character cameos. Conan O’Brien, for instance, appears as an exaggerated and angry version of himself while Rosie O’Donnell plays an editor at a literary agency in charge of making Wallace’s new memoir awesome.
O’Brien and O’Donnell are currently making their cameos in Web Therapy‘s online iteration, but will also be making them on a premium cable television channel in the near future. Showtime today announced it’s picked up a second season of Web Therapy.
Showtime debuted a 10-episode half-hour version of the program back in July. Considering the powers that be at the network are on board for a season two, it presumably performed well with viewers. The television version of Web Therapy is based on the internet version, but with new original footage shot just for the small screen. Kudrow had this to say about the good news:
“We are thrilled that Showtime will air more of the half-hour format of Web Therapy, we really love this version of the show…Of course, we are over the moon that Meryl Streep will be in this coming season. She was effortlessly hilarious, and it’s a great story. We have Lily Tomlin back who always fantastically funny. Conan O’Brien is beyond, fantastic, he’s a perfect improviser. We’re honestly giddy over the people we have for this season.”
No word yet on when to expect Web Therapy’s sophomore season to air on Showtime. Stay tuned.
David Wain is a catnip amongst a class of comedy nerds of the Best Week Ever generation, who grew up on bootlegged VHS copies of The State and followed the troupe’s subsequent diaspora into Viva Variety, Reno 911, and Stella. But you don’t need to be able to to recite Wet Hot American Summer by heart or fully understand what it means to be a comedy trio powered by the premise of “Ids in suits” to find him entertaining. Wain can be funny for everyone.
The My Damn Channel original web series starring, created, and written by Wain first debuted n 2007. It’s storyline hasn’t changed much since. Each installment features an exaggerated version of the now 42-year-old Wain – who works in a kind of tenement sewing sweat shop and lives in brownstone Brooklyn – on a perpetually unfulfilled quest to satisfy his sex drive with an array of attractive celebrity guest stars.
For Season 5, those objects of Wain’s affection, and the individuals who oftentimes get in the way of and/or steal those objections of affection include: Ken Marino (Childrens Hospital, Party Down), Steven Weber (Falling Skies, Wings), Lizzy Caplan (Party Down, True Blood), Erinn Hayes (Childrens Hospital, Parenthood), Jorma Taccone (Saturday NightLive, The Lonely Island), Zandy Hartig (Childrens Hospital) and Thomas Lennon (The State, Reno 911).
But Wain has one more very special guest star and companion for the latest season of Wainy Days. The new 2012 Fiat 500. The Italian automobile manufacturer is sponsoring the program’s entire six-episode fifth season, and gets a significant amount of inconspicuous and tongue-in-cheek product placement screen time in the series.
“The FIAT Brand continually looks for ways to help increase awareness for the brand and the Fiat 500 models in a manner that is uniquely engaging to our consumers,” said Casey Hurbis, Head of Fiat Brand Communications. “Wainy Days allows the brand to reach a new audience and introduce them to the FIAT Brand in an entertaining and humorous style.”
Check out that entertaining and humorous style, Wain, and the Fiat 500 for yourself at MyDamnChannel.com.
Now is you last chance to get the last remaining tickets for the highly-anticipated Tubefilter Meetup on creative online video marketing!
It’s time to get dirty.
Join us as we explore the seedy underworld of “cheating“—a controversial practice among online video producers. What is cheating? Is it really wrong? Where do you draw the line?
We’ll be surveying the most ingenious techniques in use and decide whether they qualify as “cheating” or not. By discussing and defining “cheating” we can more successfully identify the industry’s best practices in online video distribution. It is our top priority to ensure Tubefilter continues to be a platform for constructive dialogue and a safe environment for opposing views of both attendees and panelists.
From category jacking and bait-and-switches, to alliances and straight-up bribery, we’re going to get down and dirty with some of the worst (or best) offenders.
These YouTube veterans, whose channel is ranked #36 Most Subscribed Channel of All Time and #12 Most Subscribed Comedians of All Time, boast an encyclopedic knowledge of the wide-open opportunities on Facebook, Twitter, and even YouTube itself that video producers exploit to pump up views and subscribers.
A dedicated YouTube Partner since 2009, Will is an expert in creative video marketing and has earned the title “Sheriff of YouTube” among fans. His weekly news shows YouTube News and YouTube Winners and Losers feature the latest on the YouTube Community with a focus on the top 100 YouTube Channels of All Time.
Drew is the Co-Founder of Tubefilter and Executive Producer of the Streamy Awards.
This year we’ve been exploring how YouTube and its partner program have opened a clear path to online video monetization.
As we’ve learned from our contentious Beyond YouTube event, advertising revenue share on YouTube is just the tip of the iceberg: producers are maximizing their online video business with their own websites, platforms like Blip.tv, smartphone apps, merchandising, licensing, and more.
Being a successful online video producer is about being both a creator and a marketer. And in our Social Video on Steroids, the experts shared how to engage and drive audiences using best practices in social media marketing and promotion.
Sponsored by King of the Web, a place to discover and reward internet awesome.
But before we get into the if and how YouTube’s new layout has aggravated YouTubers, let’s briefly go over the changes. Here are some explanations straight from the source:
A New Homepage
To help you get more into YouTube, we’re making it easier to find and follow great Channels when you arrive. On the left side of the homepage you can create your own, personal, customizable YouTube Channel line-up. Sign-in, or create a YouTube account. Then you can browse recommended Channels; customize your homepage’s feed; even link your YouTube account to Google+ and Facebook to see what your friends are sharing. The new homepage feed we launched earlier this year is now front and center on the homepage. You can switch between feeds by clicking on different Channels on the left.
Simpler, Customizable Channels Given the homepage’s new focus on helping you find and organize your favorite Channels, we would be remiss if we didn’t update the look and feel of the Channels themselves. Today we’re launching an improved Channel design focused on what matters most: helping users find great videos. As different uploaders have different goals, we’ve created new Channel templates to meet your needs whether you produce one video a week or have thousands of videos for a fan to browse.
A New Overall Design To bring the new homepage and Channels designs together we’ve also applied a fresh coat of digital paint across the whole site. In July, we unveiled an experimental design called Cosmic Panda. We’ve used your feedback to improve our overall design, and today, we’re presenting a cleaner and simpler YouTube, with a consistent gray background, bigger video thumbnails and a more streamlined watch page.
Top 25 Most Subscribed All-Time YouTuber Phil DeFranco also posted a great video going over the sleek style and most of the site’s new bells and whistles. Take a look:
So, now that we’re familiar with the new YouTube, let’s look at the overall reaction from the YouTubers most affected by the change. The responses can be broken down into three general categories:
One, it kinda sucks. The status and popularity of a YouTube channel isn’t really defined by its number of aggregate views (though a high number there certainly helps), but by the number of its subscribers. It takes a lot to get an individual to click on that subscribe button (Editor’s Plug: By the way, have you subscribed to our Tubefilter channel?), and it can be extremely disheartening when you see them click it again to unsubscribe, especially when it’s en masse.
Two, it’s kinda good. Online video consumers now have a much better idea of all the YouTube they’re signed up to consume. They can now more effectively prune or add to their list of subscriptions. A simple way to unsubscribe may actually be a good thing because it (ideally) means those subscription numbers will not be drastically inflated and will have more meaning.
Like The Will of DC tweeted, “This is awesome because it puts power back in the hands of the community/subscribers. If someone doesn’t watch/like my stuff there should be an easy way to unsubscribe. Glad to know my true audience and build on top of that instead of a fake symbolic number.”
Suggested and Featured Channels Hit it Big
Of course, some YouTube channels will still be burdened or benefited (depending on your outlook) by insanely high subscription numbers. Those channels are the Suggested Channels YouTube puts on the left-hand side of the new homepage, below your subscriptions. They will show up for every single person that visits YouTube.com. And on a site that gets hundreds of millions of visitors every month, that means those channels will receive a helluva lot more opportunities to get new subs.
As Top 50 YouTube Most Subscribed All-Time channel The Fine Bros tweeted, “It’s subscriber payday if you happen to be lucky enough to be a “featured” channel that YouTube now recommends on every homepage.”
It Looks Nice
Regardless of the Subscriber Pruning and payoff for Suggested/Featured Channels, the new YouTube looks great. It feels way more high-quality than the site’s old iteration, which is more or less the point.
If you’re familiar with the design changes of other online video sharing and distribution sites, you know that one tactic used to increase the production quality of the videos users upload is to create a more professional viewing environment. The idea is if your site looks like it’d be a great place to watch public access television, then that’s the quality level of the programming people will upload and expect.
Lucas Cruikshank’s first major motion picture debuted on Nickelodeon in September 2010. The movie is based on Cruikshank’s uber-popular and readily detested YouTube series Fred, was adapted for television by “entertainment management, media and content production company” The Collective, and stars the hyperactive, high pitched, prepubescent, Judy-crushin’, six-year-old titular character Fred Figglehorn. Its television premiere drew 7.6 million viewers, which made it basic cable’s top TV movie in the year of its release with the kids demographic.
Fred 2: Night of the Living Fred is Fred: The Movie’s sequel. It debuted on Nickelodeon in October 2011 and drew an audience of 5.7 million viewers. That was enough for the powers that be at Nick to order a third installment, along with a 20-episode Fred series to boot.
Nellie Andreeva at Deadline reports Nickelodeon will first shoot that 20-episode Fred series (which will be comprised of 11-minute installments) and then premiere Fred 3 on the basic cable channel shortly thereafter. Varsity Pictures and The Collective (the two companies that partnered on the first Fred film), are on board to produce both the series and the movie.
Expect to start seeing new installments of Fred on Nickelodeon in early 2012, right around the time of Cruikshank’s three-year anniversary of his first appearance on the channel. Cruikshank kicked off his relationship with Nick with a cameo on an episode of iCarly (dubbed ‘iMeet Fred‘) on February 26, 2009.
Live interactive horror project Killcam: Live has added over 1.1 million viewers to its rapidly growing “Killmunity.”
The project, directed by John Darko, debuted on October 31st and runs through the end of the year. Killcam: Live stars April Wade, Ben Begley, Tracy Clifton, Derrick Oliver, Sam Weller, Emily Dykes, Diahnna Nicole Baxter, Billy Towers, Mirai Booth-Ong, and Rolence Patugan. Killcam: Live is the brain child of Wade and filmmaker Canyon Prince.
On Killcam: Live, viewers across the world interact directly with the characters in the ongoing storyline, changing the way audiences are interacting with entertainment programming. Audiences have already witnessed the (fictional) brutal killings of three of the story’s main characters and one surprise death. Some viewers become characters in the story itself, and others participate in “Cill Contests” in which they rip footage from the live and narrative story into their own recap videos.
The project follows a group of students as they willingly agree to participate in a social experiment put on by their charming psychology professor Michael Grayson (played by J. Michael Briggs). The experiment is meant to explore the effects of current human dependence on technology and social media as the majority form of communication. During the ongoing experiment, the students will be isolated from each other and their only way to communicate with the outside world will be through social media. However, someone has a different agenda in mind as things start to take a turn for the worse.
New narrative episodes come out Thursdays, with 72-hour live segments during which audiences will be able to inform the characters (in real time) what is happening and possibly even aid them in their escape (or demise)
“We are looking to bring a heightened level of interactivity to the audience” says Wade, “and we feel that this projects is on the cutting edge of a new age of storytelling. As filmmakers today, we have an international platform for our stories that never existed before and I am thrilled to be experimenting with creative ways to use social media to shape the film.”
Prince adds, “We’re moving farther and farther away from a traditional storytelling model. As people continue to consume more and more content via mobile devices, it’s detrimental and entirely counter-productive for us not to take advantage of the enormous opportunities that interactive multiple screen storytelling opens up.”
With only four weeks remaining before the finale, now is the time to catch up!
Videos from O’Neal’s stand-up special Elephant in the Room are a good placeto start. And watching episodes of O’Neals original web series, The Patrice O’Neal Show Coming Soon! is a good place to end up. (Note: If you’re unfamiliar with Patrice you should be warned, the language in the below is very NSFW or small children or the easily offended.)
The program was produced by Paul Kontonis’ For Your Imagination way back in 2007 (you can check out our original review here) and watches kinda like Chapelle’s Show, with sketches, bits, and behind-the-scenes footage of whatever it was O’Neal and his comedic entourage thought was particularly funny when filming. The only difference is, O’Neal’s show contains the amount of censorship you’d expect for a program produced exclusively for the internet, which means it’s not censored at all.
I never knew Patrice, but I was impressed with the face he was one of the first comedians with a foothold in traditional media (he appeared on Chappelle’s Show, Arrested Development, The Office, Web Junk, and many more TV programs) to take seriously consider the internet as a viable entertainment medium.
I met him once, too. I was surprised both his physical person and his personality could fit in the same room at once. I don’t mean that in a bad way. Patrice was a big dude, impossible to miss in a crowd, but his character made him even bigger. Despite his caustic style of comedy, he was somehow able to exude an engaging, affable attitude that could easily captivate any size crowd. It’s rare to meet someone with such an alluring presence, and it’s even more rare when all of said presence is devoted towards trying to make everyone around it laugh.
Thanks for all the laughs and rest in peace, Patrice. You’ll be missed.
Broadway Video is a 32-year-old media production and distribution company owned by the creator of Saturday Night Live, the inspiration for Dr. Evil, and the comedy industry’s most powerful individual, Lorne Michaels. It’s responsible for such television and film programs as SNL, 30 Rock, Kids in the Hall, and MacGruber. It’s also responsible for a new original web series about an enterprising young lady with child-bearing hips and an outer borough Italian accent.
I Wanna Have Your Baby stars and is scribed by SNL-writer and Upright Citizens Brigader Christine Nangle. The comedy revolves around the workplace of Nagle’s Dolores Santangeli, a charmingly upbeat surrogate mother with a charmingly less upbeat office assistant (played by fellow UCBer Gavin Speiller), a great smile, an even better attitude, and a constant stream of crazy clientele looking to rent some real estate in her womb.
SNL cast members Vanessa Bayer and Taran Killam and other NYC-based comedians join Nangle and Speiller on screen in the series that views more or less like an SNL skit, but better. Each episode is preceded by a quick intro explaining the shows’ outlandish premise before the comfortable awkward conversations about surrogacy and conception begin. It’s that comfortable awkwardness that makes I Wanna Have Your Baby worth watching.
Nangle’s created seriously absurd characters, but not one of them possess the level of self awareness needed to realize the great extent of that absurdity. Everyone’s happy to be in an environment where ghosts can help conceive babies, modern fertilization science involves turkey basters, and a woman’s baby bump can double as a drink holder. While you watch, it’s difficult not to feel happy, too. And at a running time of three-minutes-or-less, each installment is over before the premise has an opportunity to venture into any tired territory.
I Wanna Have Your Baby is the second original web series we’ve seen backed by Michaels’ Broadyway Video. The first was created by and stars another SNL writer Michael Patrick O’Brien. His in-the-closet celebrity interview series 7 Minutes in Heaven debuted back in July.
We’ve explored online video from a ton of angles during our most recent Tubefilter Meetups. We’ve discussed how YouTube and its Partner Program program have opened a clear path to online video monetization. And as we’ve learned from our Beyond YouTube event, advertising revenue share on YouTube is just the tip of the iceberg. Producers are maximizing their online video businesses with their own websites, platforms like Blip.tv, smartphone apps, merchandising, licensing, flavored carbonated beverages and more.
There are a 
Web Therapy
David Wain is a 
William Hyde, 
YouTube unveiled a 
Lucas Cruikshank’s first major motion picture debuted on Nickelodeon in September 2010. The movie is based on Cruikshank’s uber-popular and 
The project, directed by John Darko, debuted on October 31st and runs through the end of the year. Killcam: Live stars April Wade, Ben Begley, Tracy Clifton, Derrick Oliver, Sam Weller, Emily Dykes, Diahnna Nicole Baxter, Billy Towers, Mirai Booth-Ong, and Rolence Patugan. Killcam: Live is the brain child of Wade and filmmaker Canyon Prince.
Larger than life comedian 
Broadway Video is a 32-year-old media production and distribution company owned by the creator of 
