YouTube vs. TV? YouTube says the battle — if there ever was one — is over.
In a flashy presentation to advertisers Wednesday night, Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt declined to forecast that Internet video will displace television watching. Instead he declared: “That’s already happened.”
Schmidt said “the future is now” for YouTube, which recently passed the milestone of 1 billion unique visitors every month. But, he added with the Third World in mind, if you think that’s a large number, “wait until you get to 6 (billion) or 7 billion.”
Schmidt and YouTube, which billed the event as a “brandcast,” shifted away from the video platform’s relationship to TV. A year ago, YouTube seemed to have its sights set on reinventing television by funding the launch of more than 100 channels from well-known media brands and Hollywood personalities.
But that initiative went unmentioned at Wednesday’s presentation, held at a Lower East Side pier as part of a week of “NewFronts,” (digital media’s version of the TV tradition of promoting programming and selling ads). Though the model for the evening was TV, YouTube used it to distinguish itself as something entirely different.
“It’s not a replacement for something that we know,” said Schmidt. “It’s a new thing that we have to think about, to program, to curate and build new platforms.”
The presentation featured performances by Snoop Dogg and Macklemore, as well as YouTube personalities like Felicia Day. YouTube focused on its global reach, community engagement and enormous audience.
“I thought that YouTube was like TV, but it isn’t. I was wrong,” said Robert Kyncl, YouTube’s global head of content. “TV is one-way. YouTube talks back.”
Some comparisons were inevitable. One fact highly touted was that more 18- to 34-year-olds watch YouTube than any cable network.
“TV means reach,” said Kyncl. “YouTube means engagement.”
Though companies like Yahoo and AOL have used their NewFront presentations to announce new slates of original programming, YouTube made no programming announcements Wednesday night.
It did, though, announce a partnership with the Association of National Adverstisers’ Alliance for Family Entertainment to create more digital family content.
YouTube also celebrated DreamWorks Animation’s purchase Wednesday of the teen-focused YouTube network Awesomeness TV for $33 million. DreamWorks CEO Jeffery Katzenberg appeared with Awesomeness founder and CEO Brian Robbins, the former “Head of the Class” actor.
“This is a whole new form of content, content delivery and content consumption,” said Katzenberg. “It’s the medium of the future and the future has already arrived.”
Does “Hundreds of Beavers” Reflect A New Path Forward In Cinema?
Hard as it may be to believe, changing the future of cinema was not on Mike Cheslik's mind when he was making "Hundreds of Beavers." Cheslik was in the Northwoods of Wisconsin with a crew of four, sometimes six, standing in snow and making his friend, Ryland Tews, fall down funny.
"When we were shooting, I kept thinking: It would be so stupid if this got mythologized," says Cheslik.
And yet, "Hundreds of Beavers" has accrued the stuff of, if not quite myth, then certainly lo-fi legend. Cheslik's film, made for just $150,000 and self-distributed in theaters, has managed to gnaw its way into a movie culture largely dominated by big-budget sequels.
"Hundreds of Beavers" is a wordless black-and-white bonanza of slapstick antics about a stranded 19th century applejack salesman (Tews) at war with a bevy of beavers, all of whom are played by actors in mascot costumes.
No one would call "Hundreds of Beavers" expensive looking, but it's far more inventive than much of what Hollywood produces. With some 1,500 effects shots Cheslik slaved over on his home computer, he crafted something like the human version of Donald Duck's snowball fight, and a low-budget heir to the waning tradition of Buster Keaton and "Naked Gun."
At a time when independent filmmaking is more challenged than ever, "Hundreds of Beavers" has, maybe, suggested a new path forward, albeit a particularly beaver-festooned path.
After no major distributor stepped forward, the filmmakers opted to launch the movie themselves, beginning with carnivalesque roadshow screenings. Since opening in January, "Hundreds of Beavers" has played in at least one theater every week of the year, though never more than 33 at once. (Blockbusters typically play in around 4,000 locations.)... Read More