The world that is KateModern has launched upon us as Bebo has got into commissioning and broadcasting (sort of).
The questions that it poses for the industry - and the opportunities that are being realised - are manifold ... who is the media owner now? is Bebo a social network or a broadcaster - and does it matter? is this a potential future for online advertising? or for that matter online programming? or is it all a bit of a fad?
For those who are not aware of the KateModern story, she is from the team that brought us LonelyGirl15, a fictional blogger and video diarist, whose adventures were tracked by millions. Once outed as a fake, she retained a substantial following, those eager to find out what became of her. The story still continues.
Now Bebo has picked up rights to the KateModern story. A Bebo user claiming to be called Sophie has set up a KateModern page on which "she" is posting video clips from Kate. Strangely, this happens before "kate" manages to post them herself - because of the deal that Bebo has cut, viewers get the news first through them.
So far, so post-modern.
What makes it interesting is that "screening" KateModern's adventures means that Bebo has become host to "broadcast" content - a soap plot being updated in installments. Which makes them no different to any other commercial broadcaster - and a simple social network no longer.
The KateModern Bebo pages have now been viewed 106,638 times and the publicity machine has only just started. So while the whole thing is a long way off matching a mainstream commercial broadcaster, these are early days and our prediction would be that this story will only grow.
At the same time, Bebo is starting to talk about plans to include product placement in the films, with the likes of P&G, orange, Microsoft all keen signed-up to get involved. So for Bebo, the world of banners and buttons could well be left behind as they tap into a brave new world of branded entertainment.
The whole thing is kind of a neat inversion of the Skins/MySpace campaign, in which characters in a C4 soap assumed personalities in a digital social network. In this case, the characters, personalities and the network are all run by one business.
For this writer, campaigns such as this, which are gaining traction amongst a younger audience, are the biggest threat to broadcasters.
It is not that the volume of broadcast media watching will fall (see Les Binet's recent IPA presentation to show that is not the case) it is that for the commercial broadcasters the competition from the likes of Bebo, MySpace and the other big media players means that eyeballs will go elsewhere - to media owners that offer greater interactivity, are fleeter of foot and carry lower costs than a large, encumbered national broadcaster.
If KateModern is a potential future, we say: "bring on the future, it's great".
UPDATE: Interesting interview with Joanna Shields, the woman behind the KateModern campaign in today's Media Guardian - with news that there will be more to follow along similar lines.
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