CBS Features Machinima in Upfront Presentation
The Upfronts are the week when television networks show off the season’s upcoming shows to advertisers, hoping to win them over and grab fistfuls of their cash. For that reason, they’re very important, and the networks make sure their presentations are top-notch and designed to entertain. CBS made its showing yesterday afternoon at Carnegie Hall — and kicked it off with a machinima piece (produced by the Electric Sheep Company, sponsors of this blog) showing an avatar of JoAnn Ross, the president of network sales, flying around the virtual world of Second Life, according to Paul LaMonica of CNN/Money (who wasn’t sure it really was SL, apparently). CBS hasn’t posted the video on YouTube yet, but it will apparently be up there eventually, 3pointD hears, though it could take a week or two. The network is definitely taking a brave step into the future with the use of machinima in such a context, but it isn’t yet moving around the present very quickly, it seems. You can look for more good stuff in this vein from CBS, I’d bet. What I like about it is that it’s the kind of thing that will drive adoption of virtual worlds.
Feeds
Very nice! I recently interviewed Chris Carella of The Sheep (thx Chris!) and found out a bit about their previous dabble with CBS and machinima (a promo piece for a sitcome featured before the Super Bowl which I’m sure you’re all aware of). This second piece is very promising, suggesting that CBS had positive feedback with the first.
Chris had discussed with me the very neat implications of machinima going more mainstream, and similar to YouTube, it offers a wide range of people the possibility to create unique and inexpensive media. Certainly, the big networks and Hollywood will not miss out on their chance to capitalize on it though.
Bonnie Boglioli Randall
aka Svetlana
RCE Universe