@ Ad Week: Blip.tv Bets On A 'Slacker Uprising'; Will Moore Deal Lead To Rising Traffic, CPMs?
This story was written by David Kaplan.
Over the last few years, left-leaning documentarian Michael Moore's cinematic molotov cocktails have gone from filling seats at the art houses to multiplexes. Online video sharing site Blip.tv hopes that his latest, Slacker Uprising, will lead to more traffic to its site. Blip.tv is offering Moore's new film, which is being released online instead of in theaters. The movie, which debuts Tuesday, is also going to be available for download on iTunes and on Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN). The movie, which clocks in at 2 hours, 23 minutes, carries no advertising and is otherwise free. So why would Blip.tv agree to run it? It's not out of charity, says Blip.tv CEO Mike Hudack.
Brave New World, the film's producer, had worked with Blip.tv on other projects and asked if the video site would be interested. "We jumped at the opportunity to hose the first major feature film to be released on the internet," Hudack told me. "You can liken it to Radiohead or Nine Inch Nails putting putting out their last albums for free download. "Advertising on blip is opt-in. Moore could have asked. And we could have made him a ton of ad revenue. But for us, it's about increasing the amount of content we have on the site and the amount of viewers." More after the jump.
-- All about the network: Like a lot of sites in online video distribution game, Blip.tv is singularly focused on driving traffic to its network, and not positioning itself as a destination site. "The general idea is to concentrate on creating and distributing high quality shows. After that, the goal is to provide services to creators that they can't provide themselves. There're either a small studio or guys in a garage. In order to be successful online, you have to have workflow automation, marketing and ad sense. When you look at that servives, you need scale, because they cost money. Scale is where we come in." I also spoke with Dina Kaplan (no relation), Blip.tv's COO, who said that video views is up over 79 percent since January with about 50.4 million views last month. While that's respectable number for the major sites and networks, Blip.tv feels that the September is likely to spike those numbers, though they're reluctant to offer any guesses how high the arrows will go.
-- How long is too long?: While video sites like Hulu insist that online video can attract users for longer than five minutes by running episodic fare on their computers, there's still a debate about whether masses of viewers will adapt to the small screen. Things like *Apple* TVwhich is far from a raging successmake it easier to watch online videos the old-fashioned wayon TVHudack characterizes showing the Moore film as an experiment. "We're going to have to wait and see if audiences embrace it. It's true that people are getting more and more comfortable for longer forms for streaming video. But at the very least, this is a good way to try."
-- The wild west: As for measuring success in CPMs, Kaplan feels that that while the range is uncertain, it's clear that rich media in general are a way to close the gap between spending on traditional media and online. Kaplan: "It is fair to say the market for video ads is nascent and that it's not clear what CPMs the market will settle on in the end it's a bit of the wild wild west right now, with no real standards set at this point. The good news is that as more eyeballs turn towards web video, it's inevitable the ad dollars will follow."
By David Kaplan