Paulo Coelho turns his book into a feature film with MySpace users’ videos

This should be interesting. Author Paulo Coelho is going to collaborate with MySpace to make his latest book into his first feature film. The MySpace collaboration will center around creating a mashup of videos and songs created and submitted by MySpace users.  Coelho will choose the winning videos and songs to use in his film.

But here’s the rub: Coelho is going to own the film.  What do the MySpace filmmakers and musicians get?

Winners will enjoy significant publicity, and their work will be featured across MySpace worldwide including the homepage, MySpaceTV and an extensive banner campaign.

Well, exposure is always a good thing, right?  Not as sweet as a percentage of the gross, or residuals, but you have to start somewhere.

Oh, and the fine print says that if there aren’t enough videos and songs submitted that meet the required standards, the whole project will be scrapped.

It’ll be interesting to see what comes of this. [Via Publishers Weekly]

 

Is news still news if it’s yesterday’s news?

Here’s an interesting concept:  crowdsourcing the news.  Even more interesting:  getting paid to crowdsource the news.  That’s Knewsroom’s new model.   One thing about it seems a bit off to me:  the freshness of the news.  Their process, in their words:

“The Knews” gets published every morning, featuring the previous day’s top stories in Politics, Business, Technology, Design, Sports, and Entertainment.

Just about everything is, or is moving towards being, instantaneous on the interweb.  Reading the previous day’s news smacks of taking a step in the direction of the Pony Express.  I understand it takes time for a crowd to, er, source.   And I applaud the Knewsroom’s efforts in democratizing news.  It just seems there could be a way to manage it so that they could present the news while it was still news. 

[Via mycreativeteam]

 

Breaking my own blogging rule!

Time has literally slipped through my fingers. I’ve been busy with a new client, and before I knew it, days, nay weeks, have passed since I last posted to my blog (never mind the last time I’ve twittered something or signed into meebo chat).  Shame on me for not balancing everything and keeping up.  I promise to do better.

It does appear, from looking at the search term referrers and other stats, that this little blog is being used as a reference or guide of sorts, which is definitely one of the main purposes for which I had hoped people would view it.  Still, I need to get back on the stick with updates.  There really is a lot more I wish to share.  I’m always open, as well, to discussing particular topics and answering questions, so feel free to pose a question or suggest a topic in comments.

More to come soon!

 

 

 

A Filmmaker Live Twitters Tribeca All Access

Full Disclosure: Double 7 Film is a client of mine.

I’ve convinced a busy Director and Writer to try Twitter .  I don’t usually bring my client work over to my blog, but I’m really excited about Pete Chatmon’s willingness to embrace the idea of reaching out directly to fans through a variety of Web tools, including Twitter.

Pete’s production company is in the midst of retooling their online presence, to include a total redesign of the corporate website and an expansion of their presence on YouTube (in addition to writing and directing feature films, Pete also directs music videos ). 

Pete has a lot of irons in the fire.  He’s in development on his next feature, he’s writing a couple screenplays, and preparing some commercial shoots.  However, he’s dedicated to the idea of finding new ways to connect with movie fans.  He understands the power of interaction and wants to join the conversation. 

He’s an invited participant in Tribeca All Access, and plans to live twitter his experience there today.

This should be an interesting experience and opportunity to get behind-the-scenes with a filmmaker. Check it out.

Know your audience: demographics on bloggers

BIGresearch.com has released a survey on the demography of bloggers. Since reaching out to bloggers should be an integral part of the publicity and marketing campaign for a film, knowing a bit about who blogs can help.

Highlights of new media use by bloggers:

Regular/Occasional New Media Usage (Top 5)
	% of Regular/Occasional Bloggers	% of Adults 18+
Cell Phone	93.0%	87.5%
Instant Messaging	75.3%	49.3%
Download/Access Video/TV Content	72.2%	45.0%
Video Gaming	66.9%	47.5%
Text Messaging	65.5%	45.2%
Source: BIGresearch, January 2008, N=15,727

I found it interesting that the survey indicates the most common trigger for a blogger’s internet searches is  reading an article (48.8%). I wonder whether those articles read were located in a print publication, or online? [Via mediapost.com]