Mashing up media

Bevin Linkhorn likes to mash things up. He has worked as a writer, performer and producer in theatre, TV and film and crossed into ‘new media’ to create New Zealand’s first made-for-mobile drama series My Story.

The Gibson Group Producer’s latest project Mash Pit Comedy is a user-generated sketch comedy website and Prime TV show.

It was one of the first multi-platform initiatives funded under NZ on Air’s digital content partnership.

In this ‘Skype’ chat with The Big Idea Editor Cathy Aronson, he talks about applying the ‘seven deadly sins test’ to a new idea, user-generated content and quantity versus quality, keeping up with the latest ‘now media’ fads, grassroots interaction and empowering the audience.

“Given my background I guess I do think about the audience quite a bit. What do they want to see, what will they find funny ... or in this case, what might inspire them to make something funny.” 

Cathy Aronson: Tell us a bit about Mash Pit Comedy.

Bevin Linkhorn: Mash Pit Comedy is an interactive comedy project... well, an interactive "social" comedy project really. We want to make a "sketch comedy 2.0" TV show with the help of creative and funny NZers.

It starts as a website - a video sharing site - where anyone can join up, upload their own original comedy - with its point of difference being that ANY video on the site can be downloaded and used by members to remix, re-edit, mash-up, to create brand new comedy video creations.

Then, once there's a bunch of hilarious video on the site, we'll compile NZ's first user generated comedy mash-up sketch comedy TV show, broadcasting to the nation on Prime in primetime.

The creators of the videos that get selected to appear on the TV show - selected via being popular on the site, and by being judged as funny by the Mash Pit Comedy production team - will get glory and much recognition from their mums and dads for doing a good job. And they'll be in the running for some prizes too.

There's a video clip that explains the site a wee bit too.

Rubber chickens eh ... they're always funny.

Cathy: So is this for the general population (their mums and dads think they are funny) or budding comedians?

Bevin: Both really. There's a bunch of budding comedians who have already made stuff for the site ... and I've got word that others are making stuff at the moment too (they're just waiting for their mock exams to be over). But it's also for anyone out there who thinks they're funny and have access to a webcam, or video camera, and can figure out how to upload videos to the site .... BTW it's really easy to upload videos to the site.

Cathy: In this new media world of user-generated content it can be hard to find quality compared to quantity - does the Prime TV aspect help you do this while still staying open to all users?

Bevin: Perhaps in a way we need the quantity to get to quality. And the mash-up aspect of the project allows people to take a clip and make it funnier ... the cycle of the gag can keep on going.  Because we've got the carrot of "getting your comedy on TV", the whole project becomes a comedy development platform ... where we can expose budding comedy talent to a wider audience.  It also empowers the comedy creatives. People can make what THEY want to make and expose that directly to the audience.  These days, home video cameras are on a par with what the professionals are using ... there's even HD quality home video cameras these days!

Cathy: So the technical quality is there - but what about the writing? Is it learn as you go - or are there tips on the website (ie 101 things to do with a rubber chicken)?

Bevin: That's a good question.  We've pulled a bunch of technical information together on the site ... stuff like how to edit your video using free software like Windows Movie Maker and iMovie and how to best encode your videos for upload to the site ... but as yet we haven't pulled a tips list together of how to write/create best practice comedy.  It might be a blog post for us!  So at the moment it's more learn as you go.  I also hope that people start learning from each other ... by taking note of what comments people make about their videos, how they're shared around, where their videos are embedded.

Also, at this stage of the project, I'm not sure if giving "Best Practice" of how to create comedy is the best thing for us to do.  We're empowering the audience and allowing the audience to take any video to mash-up with ... I'm curious to see what they can do.  Although saying that, there are some tips we give, like: keep your comedy short; give it a snappy title (so people want to click on it to view).  And given it's on the web, people have to make sure they get straight to the point when their clip starts. 

I don't know about you Cathy, but my attention span gets shorter and shorter watching web videos.  So clips that get going straight away (that old adage: "get in late, get out early" totally applies to comedy on the web) appeal to me.

Cathy: Sorry.... I zoned out there... 

Joking ;)!

Bevin: It's your short attention span eh

Cathy: Have you had support, guidance or feedback from New Zealand comedians?

Bevin: We shoulder tapped a few people early on, and got great support from them about the whole concept.  It was great that people really "got" the whole sharing aspect of the project. And I got Kylie Aitchison from the Comedy Festival across the project too ... she saw the appeal to both comedians and the general public for the concept, so we're talking to her a bit further to help spread the word about it all.

Cathy: Mash Pit Comedy was one of the first projects funded under NZ on Air's digital content partnership fund.  Did you tailor the idea (of multi-platform) for the fund or was the concept already there - and it was good timing?

Bevin: We'd be playing with an interactive comedy idea for a while prior to the NZ on Air digital content partnership fund ... initially we'd been looking at how we could harness video from mobile phones, submitting clips in and then pushing clips back to video phones.  This was after we made the made-for-mobile drama series 'My Story'.  But then the idea morphed into a project that was better suited for the web and TV.  We got Prime excited by the idea, then we pitched to NZ on Air.

Cathy: Was it a difficult task to convince a traditional broadcaster (Prime) to back internet based user-generated content?

Bevin: Prime are WAY KEEN for local shows ... this was a way to get a local show on Prime, backed by NZ On Air.  It wasn't an easy pitch, but they understood that this would be a different kind of comedy show, so they jumped on board.

Cathy: Is comedy on the internet an easier genre than others like drama?

Bevin: I think we're more used to watching comedy on the internet.  How many LOL cat videos have you seen? The short form nature of web video suits the sketch comedy format too. And they're often stand-alone gags.  Drama often relies on a serial element.

Cathy: It's more of a grassroots form of interaction on the internet?

Bevin: Totally ... people can try things out ... gauge the audience's reaction, and then make something else.

Cathy: When you are creating a new media concept, and infact a new concept, how do you assess if there will be an audience and demand?

Bevin: I read something recently that said if you're working on a new idea, you should apply the seven deadly sins test. If your pitch can't satisfy at least one of those basic (or is it 'base'?) desires, you need to go back and re-work it.  I quite like the idea of that test ... I guess with Mash Pit Comedy we've got: Vainglory, Pride ... and potentially Sorrow if you make a clip and people totally rat on it.

Cathy: How do you think your background as an actor, playwrite and scriptwriter has helped you with this project – compared to others in new media who may not have these background skills?

Bevin: Given my background I guess I do think about the audience quite a bit. What do they want to see, what will they find funny ... or in this case, what might inspire them to make something funny.  And when it comes to new media projects, it's the "user experience" that I focus on ... rather than say the technical build (which I leave in the hands of very talented web development people).  The technical web engine is the medium we're using to engage with our audience, but the core offer still have to be clearly communicated.

Cathy: You started with Gibson Group in 2004, working in film, factual TV, drama and comedy – including as script editor on The Insider’s Guide to Love. How did you end up getting into new media? What drew you to it, what did you have to learn?

Bevin: I've still got an arm back in the "fiction" camp ... adding the new media "bow" was a chance to learn new skills, and I recognised that more and more of our audience will want to be engaging with content in new ways - on new platforms. 

I was drawn in during the production of 'My Story' ... that was a 2 minute micro-drama series we made for C4. 40 episodes that played on TV, the web and on video mobile phones. And that was before the TV broadcasters had any big web-video presence, so we built our own website to play the episodes as a weekend omnibus edition.  And I worked with our mobile distributor, Sonic Mobile, to help set up the system to deliver a new episode to mobile's each morning.  

So I've learnt a lot by being thrown in the deep end and asking a lot of questions.  Some of them have probably been really stupid questions, but that's the only way to learn.

Cathy: What's changed in new media since then - how do you keep up with the kids and stay fresh and relevant - like mash-ups?

Bevin: I think the whole term 'new media' is a bit old hat now.  Everyone seems to have a new definition or a new name for what it is. We heard someone call it Now Media the other day ... which is actually a bit naff eh.  

How do I keep up with the kids and stay fresh?   We ran a great focus group with the Wellington Class Comedians during the Mash Pit Comedy development ... they're high school students who are training to be stand-up comics with the Comedy Festival.  They kept us on their toes and gave some great ideas to tweak the site's look and feel.  

And staying fresh? Deodorant  helps (Ok, that was a "Dad gag" eh).  Keeping engaged with all the new social platforms that come out ... I admit, I'm a Facebook addict.  Twitter, not so much.  I'm more likely to read other tweets than make many of my own.  I heard that high-school students are stopping using Facebook these days, because their PARENTS have started to join.  So there'll be some new fad to join next week.

Cathy: The mash-up idea has been popular in the music scene (ie dance music) online for sometime - is this a first for comedy/video on this scale?

Bevin: I'm not sure it's a total "first" for comedy/video in a world-wide sense.  But it's definitely the first time there's been a project like this in NZ that links mashed-up web video with TV.

I should probably say it's a TOTAL FIRST though huh ... big it up a little.  But the web is a big place, so somewhere there could be a similar offer.

Cathy: So how has Mash Pit been received since your launch - and how do you measure success (traffic, number and quality of submissions etc)

Bevin: We've had great feedback so far ... from people that have visited the site and those that have uploaded clips there. Our promos will be airing on Prime shortly, so once they've gone out we'll get access to a lot more eyeballs to visit the site.  We'll be compiling the TV show within the first quarter of next year, so it's still early days for activity on the site.  We need to make 4 x half hour TV shows ... so that means we're after about 80 minutes of awesome comedy video.  That's our core yard stick for success: to be able to make 4 good half-hour TV shows from content on the site.  It's exciting but it's also a bit daunting, as we don't know what kind of comedy content we're going to get on the site ... or the TV show.  It's a bit weird for a production company to be handing over the power to the audience ... but that's a good thing too!

Cathy: Given this is tied into the digital content fund, with the show on Prime next year, will the website keep on going beyond this?

Bevin: Yes, at this stage the site will keep on running after the show airs next year.  The show itself will end up being a big ad for the site, so if it all goes well, we could end up running another series of the TV show later in 2010 made up of new gags.

Cathy: This year’s digital content fund criteria has removed the need for a broadcasting outcome. What do you think are the pros and cons of this?

Bevin: For our project, the partnership with Prime as the TV broadcaster means that we've got the ability to promote the project through promos on screen, which is a big thing -- as we don't have a separate "marketing budget" on top of the funding to build and manage the site and create the TV show.  Also, the opportunity to get your comedy video on TV is a big sell to our audience.   Our project was created with a TV outcome in mind ... we are creating a show that fits the normal TV schedule requirements ... ie it's half-hour long. 

Other digital media concepts don't necessarily fit within a traditional broadcast box, so removing the need for a broadcast outcome will suit those projects.  However I think partnering with a broadcaster or another content portal will help any digital content project -- whether it be access to an audience via marketing, or a project that supplements the online activities of a broadcaster or web portal.  I think the trick is to be where the audience already is, as it's tricky to get people to come to you.  That's why we've made all the videos on Mash Pit Comedy easy to share via the web, email and all the social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Bebo etc.

Cathy: Have you made your own Mash Pit Comedy clip!?!

Bevin: Yes I have. It's pretty basic though ... and features my cat ... licking himself ...hmmm ..  But watch this space as I've got an idea for a follow-up, which will likely feature elements of the first one.  So it'll be a mash-up.  Here's my first one: http://mashpitcomedy.com/videos/cat-washing-on-washing-machine

Bevin: When will I see a video from you Cathy? :)

Cathy: Hmmm something about Frodo replacing the ring with a rubber chicken...

My ma and pa might like it....

Bevin: Yeah, go on.  Likely to score you a part in The Hobbit

Cathy: Or I might just mash up one of yours!!!!

Bevin: YEAH!  Go on!  I can't wait to see more mash-ups on the site. That's why we've built it.  So Mash, Mash away!