distribution

UPDATE: Netflix has decided to not split its DVD business into Qwikster. In September 2009 Netflix was trading at around $50 a share, the next year it was at $150 and just a few months ago it reached a peak of $300. Netflix’s meteoric rise wasn’t a bubble, it was based on its growing subscription [...]

BET surprised a number of video producers  this year when it announced it picked up four series for online distribution, many of them serious scripted dramas edgier than BET’s on-air fare. During a panel held at CAA at ITVFest, the tone coming from executives Martez Moore and Monique Ware was clear: they are committed. “I’m [...]

Posted at Tubefilter. Even today, when I mention I write about web series, I get nonplussed looks and requests for examples. But there is one series I see friends consistently cheer and evangelize: The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl. “Have you seen it?!” I hear. “You have to see it!” It’s quite a feat for [...]

As if we needed any more proof the term “viral” was a relic of 2008, the team behind Machinima.com’s Bite Me gave us one more yesterday at their International Television Festival panel. The panel was called “Bite Me: How to Go Viral,” but in the first few minutes, Andy Shapiro, Machinima’s vice president of creative [...]

You may not have heard of BWE, the Black Women’s Entertainment Network, but if you’re an aspiring TV writer you might have heard of a certain $10,000 contest for web series pilots starring black women. “It gets people in that mindset of, ‘yea, let me create something for a black female lead,’” BWE CEO Camille [...]

The web series world is different from traditional TV, but not entirely. Like on television, most web series are generally upbeat, middle class or stay away from intense real world problems. That’s where Downsized comes in. The acclaimed web series focuses on the effects of the recession on a diverse group of people, starring Beth [...]

So far 2011 has produced three “yowza!” moments, news so big I urgently retweeted them with a preceeding “yowza”: Google/YouTube buying Next New Networks, Netflix delving into original production and now this: Sony’s Crackle jumping in line with Netflix for long-form programming. Variety‘s Andrew Wallenstein broke the news, delivered by recently promoted Eric Berger, now VP of [...]

Posted at Black Web 2.0! Comment there! Every week it’s becoming clearer black TV, online and onscreen, is set for a revival. Cable networks from TV One to TV Land are ordering new shows produced by and starring black actors, as are the Big Four. And brand new channels are waiting in the wings: a [...]

Thanks to NewsforTVMajors and MIT Center for Civic Media for linking! We’re in for a deluge of black programming on television and on the net. Last fall I spent a considerable amount of time pitching articles about the rise of the “black network,” without much success. Mainstream publications seemed uninterested. Black Web 2.0 was gracious and forward-thinking enough [...]

Do women rule the Internet? There are good arguments for why they do: women are avid consumers and social networkers. Yet for some, women are chronically undervalued by marketers online. If Stephanie Piche has a mission, underscoring the importance of women online is certainly one of them. “Women are out there buying. Men don’t like [...]