MySpace Teams with Fox To Find TV Talent

MySpace recently announced that it will be teaming up with the FOX television network and the Producers Guild of America to find television pilots. The “Storyteller Challenge,” beginning September 4, will be a contest in which MySpace will ask for 5-to 7-minute television pilots to be submitted and voted on by the other users of the site. Two winners will then be chosen and rewarded with a $25,000 prize, as well as the possibility of a development deal with FOX.

“Producing will always be a difficult and competitive job, but I’m proud that our Storyteller Challenge will give unique new voices the chance to find their audience,” said PGA chief Marshall Herskovitz. “You never know where the next great storyteller will come from.”

The concept behind the new contest is very similar to an unsuccessful show, aired by Fox, known as “On the Lot.” The reality television show was created in the hope of finding a theatrical director (with criticism from judges similar to American Idol), but it failed with low ratings. According to Variety, “News Corp. hopes the contest will be better suited to online medium than an hourlong primetime show.”

TechCrunch has said that this is MySpace's effort to replicate the success of it's own short form webisode, “Prom Queen”, which delivered over 15 million streams during its first season. It could also be an attempt to compete with Sony’s Crackle. paidContent believes that it might be a way to stand apart from Facebook. The Social Web notes that “it’s clear that in the perceived battle between MySpace and Facebook, the former is keen to further position itself as a destination for original content — and community built around that content — rather than a platform purely designed for communication.”

Other recent efforts by MySpace, to maintain its status as the most used social network, include its recently launched MySpace TV as well as its certain involvement in the deal between its parent company, News Corp., and NBC.

Will this be enough to provide a successful show for FOX though? My concern is whether a move from the web to traditional television will keep a show popular. On the web, users can view a video whenever they are free, and they have the ability to interact and provide their own feedback. In contrast, traditional television will make the video content only available at a certain time and day. After all, not everyone has a DVR yet, to record their favorite programming. It should be more about television networks adopting the new medium, online video, instead of trying to take something created for a new technology and adapting it back to the older, ailing one.

“The truth is, MySpace (and any other popular social network) is a great medium for building audiences for shows, especially online shows where maintaining character profiles and such comes naturally… However, bringing a show out of its web pilot and onto TV is a shaky proposition,” according to NewTeeVee. Internet users love the convenience that the web allows, and a move to TV takes that away.

We will have to wait to see the final results of this initiative, as MySpace will not be announcing the final winners until January 2008. What is your take on this situation? Will you be entering or keeping track of the contest? Do you think it will prove successful or will it be another flop?