By Moira LawlerPLAY Writer
Social networking sites have consumed all of our spare time. Turn on the computer. Check Facebook. Do a half hour of homework. Check Facebook. Forget what you did last night. Check Facebook. It’s an endless cycle in which our time is sucked up by “social networking” (read: stalking).
Now, Facebook.com and MySpace.com will eat up even more of our lives. These networking sites will soon be used not only to watch TV and videos, but to produce feature films as well. Seeing as we already watch TV on our computers via NUTV, these Web sites will no doubt give NUTV a little competition.
In the beginning, MySpace was a place for bands to showcase their music and attain a fan base. Then, it became a networking site not only for musicians, but for teens and dirty old pedophiles as well. Facebook followed suit and pushed itself into a daily habit for virtually all college (and high school) students.
Now, MySpace has evolved into a marketing tool for television and film. MySpace launched “MyMovie Mashup,” a U.K. competition among MySpace members to find a director, script writers and actors for a $1.96 million feature film funded by studios Vertigo Films and Film4.
The movie will premiere in 2008, after MyMovie Mashup completes a 10-step program during which the entire film will be made. After they find the best short film maker on MySpace, users will vote on titles proposed by other MySpacers. The Web site will then post scenes from the script and leave it open to members’ suggestions. Any of these suggestions will be considered by the director and may appear in the movie. The rest of the steps include finding actors, putting together a production crew, providing music for the soundtrack, editing the trailer and marketing the movie.
Facebook’s comeback? The MySpace competitor will also branch out into the film and TV industry with the help of Comcast Corp. “Facebook Diaries” will be 10 half-hour episodes produced by Emmy awarding winning producer/director R.J. Cutler. Cutler produced American High for Fox. High was an edgy show based on the stories he gathered about the lives of suburban Illinois teens. Comcast’s Ziddio.com, a Web site similar to YouTube, along with Facebook.com, will show the episodes. The series will kick off later this year.
Both Facebook and Comcast will accept video submissions beginning in March. The videos can be about any aspect of users’ lives, from mundane work days to dramatic heartbreak. “Facebook Diaries” targets 18- to 24-year-olds who will submit videos from any electronic gadget they have handy, such as cell phones, video cameras or web cameras.
The idea is for users to express themselves however and through whatever means they choose. The contest operates under the assumption that everyone has a story to tell, and Facebook and Comcast say they want to give users a chance to tell about their first love, their experience at war or their most embarrassing moments. The best ones will appear on “Facebook Diaries.”
“People can share anything they’re interested in,” says Stefanie Williamson, a Ziddio.com spokeswoman.
“Facebook Diaries” will allow Facebook to attain video-sharing capabilities. Currently, Facebook members cannot share videos through the Web site; members have to post Web sites to videos in order to share them. On Comcast’s end, the company will benefit from more web traffic on its Ziddio Web site, hopefully making it a closer YouTube competitor. Right now, Ziddio.com has received very little attention, being overshadowed in the media by YouTube. More users are expected to become regular visitors to the site as a result of acquiring the user base of Facebook, the second largest social networking site after MySpace.
“There’s only so much you can do on those Web sites now,” says MySpace member Kevin Miller, 21, from California. “People get bored of looking at people’s pictures all the time, so I think people would fill their time by watching videos.”
“The only condition I would watch it is if a lot of people were talking about,” says SESP freshman Danielle McLean. “I wouldn’t just go on to look at the videos, but if people were talking about it, I would want to see what they were. It’s like a ripple effect.”
With social networking Web sites expanding even further into our daily lives, what does this mean for the future of TV, film and the rest of the media?
Soon, we could soon be living in a world where romance receives yet another technological boost. In the ’90s, we had the You’ve Got Mail-style e-mail romance. In the future, a romance driven even more by technology could result from the expansiveness of these social networking sites.
Boy meets girl. Dozens of wall posts follow. Pictures of the two appear online. A video is posted of their first kiss. Love blossoms. Obviously.
Facebook and MySpace have already conquered our lives. And soon, they’ll also conquer TV.
Weinberg freshman Moira Lawler is a PLAY writer. She can be reached at [email protected].
