“Punked” is one of those words that started out as a slang term, but was taken to a whole new level by a pop culture moment — in this case, the MTV show Punk’d. But as quickly as it heated up in 2003, it quickly burned out, lasting just 4 years. But the company behind it, Ashton Kutcher’s Katalyst Media, may have found a way to revive the formula — take it live and online.
Katalyst is teaming up with Ustream, the online streaming video service, to bring “Punk’d-style experiences” to the platform. It would seem to have all the makings of a new web hit: People getting tricked and embarrassed on video, the whole thing happening live, interactivity and, perhaps most importantly to get it off the ground, star power. As we saw this past week with Kutcher’s race to a million Twitter followers, the guy knows how to leverage himself on the web.
Of course, content is still king. Kutcher and partner Jason Goldberg’s web cartoon show Blah Girls, hasn’t exactly exploded onto the scene after being unveiled at last year’s TC50. Traffic to the Blah Girl’s site does seem to be increasing nicely now, but it was in a rut for a while — and pales in comparison to say, the amount of pageviews Kutcher’s Twitter profile did just last week. And to be fair, Blah Girls is syndicated a bunch of different places, so website traffic doesn’t mean all that much for the show.
But Ustream knows a bit about huge viral shows itself. It hosts the Shiba Inu Puppy Cam, which is literally just a live stream of a puffy puppies sitting there being cute. That video has attracted some 10 million viewers, according to Ustream. And Ustream also did some major streaming during President Obama’s inauguration in January.
On top of their web partnership, the two sides plan to bring their videos to the iPhone in May, with a new live streaming aggregator app, taking all of these Punk’d-style live videos mobile.
As I said, it sounds like a winning combo, but I would caution Kutcher and company of one thing: There is still backlash on the web. If you overexpose yourself too much, users can get turned off, just as viewers do in Hollywood. Stay focused on what works, but don’t try to do too much. And please follow up on your promise to punk Ted Turner.
Sounds awesome. It makes you a part of the whole experience.
Cool! Maybe they can punk Justin Timberlake live…that was the funniest eva!
Super cool. Can’t wait to watch.
This is what the web was for!!!
Not e-commerce
This is HUGE news!!
I saw Ashton on CNN w/Larry King speaking about the difference between “old” and “new” media.
This all makes sense now…it’s all a part of the plan.
He’s a genius. Btw, loved his Ustream that night!!
Everything this guy does is 100% boring. Movies, TV, Internet, all of it pure bullshit. Get a life and stop kissing his stupid ass!
Ashton, Ustream and Twitter are everywhere. I just saw it on Oprah!
Sure this will become “internet famous”. Especially if it becomes a YouTube channel after it is done live. However, will that make Ashton as much as doing a That 70’s Show Reunion or another movie? I don’t think so.
The thing is, he’s doing this in addition to movies/other work.
Newspapers, TV are all dying. The web is the new distribution vehicle. It’s ubiquitous and interactive. This makes total sense.
The best punk’d was Nick Lache- Hilarious…
I <3 Ashton
I wonder if anyone will ever reach 10 million followers.
That is pretty powerful- I think Oprah does only 6 million viewers in a week.
One of these days we’ll see Ashton on Ustream with like freaking 1,000,000 viewers. That would be crazy
Ashton Kutcher is huge. I saw him on Oprah, Larry King…
I want to see celebrity parties LIVE!!!!!!
Wow….man he is really making great use of internet marketing tools.
IPO IPO !!
Watched Ashton hit the million mark live. Definitely was pretty cool.
I swear I saw Punkie Bruster in the background
so…… i guess we haven’t had enough of this guy, huh?
This is going to be a disaster:
1) The quality of Ustream videos is not particularly good. Nothing against them really, as streaming high quality video is difficult and costly.
2) I highly doubt the Ustream architecture is ready to handle a recurring large scale programming effort like this. If they plan on keeping performance acceptable, there are going to be serious costs.
3) Live TV is not good TV. It works for award shows and sporting events, but really nothing else. The content will be quite awful.
4) Ashton Kutcher is a tool.
Jealousy is a bitch huh?
15 yr old tool
That’s not jealoudy it is wisdom.
If you get started now you might still be able to turn it arround. First step, realizing that kutcher is indeed a loser tool.
Funny, I was attending this panel at UCLA sponsored by @Scripped last week titled “Hollywood 2.0″ and this very subject came up (celebrity overexposure on the web). The head of digital at Endeavor cautioned against the harm celebrities may be doing to their own brand by over-exposing themselves on the web. The ones who “shoot from the hip” and don’t have a real strategy other than getting out there aren’t going to do as well as people like Will Ferrell, Seth Macfarlane and others who have a real digital media strategy with very smart people behind them. Alex Albrecht was on the panel as well, and provided good insight on the other perspective (as an “Internet” celebrity trying to make it in “traditional” Hollywood). The takeaway – you shouldn’t dive head-first into the web if you’re a real celebrity, because you are going to dilute your brand.
That’s nice..LOL
The “punk’d” effect is almost in full swing http://bit.ly/I9G0K
Cool idea, I’ll watch! Please punk Ted Turner live!
Something about raw live stream, just love it!
I’m not crying like “anon” about quality live video because it live and its on the web dude!
My major concern is that the demand for bandwidth will completely overload the servers, resulting in a permanent client buffer. It’s one thing to serve a couple hundred/thousand clients, it another to serve a couple hundred thousand/million. I’m not saying it can’t be done, just that it is prohibitively expensive. I’m sure if Ustream/Katalyst are bringing in significant traffic they will be able to sell meaningful ad space, but I’m not convinced that the revenue brought in can offset the operational costs. The hidden camera/blooper format has proven to be immortal, so I think the entertainment end will be fine from a conceptual standpoint, I just don’t see it coming together during implementation/deployment due to constraints of a live format and of the web as a delivery/interactive medium. I applaud the experimentation, I just don’t think it will work. Maybe in 5-10 years, but not today. We just aren’t there yet.
We are totally there with live. The quality is definitely there as pioneers like Leo Laporte are broadcasting in tremendously high quality.
The scale is definitely there. Not only can all these live sites now support massive viewership already, all the major CDNs support live flash. Scale was a issue 3 years ago, but not today.
Your statement was true 3-5 years ago, but today is a totally different story with proven results.
“I’m not saying it can’t be done, just that it is prohibitively expensive.”
Anon is correct. You only support his point by citing Leo laporte as a reference. WTF
It sound good it really great thing to watch
this already exists and it’s called bragster.com