How much do I love Joss Whedon?
More than two years ago I ran a post suggesting that it would take someone like cult-favorite Whedon to blaze the next trail in online media. Then last year Whedon launched Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, a three-part production that was made available for free on the Web. Through DVD sales and paid iTunes downloads (the content was only free for a short time), Dr. Horrible grossed $2.5 million.
Now Joss Whedon is at it again, this time with a plan to create a microstudio focused exclusively on content for the Internet. From a recent Forbes article:
Whedon envisions producing series that could be shown as individual episodes and then repackaged as movies. The site would make money the same way Dr. Horrible did–via downloads and DVDs.
Given that big media is still more than a little scared of online ventures, it’s a relief to see someone with Joss Whedon’s clout experimenting with ways to make Internet media financially viable. It will be a long time before revenues from online video come close to being competitive with traditional TV, but the path has to start somewhere. I can think of no one better to start mapping the way than Joss Whedon.
Oohh! “Firefly” episodes would be nice…
Dr Horrible is free on Hulu
Huh. I didn’t realize you could still get it free somewhere. Nice.