Can EQAL Make CBS’ Harper’s Island a Hit Online?
The partnership between EQAL and CBS is starting to bear fruit, as the two media companies announced their new upcoming multi-platform “social show,” Harper’s Island. From the press release:
HARPER’S ISLAND is about a group of family and friends who travel to a secluded island for a destination wedding. They’ve come to laugh… to love… and, though they don’t know it… to die. As the wedding festivities begin, friendships are tested and secrets exposed as a murderer claims victims, one by one, transforming the wedding week of fun and celebration into a terrifying struggle for survival. In every episode, someone is killed and every person is a suspect, from the wedding party to the island locals. By the end of the 13 episodes, all questions will be answered, the killer will be revealed and only a few will survive.
Dunh-Dunh-DUNH!
CBS is using EQAL’s technology and video experience (lonelygirl15, KateModern) to develop the Harper’s Globe web site that will feature original online episodes that will intertwine with the TV component. The online part of the show will debut on March 18, weeks before the show debuts on TV on April 9, and the old and newteevee shows will coexist throughout the show’s weekly run, which will conclude on July 2.
Now that EQAL (and by extension, new media) has a seat at the table, it has to prove its worth. EQAL Co-founder and President Greg Goodfried was on our transmedia panel at NewTeeVee Live, where he and all the speakers refused to talk about transmedia success metrics or define what those metrics should even be. Defining your own success when it’s just a girl with a webcam is one thing, but when you’ve got a big media company footing the bill — they’re going to want tangible results.
Interestingly, one of the show’s executive producers is Jon Turtletaub, formerly of Jericho — a TV show that cultivated a rabid online following. Combined with the talents of the EQAL crew, Harper’s Island could wind up being a very interesting experiment. But there’s a difference between creating a groundswell organically and trying to manufacture one from the outset.
The pains to which EQAL and CBS are going to promote this as a “social show” (the phrase appears eight times in the press release) makes it feel like they are trying too hard. This manufactured feeling is reinforced when EQAL uses marketingspeak like “rich set” and “paradigm” to define a social show as:
[P]resented on a website that incorporates a rich set of social networking features, and the narrative extends beyond the videos and into character profile pages, text blogs, photo albums, live text and video chats, and even into the real world. Fans of social shows are active participants, not simply passive viewers, and the medium is about a dialogue between the community and the show, unlike the one-way “broadcast” paradigm seen in traditional entertainment mediums like TV and film.
To its credit, EQAL found success with LG15 by extending the experience into the real world through ARGs and even including fans in actual episodes. So presumably CBS is hoping EQAL can incorporate those elements to deliver the same type of buzz and following LG15 developed.
CBS Interactive CEO Quincy Smith has been secretive about his plans for EQAL, but he did tell us last year that he wanted to include EQAL at the script level when it comes to creating online extensions of TV programming. Looks like he made good on the promise as EQAL has been collaborating on the show since last spring.
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if its good it will become ’social.’ if its not – and this one sounds awfully silly- it will become ‘anti-social’
Patty M on January 13th, 2009 at 12:54 pm - Permalink
Hey Chris, thanks for writing about Harper’s Globe! We’re really excited about the new show and our partnership with CBS and the Harper’s Island creative team. Sorry if we went a little heavy-handed with the term “social show” in the press release but we wanted to be clear that we aren’t making webisodes. The LG15 and ARG community have been debating for awhile about what to call these “things.” ARG? Chaotic fiction? We didn’t think anything really fit and then we stumbled upon the idea of simply calling them social shows… er, because they are social… shows… We think there’s something special about them that goes beyond the descriptive ability of the word “webisodes.” Oh, and as for “rich set” and “paradigm”… I wrote that right before you posted the blog… and I just like the word “paradigm.” And “synesthesia”… i need to use that one sometime soon. Sorry, I’m a doctor :)
Miles Beckett on January 13th, 2009 at 2:15 pm - Permalink
Point taken, Miles. Thanks for the clarification. Break a leg with the “social show” (try saying it ten times fast).
Chris Albrecht on January 13th, 2009 at 2:36 pm - Permalink
Social show, social show, social show… hehehe, yeah… that’s kinda tough. Thanks!
Miles Beckett on January 13th, 2009 at 2:37 pm - Permalink
[...] opaphid The makers of Lonelygirl15, EQAL, announced their deal with CBS last Spring. Today NewTeeVee talks about the new show with an online component, Harper’s Island. The article quotes from the press release to describe the plot, which sounds like a low-rent [...]
LG15 makers team with CBS for Harper’s Island « Tizzyblog’s Weblog on January 13th, 2009 at 3:32 pm - Permalink
No matter how successful the “social” part is, the fact remains that if the ratings are not up the CBS’ standards, we won’t get to the 13th episode to find out “who done it.” Therein lies the rub – it’s still on TV and ratings rule.
I am one of the “Jericho NUTS!” and I will be watching and will, at least, check out the “social” part of the show; but having been there already, I have no illusion that CBS learned anything and will still want top advertising $$$ for their prime time TV seconds. So unless the Neilsen Families out there have found their ability to follow a continuing story line, we have a problem before it gets started.
Fix the ratings system and TV will survive. As it stands right now, I’d rather have webisodes and a total “social” experience that won’t disappear overnight.
N2N2 on January 14th, 2009 at 6:54 am - Permalink
I’m an LG15 fan and a Jericho fan (only recently though, thanks to Netflix) so I’m curious to see what the combination of these teams come up with. Also, Melanie from LG15 stars in the online show so that gives me more reason to watch because I always liked her.
I agree with the previous commenter about the rating system being broken. Too many good shows are canceled while too much crappy stuff stays on TV. It’s very sad.
Cassi on January 14th, 2009 at 7:50 am - Permalink
Correction: The ARG component was created by a fan within the community and not by Eqal Inc, LG15 Studios or any entity related to the creators. Even CIW (which sparked the original ARG) was created by a fan. The creators did attempt to create an ARG on their own but that was pretty much a failure. While some have called what remained after the ARG associated with lonelygirl15 ended an ARG it is clearly not an ARG as Miles himself points out.
modelmotion on January 17th, 2009 at 3:11 pm - Permalink
[...] interesting that this separate Zuiker project launched first. Meanwhile, EQAL’s first announced joint project with CBS is an original TV and web show called Harper’s Island that’s [...]
CSI Creator’s New Novel to Have a lonelygirl Twist « NewTeeVee on March 2nd, 2009 at 9:48 am - Permalink
nintendo – original, best, will always rule
nintendo ds on March 2nd, 2009 at 2:58 pm - Permalink
[...] and Kate Modern, have just released a trailer for Harper’s Globe, their latest online show in partnership with CBS. The Website will feature its own original side story to accompany Harper’s Island, a new [...]
Ooh, Teaser For Harper’s Globe Looks Spooky on March 10th, 2009 at 11:16 am - Permalink
[...] and Kate Modern, have just released a trailer for Harper’s Globe, their latest online show in partnership with CBS. The Website will feature its own original side story to accompany Harper’s Island, a new show [...]
The Far Edge » Blog Archive » Ooh, Teaser For Harper’s Globe Looks Spooky on March 10th, 2009 at 3:00 pm - Permalink
[...] Loneygirl15およびKate Modernのヒットを飛ばしたEQALのウェブビデオプロデューサーであるMiles BeckettとGreg GoodfriedがHarper’s Globeの予告編を制作した。CBSとのパートナーシップに基づいて制作される、EQALの最新作品ということになる。ウェブにはCBSで4月に放送される新番組のHarper’s Islandに関するオリジナルの再度ストーリーが掲載される。エピソード毎に行われる殺人で、シーズンワンが終わるまでにはみんな死んでしまうらしい。 [...]
Lonlygirl15のEQAL、CBSの新番組用ティーザービデオを担当 on March 10th, 2009 at 3:26 pm - Permalink
[...] and Kate Modern, have just released a trailer for Harper’s Globe, their latest online show in partnership with CBS. The Website will feature its own original side story to accompany Harper’s Island, a new [...]
Top Free Mini Games » Blog Archive » Ooh, Teaser For Harper’s Globe Looks Spooky on March 10th, 2009 at 3:33 pm - Permalink
[...] and Kate Modern, have just released a trailer for Harper’s Globe, their latest online show in partnership with CBS. The Website will feature its own original side story to accompany Harper’s Island, a new [...]
Ooh, Teaser For Harper’s Globe Looks Spooky on March 10th, 2009 at 5:56 pm - Permalink
[...] Harper’s Globe is the brainchild of Miles Beckett and Greg Goodfried of EQAL, and is a new joint effort with [...]
Harper's Globe: Creepiest Trailer Ever? | Blippitt on March 11th, 2009 at 8:00 am - Permalink
Very nice post, I share the same position about this.
Company friend on March 12th, 2009 at 12:43 am - Permalink
[...] has info on the release dates of the webisodes and the broadcast episodes: The online part of the show will debut on March 18, weeks before the show debuts on TV on April 9, [...]
Fanatical Pupil » Harper’s Bizarre on March 12th, 2009 at 4:32 pm - Permalink
This is right here, in the present, not the future.
Elizabeth on March 24th, 2009 at 5:35 pm - Permalink
this is a lovely idea:)
Noelle Marsh on May 20th, 2009 at 3:28 pm - Permalink