US firm Fun Little Movies has just announced ‘the first broadcast television commercial promoting an original, made-for-mobile series’. Break out the bunting! But seriously, it’s quite a big deal.
‘The Pool’ (short for ‘The Carpool’) looks like a sassy comedy series from the trailer that FLM has released – the show itself debuts on August 9th in the US. FLM has roped in Toyota to sponsor the show too, which presumably means lots of lingering shots of shiny motors alongside the jokes.
Is this cool content, or just sneaky advertising? Or cool content with an element of sneaky advertising? It’ll depend on the cars-to-gags ratio. But the fact that a big car manufacturer like Toyota is getting involved is an indication that mobile TV has a big future ahead of it.
Not sure whether ‘The Pool’ would work in the UK though – we tend to commute by public transport rather than shared cars. Maybe they could do a rewrite, transposing the action to a crowded train carriage, and getting sponsorship from… Ginsters pasties? Maybe not.
Be interesting to see how made-for-mobile movies play out against user-created clips. Sort of David versus Goliath. (Or Playboy versus Reader’s Wives, in a lot of instances!)