Personal videos get $tar billing

By MARISA GUTHRIEDAILY
NEWS STAFF WRITER
草根视频选绣活动

The YouTube revolution will be televised. Carson Daly is making sure of that.
The host of NBC's "Last Call" has been a pop culture arbiter since turning MTV's "TRL" into a staple of the GenY vernacular. Now he's giving a generation of amateur video artists a major platform on broadcast television - and some cash.

"It's Your Show TV" (www.itsyourshowtv.com) - the brainchild of Daly and financed by NBC - is asking viewers to submit short videos throughout October and early November. There's a cash prize of $1,000 for the winners of each of 18 challenges, and a chance to compete for the big payday: $100,000 and the opportunity to get their video on NBC.

"User-generated content," said Daly, "seems to have been everywhere. What we're doing is creating a site that offers a little more focus. And also paying people, because everybody's making these videos but nobody's getting paid."

One of the weekly challenges, for instance, includes "Bald Is Beautiful," where participants are asked to make a promotional video illustrating the advantages of being bald.

At the end of the project, the top 20 winners in each challenge are entered into the final $100,000 contest.

Daly said he hopes to showcase many of the videos, not just the big money winner, in an NBC special he would host.

Daly is no stranger to YouTube. Last summer, he recruited YouTube user Brooke Brodack, known as "Brookers," to create and star in videos for TV and the Web.
But will the presence of a big media conglomerate like NBC quash the ruthlessly individualistic spirit of the genre?

"That's everybody's knee-jerk reaction," answered Daly. "NBC, if anything, is offering the viral community an incredible opportunity to A, earn money, and B, get their 15 minutes of fame."
Or more, said Daly. The next "Brookers" could be in their bedroom right now with a hand-held video camera and Windows Movie Maker.

"You could potentially launch your own career off a site like ["It's Your Show"]," Daly said. "We're not taking it lightly - here's $1,000, thanks for your goofy little video of a worm on the floor."

The television networks aren't taking the so-called viral video movement lightly either.
"They recognize that viewers exist in a multiplatform universe now," he said. "They're not just sitting in their living room watching TV on the big screen."

Just as technology has spurred a shift in viewing habits, it has also enabled viewers to become stars from their living room couches.

"People want to be heard," said Daly. "People want to be seen. They've just never had the ability until now. They can make videos. They can write blogs. Before, when they wanted to read the news, they went and got a newspaper. Now they can become the news."