1) TRANSMEDIA FORMAT 1: YOUTOPIA
It’s always very difficult to transport the digital world into tv. YouTopia, a format from Leonine Studios adapted by Mediawan for France, tries to do it.
In YouTopia, YouTube creators move into a glass dome (see picture below), welcome high-profile guests and collaborate to create a program of challenges, environmental experiments, expert talks and a live concert. The French version of YouTopia will be livestreamed on YouTube for the first time, for all this full today, November 5th.
Supported by their community, YouTube and the brand partners involved ( Accor, Garnier, Plantes Addict, Foodles, Virgin Radio FR and others), the YouTopians will also collect donations for a nonprofit environmental organization.
In this case the concept starts from the digital partner and the digital strong points (You tube and youtubers), trying to develop a coherent tv show from it (which might not be easy at all).
2) TRANSMEDIA FORMAT 2: CHINA’S GOT TALENT
The approach of the new series of China’s Got Talent (the first one was aired on Dragon Tv from 2010 to 2014: see picture below) takes the opposite approach: it starts from a very strong tv content (the Got Talent franchising, created in 2005 by Simon Cowell and is co-owned by Syco Entertainment and Fremantle) and develops it on social media giant TikTok China.
In fact, this new series of China’s Got Talent is being produced by Star Canxing and will be simulcast on both Tik Tok in China and local broadcaster JiangsuTV: the video app, which has an average of more than 600 million daily users, will be the exclusive online platform, while satellite network JiangsuTV is the exclusive TV broadcaster. The show premiered on 31st October 2021 and will air weekly on Sundays at 9:00 p.m. for 11 episodes.
This different strategy seems to be stronger and more in keeping with the rule n.1 of transmediality: a transmedia format is strong only and exclusively if its main television content is strong!
3) THE FAR EAST WAVE
It’s well known: the future of the audiovisual (scripted and unscripted) passes mainly through Far East Countries, thanks also to the strong support for this industry by the local governments.
There is South Korea, of course, whose governmental agency KOCCA (Korea Creative Content Agency), established in May 2009, oversees and coordinates the promotion of the Korean content industry. The BUSAN CONTENT MARKET (Busan is the economic and cultural center of southeastern South Korea) will start 11th November, with also an innovative 3D virtual online market (the very first one with 3D technology: see picture below), not to mention the “never-ending” BCWW market, sponsored by the Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism.
But Korea is not the only one. Recently, also Taiwan has entered this marked with its Creative Content Agency TAICCA, formed in 2019, which has organized, together World Screen, the recent TAIWAN TV FESTIVAL, under the oversight of Taiwan’s Ministry of Culture, with lots of events and local contents (among the unscripted formats presented, we can point out the Chinese talent show Dancing Diamond 52 and the Taiwanese cooking show Friends by Food Truck).
So, thanks to a better and more coordinated political support, great energy and, let’s tell the truth, the general period of creative stasis in other regions, this part of the globe is becoming more and more crucial for this business.