Profile: Sharpening Crackle

Written by A. L. Friedman

Wednesday, July 18. 2007 at 10:45 AM EDT Post a comment

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On Monday, Sony relaunched its user-generated video site and changed its name from Grouper to Crackle. Yesterday, I spoke with Crackle president and co-founder Josh Felser about the new site.

A quick recap. Crackle brands itself as a "streaming entertainment network," not just a video sharing site. It hosts a variety of original programming, as well as themed channels into which users can upload their own videos. The channels are organized more by their format than their content. Crackle runs contests within the channel whose prizes are generally some sort of career boost, like a chance to pitch a film to Columbia Pictures.

Felser was adamant about Crackle's focus on talent development and pushed its connections with Sony as what would make the new site an ideal place to seek discovery:

"[Crackle] creates a fertile environment for our audience... to not only find fame through exposure, but to really take that next step in their career. This is not just a fluffy 'this may happen'."

Aside from the contests, Felser touted Crackle's syndication platform, on which every "featured" Crackle video runs. Videos can become featured either by topping the leaderboard (based on a point system which factors in more than views alone), or by simply being noticed by the site's editorial staff. Crackle syndicates to sites like Hi5 and AOL Video, as well as future Bravia TV's, Sony Ericsson phones and the PSP. That is a whole mess of placement.

But I did incorrectly speculate that Crackle might be a loss-leading talent filter for Sony projects. Felser informed me that Grouper was already trying to move to being more of an entertainment destination and less of an untamed wilderness of UGC before its recent rebirth. While he noted Sony is "excited about having [Crackle] act as a filter," he didn't think the site could survive without standing on its own. That is, being featured on Crackle has to be a benefit in and of itself, not just a consolation prize.

Indeed, Felser noted that Sony is showing its faith in Crackle's prospects as its own entertainment destination by offering its 60-person ad sales team. Spots for the new Harry Potter movie are already running with Crackle videos on Hi5 in India.

An interesting note is Crackle's relationship with more traditional user-generated content. The entire Grouper catalog remains online, including no shortage of, as Felser put it, "people falling off the roof." And Crackle will do nothing to discourage the uploading of this fare (even allowing marking videos as private), although it makes it clear that there are other places for that nonsense. To that end, Felser pointed out that Crackle uploading functionality will be built into Sony HD cameras, but only HD cameras, as higher-end equipment tends to record more professional material.

So far, Crackle has the most ambitious program to find and develop talent of any of the video sharing sites on our radar. The Crackle model streamlines talent discovery in a pretty efficient way and has a lot of potential, assuming its original programming catches on. The Lionsgate/Break deal may yield something similar, and Viacom seems overdue for such a move with ether iFilm or AtomUploads.