Web video doesn't need Hollywood to thrive, but it might need traditional Hollywood business models, like production studios, to make it through the long haul. That's more or less the role that Paul Kontonis' company For Your Imagination intends to fill. FYI takes people with good ideas for video and makes them better -- while also making them more profitable.

(Profile continues below...)

Founded: 2007

Location: New York

Size: 11 employees

Product: Web video development

Funding: Series A pending

Competition: Vuguru, Deca

What makes a "good" idea isn't as subjective as one might think. Of the daily proposals the company gets, Kontonis says his team is careful to pick shows that have both a potential audience and room for branding. Currently, the roster is seven deep, with a few more in development. For those shows, FYI handles the development, production, marketing, syndication, licensing, and distribution.

"Nothing we do is magical," said Kontonis. "We just have to do it."

What they do is more about marketing than it is about the creative. With so many entertaining, professional videos flooding the Internet, getting noticed is as much about branding as it is about being worth watching. Given that marketing prowess is in shorter supply than good ideas for Web shows, FYI's real upside is its expertise in making programs more visable and thus more watchable.

FYI's ideal projects are TV shows that are too weird, too dirty, or too high-concept to survive on the air. Much of the work involves making ideas for TV Web-friendly. Episodes are streamlined, plots are chopped into five-minute story arcs, and production is simplified so that the total costs stay below about $1,000 a minute. FYI then develops a Web portal for the show (for which the company relies on Squarespace) and distributes the episodes to all the major video sites using TubeMogul. The end-goal is not TV per se, though the shows are developed with a transition to TV in mind. As Kontonis noted, "Who the hell doesn't want to be on TV?" An audience built on the Internet could help weird, high-concept content move over to television as a proof-of-concept for networks looking to buy.

TV or no TV, the real bet is that there is enough money in Web video development built on a traditional media ad model away from the long tail. Kontonis quoted me $40 CPMs for the popular show Break a Leg. But aside from the entertainment, FYI also produces hyper-targeted shows like bschooltalk, a video podcast about how to get into business school. Advertisers are attracted to the niche play and the show pulls in CPMs around $80. Kontonis also said that other media companies were showing an interest in FYI.

Big media companies are quickly realizing that video can both be a product and it can sell a product. FYI is also developing a show from author Lynette Lewis designed to complement her book Climbing the Ladder in Stilettos, and Kontonis is talking to at least two major labels about developing Web shows around artists recording albums.

For Your Imagination is taking a risk if it thinks there's money in, essentially, upsizing Web video. But, then again, so is pretty much everyone else in the Web video market right now. The shows that the company has released so far are good and the team, which carries as much marketing and advertising expertise as it does video production ability, is talented. FYI also has a franchise name in veteran comedian Patrice O'Neal (whose show is titled, not surprisingly, The Patrice O'Neal Show). It wouldn't be surprising to see that one end up on the small screen in a year or two.

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