Welcome to Stage 9.

Disney has just launched their first (?) on-line production studio, Stage 9 Digital Media (summary, article).  And with the launch of their studio, they also introduced their first of twenty made-for-web series.

That’s right, twenty.

This first show, Squeegees, is a comedy series about a group of slacker window washers that can now be found on abc.com and YouTube.  The first Stage 9 production, Voicemail, was a one-off episode and is now being developed into a full series.

The online episodes are short (YouTube length), and at 3-5 minutes each only have space for a solo sponsor/advertiser.  Toyota has signed on to sponsor the Squeegees production and will be using the program to hold viewers to its pitch for the Corolla.

Online video viewing has grown tremendously over the past few years.  Comscore estimates for December put online viewing at over the 10,000,000,000 videos watched online (article).  And that number continues to trend upwards.

YouTube has also just announced another foray into the live video business again, trying to break the online video business wide open.

From a studio perspective, Disney is just jumping into waters already being tested by other major television networks and production companies.  The cost of producing an online series is significantly less than producing pilot episodes for broadcast (or cable) and the metrics are much more granular.

Where will this probably lead?  I’m sure more than one executive has considered the benefits of developing and testing series ideas online and then “evolving” franchises from the online medium to television once fan bases have been established, characters have been developed and a solid demographic can be measured and “pre-sold” to sponsors.

It’s a bold new world and definitely one worth watching.

Side Note: Here’s my little production for consumption in the online world.  Enjoy.