Snapchat TV Will Be a Thing You Watch at the End of This Year
NBC, BBC, and Vice Media are on board.
Snapchat may be where you go to watch five-second clips of your friends having more fun than you, but soon, the smartphone app may also become your source for original television shows.
The app’s parent company, Snap, has signed deals with numerous old and new media companies, including NBC, the BBC, Vice Media, Discovery, and NFL. The goal is to bring two or three original shows per day, each between three to five minutes long, to the “Stories” and “Discover” sections by the end of the year.
It’s a lofty goal for the disappearing photos app, but the company has already managed a successful launch of its “Discover” section that features content from branded publications.
In its quest to take over TV, though, Snapchat has seen challenges working with some unnamed, older companies.
“They were very much in a TV mindset,” Snap’s vice president of content, Nick Bell, told the Wall Street Journal in a report published Thursday. “We wanted something as premium as television itself.”
One of the first ideas is a version of The Voice where contestants send in 10-second audition clips. But Snap is also looking for scripted drama, comedy, news shows, and documentaries. Basically, if you’ve seen it on TV, Snap’s probably considering it for the app.
A woman wears 'Snapchat Spectacles' on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).
Twitter’s Livestreaming Plans
Snap’s not the only big-name social network working on original programming. Earlier this week, Twitter announced over a dozen new premium content deals, covering live feeds from the likes of the WNBA, PGA Tour, Live Nation, Bloomberg Media, and Cheddar. The deals are a culmination of a live-centric strategy that started last year, when the company announced its first such deal to stream NFL games.
Facebook Video
Another company looking to get on the content bandwagon is Facebook. During the company’s first-quarter earnings call on Wednesday, CFO David Wehner said: “We are looking at kick-starting an ecosystem for longer-form content on Facebook.”
Quite what that will look like is unclear, but Facebook said it wants to become a destination for video viewing. With Twitter and Snap in the mix, these three could come to dominate the future of TV.
