ICE 07’s pair of pitch winners markedly different

The first-place winners of two competitions at last month's ICE 07 are about as disparate as they come in terms of their projects. Neither are newbies to pitching, producing and putting in long hours, however.Jarrett Sherman, owner of Miracle Pictures, cut his teeth at TVOntario's TVOKids division, including a lengthy stint as writer and director on the Gemini-nominated Reading Rangers series.With URL: The Series, he's turned his vision to a darker, more dystopian vision of the future, where jaded adolescents turn to the Web and a destination promising synesthesia - the blurring of the lines between senses - for a thrill.As pitched at ICE 07, the property would include a 26-episode animated TV series as well as an online tie-in where users could adopt avatars and interact in a world not unlike Sulake Corp. Oy's Habbo Hotel.Others clearly find favour with the concept: as the winning entrant in the Telus Multiscreen Challenge - a competition juried by luminaries such as Ontario Media Development Corp. chair Kevin Shea and Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. senior VP of digital media Claude Galipeau - he was awarded $10,000 to develop the idea further.Sherman says he's inspired by the production team behind ABC Inc.'s desert-island drama Lost. "I just love turning on the TV and being in that jungle with those people. I really like the environment, the music, everything - it just creates such a sense of atmosphere," he says. "I want to do a similar kind of thing with this, in terms of creating a palpable place with real characters that everyone can relate to."Despite Sherman's background in television, the series may not make its debut as a linear TV property. If it does, however, he says "we'll probably look to partner with a bigger production company, or at least an exec producer with more experience."While the Telus MultiScreen Challenge purse isn't going to see URL: The Series through to completion, "relative to where I am now it's a huge start," Sherman says. Already, thanks to the profile boost that's come from winning the competition, he's talked with game developers and publishers - including the venerable Electronic Arts Canada - about how best to bring his concept to market.He's also not ruling out a deal with the pitching competition's sponsor, a move that would likely entail building a sizable mobile component into the series. "I like the people there and they're progressive enough," he says.Whereas Sherman took his inspiration from a Gilligan's Island for the 21st century, the winning entry from husband-and-wife team Alex and Alison de Bold draws inspiration from Alison's love for fashion - and her frustration when planning the couple's wedding in 2005.The de Bolds won first place in the CHUM U-Pitch competition - including $5,000 in cash - for Where'd You Get That?, a street-level fashion video blog that mixes spot interviews with stylish individuals and an online community of trend-watchers."We just kind of thought this would be a fun thing to do to create awareness for the brand...almost like a PR stunt," says Alison of the idea.That brand is ChickAdvisor.ca, a site the de Bolds founded in September last year after Alison's fruitless efforts to find impartial and practical advice and resources for planning a wedding."I was looking online and trying to find hair salons and spas to get nails done and photographers and all these things, and I found that it was really difficult - there was nothing that had ratings for anything specific," she says. "There was stuff for the US, but nothing for Canada."Since Alex de Bold has advised other Web-based start-ups looking for financing - including online photo sharing service Bubbleshare, which was acquired by Kaboose Inc. in January - it seemed natural that the two craft their own solution, based on the belief that there are tens of thousands of Canadian women in Alison's predicament.Today, ChickAdvisor is in beta mode, and boasts more than 2,000 reviews of 1,000 unique products. But getting the site off the ground has required a considerable investment of both money and time for the couple."In terms of money it's been a lot - in the tens of thousands of dollars range," Alison says. "Alex's job has basically funded the whole thing. We have a team of developers who have worked primarily for equity and some cash, and we've done it out of our living room."Alex adds that the market is still dominated by the same kind of thinking pervasive in the first Internet era in the late 1990s. "There is no real VC money in Toronto, valuations aren't necessarily great, so our goal is to grow this organically," he says.Alison says the $5,000 prize money will help Where'd You Get That? transcend the "student production" level with an investment in some video hardware and similar equipment. More broadly, plans for ChickAdvisor.ca include adding affiliate-based advertising as well as promotions for local merchants."We're not going to try to be content producers, but we do want to be the resource for the woman standing on the corner of Bloor and Yonge and...looking for a shoe store," Alex says.Sherman, meanwhile, is already at work planning the next pitch for URL: The Series at the Banff World Television Festival in June. "I'm trying to...get it a little bit tighter and get it ready for Banff, and see what kind of interest I can raise there," he says.ICE 07 was the second annual conference staged by the former New Media Business Alliance, Interactive Ontario.

ICE 07’s pair of pitch winners markedly different

Broadcast | April 16, 2007

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