Topic: Once upon a time, storytelling was restricted to a single and isolated medium- television, film, a book. Technology has changed all that providing new tools for a story to play out across multiple media and platforms.

Big take aways:

Go where your audience is.

Put an idea in the center – not a specific property or channel.

Connections with fans is built on authenticity. Can be fragile. If you let anything except creative vision drive the show, it’s going to cost you.

Raw notes…

Started with a video:  “If the audience can become involved in the making of the ad, they’re happy.”  Quote from 1955, Marshal McClewen.

Heroes – great example of trans media programming.  Won the interactive Emmy.
Fans can be found through multiple channels.  Get fans feeling like they’re part of the show.  Show extra angles of the story via multiple channels. New media unit in Heros is in the middle between writers, NBC new media team and other creative teams.  Measurable responses, listen to fans. Upped production of downloadable graphic novels from one per month, to one per week.

Were telling in between stories – things that flesh out the story told on TV.  Then stated doing parallel stories – like when one actress left for a few months to do a movie – they told the story of what her character was doing during that time.  Also, used the graphic novel to introduce a new character, tell his back story

Graphic novels are tightly tied to what’s happening on the TV.  The artist draws characters as the actors portray them, mimicking posture, etc.

Slow burn – cuts out to the web site, web team would work with the writers on what happened.  Mini story arcs shown via web video.

Survival game – create their own hero.

Flash games with clues.

Lot of fans on Twitter. People would tweet in character of their fav hero.  Started a twitter account as the circus.

Started hiding things in the shows and online, giving out prizes.

Heros wiki – Done fans.  Is now used as a resource by writers to keep continuity – fans keeping the show on track.

Dec 17, 1978 – birth of transmedia, Star Wars holiday special, there was a 5 min cartoon that introduced a new character named Bobafet.  That summer, released Bobafet as a limited edition action figure.  Bobafet was put in the next movie.

Heros – Long time traditional TV writer, did Crossing Jordan.  TV was a one way street.  We pushed content out and hoped people watched it two or four months later.  Only had Nielson ratings to go by.  Eventually saw Neilsons slipping as people migrated to other platforms.  Decided that his next show would be more about being where the audience is.

Created Heroes because literally wants to save the world.  Had small kids at the time.  Got to thinking about how complicated the world is.  Wanted a message about how interconnected the world is.  How anyone can be a Hero. Wants to leave a footprint.

Did a sort of mind map about where the show could go.  Fast Company eventually published a diagram that looked almost exactly the same, showing what Heroes has done.

New was going for a younger, more tech savvy audience.  At Comic Con launch, drove people to a mini-site.  Fans quickly took the idea and built their own fan sites.

Realized people were watching the show via Bit Torrent, not on air.

“I’m quite honored that Heroes is the most illegally downloaded show.  We’ll take fans were they are.  Since our world is so multiplatform – this idea that people are pirating the show is not so alarming.”

Some reps at NBC don’t seem to get this.

Made a lot up as went along.  The only idea had in advance was that would do a graphic novel with the show.

Staffed up fast, grew quickly.  Budget for non-TV “everything else” came from NBC, which wanted to experiment.

Connections with fans is built on authenticity. Can be fragile. If you let anything except creative vision drive the show, it’s going to cost you.

Who’s watching the audience?  It’s really hard to do.  It moves so fast.  Often swimming a little bit blind.  Often feedback is anacdotal.  Sitting at lunch with someone who saw reactions on twitter.

In production, are about 2 months ahead of what the audience is seeing.  But among the team, we’re kind of almost fans ourselves.  Our reactions almost mirror theirs.

Online is different – immediate feedback loop.

Successful brands today – ones where the audience feels they own the brand.

Participated in the writers strike.  Show went a little wonky while they were away from it.

Show costs 4 mil per episode to make.

Learned from audience – Get out of the mindset of one way street, push only.  Audience wants participation, shared ownership.

No longer take the show and put it in the center.  Now take a concept, an idea and put it in the center.  Then you can think about where the people who would watch that show are.  How they’ll watch the show, interact with the concept.  Adjust your storytelling to take advantage of that.

For example, you can’t just squeeze a 4 mil dollar episode onto an iPhone screen. It’s a waste.  But there are very rich ways to interact with people on their phones.

Had room for innovation, risk taking because of the funding situation. (NBC wanting to experiment.)

Story is still most important thing.

Q and A

Q:  Is legal still an issue?  Re: copyrighted material, etc.  fan created material (Warner Bro trying to shut down Harry Potter fan art).

A:  We try to keep fan fiction and mother show separate.  Plus our shows are done well before the fans see it.  [Seemed to have interpreted the question as worries about being sued for them lifting fans ideas. Suspect fans would be flattered as long as credited.]

Heros broke down internal walls.  Go into giant meetings that were the first time people from different divisions met each others.