Social media giant Facebook is set to enter a territory by making a debut in premium video programming. As per a report in the Business Insider, Facebook is aiming to premiere its first slate of programming in mid-June.
Facebook is planning to have around 24 new shows for the initial push. It has also greenlit multiple shows for production.
According to the report, the social media giant is looking for shows in two different tiers. One is a tier for longer, big-budget shows that ‘would feel at home’ on TV and a set of shorter, less expensive shows of around 5-10 minutes long. These would refresh every 24 hours and will autoplay on Facebook’s news feed.
This comes at a time when Amazon, YouTube and Snapchat are aggressively expanding their own premium video programming as well. And with Facebook launching its own content, several reports suggest that this will mean it will have much more control on the content that appears on it.
This initiative is being led by Ricky Van Veer, co-founder of CollegeHumour. He was hired by Facebook six months back to head the company’s global creative strategy. Veer and his team have been meeting several production companies and listening to pitches for the videos. These episodes that will range anywhere between five to 30 minutes, will be a part of a revamped version of Facebook’s video tab.
The standard Facebook is apparently looking to maintain is Netflix’s House of Cards for its longer format. For the shorter versions, it is looking at a production budget that falls between television and digital shows.
Business Insider reports that one show Facebook has greenlit is a virtual reality dating show from Conde Nast Entertainment where people can go on a virtual-reality date before actually meeting in real life.
And for the shows it wants to produce, Facebook is looking at A-list celebrities to star in these shows.
Sports is another area that Facebook is considering. In fact, CEO Mark Zuckerberg also said this on a recent earnings call.
The shows might be unveiled during the Cannes Lions advertising festival, which starts on June 17, as against the original plan of unveiling it during the developer conference that was held in mid-April.
What remains to be seen now is if people will actually turn to Facebook as a video-streaming platform.