MUMBAI: Even as the movie is more than two months away from release, the Spidey mania is building up around the world. Two World Wide Web-crawling Spider-Man enthusiasts will have the chance to report breaking Spider-Man 3 movie news as the winners of Columbia Pictures’ “Face of the Fan” contest.
Building on the success of Columbia’s partnership with online user generated video portal Grouper, the “Face of the Fan” contest will provide at least 250,000 Spider-Man movie network members with the chance to become the official online correspondents for the network.
The two winners (one male and one female) will be tasked with creating videos that will offer breaking Spider-Man news, information, and special promotions across the Web at least once a week leading up to the highly anticipated release of Spider-Man 3 on 4 May, 2007.
Beginning immediately, aspiring Spider-Man 3 webcasters can find everything they need to enter the contest at spiderman.sonypictures.com/faceofthefan.
At the site, contest entrants can join the movie network, as well as find tools to help them tape, edit and submit their entry. Fans are encouraged to show their true colors in their screen tests. Entrants will be judged on the presentation of a pre-provided script as well as their enthusiasm and credibility, articulation, and ultimately, they will be selected on the quality of their overall submission. The contest is open to any US resident who is at least 18 years-of-age or older unless otherwise indicated in the official rules. Entries must be submitted by 23 February, 2007.
Columbia TriStar Motion Pictures Group executive vice president of worldwide digital marketing strategy Dwight Caines said, “Since we launched the first Spider-Man film in 2002, we have used the internet in exciting and innovative ways to reach our core fans with news and information about the upcoming movies. With Spider-Man 3, we are taking our commitment to the online community to a whole new level. This is the largest digital campaign we’ve ever attempted and the Spider-Man Movie Network is its backbone. The “Face of the Fan” contest is just one part of a very aggressive interactive campaign that we will be rolling out in the coming weeks to support this franchise.”
The studio has tapped Grouper to power the user-generated video (UGV) submissions for Spider-Man fans vying to become the “Face of the Fan”. Grouper will enable fans to upload any video of themselves or even record one instantly with Grouper’s Webcam feature.
The winning fans will then take a leadership role for the Spider-Man fan community on the official Spider-Man website. The two winning correspondents will record and post additional videos on a regular basis, which will also be hosted and served by Grouper.
Grouper president and co-founder Josh Felser said, “Grouper is making it possible for fans to display their creative acumen as passionate followers of Peter Parker and the continuing adventures of Spider-Man. With this contest we are demonstrating the power of engagement that user-generated video offers, while enhancing our mission to reward the best user-generated video on the Web.”
Online, the Spider-Man fanbase has proven to be one of the most enthusiastic movie communities on the web. Since the first Spider-Man site was first launched in March 2001, there have been more than 100 million visits to the film’s official site.
The Spider-Man Movie Network was first created in 2004 to support the launch of Spider-Man 2. By registering to the Network on the last film, fans of the franchise were granted special access to immersive special features including a fan art submission contest and they were also given the ability to post on the official Spider-Man Movie message board. In addition, members were issued a special card redeemable at 25 retail chains across the country entitling them to special discounts especially negotiated for Network members.
