Ironically, talking to JibJab's Gregg Spiridellis at the Banff World Television Festival made me wonder why anyone would bother creating television over digital video. His enthusiasm for his own business – what he calls a "new media comedy brand" — is infectious, and the Internet's ability to quickly develop innovative content, and measure and connect to their audience puts the television industry to shame.

"We hope to literally make JibJab a branded comedy network so that wherever you are, on your cell phone, obviously on the web, on IPTV, that JibJab is a place you can turn to for really well-produced, premium branded comedy," says the former investment banker who now straddles the creative and business line, running the company with his brother, Evan, who animates the original shorts Gregg writes.

From boom to bust to boom again
In an Internet start-up cliché, the brothers self-financed their new venture from a Brooklyn garage. This was 1999, and they created hit videos in the pre-YouTube era, lead a staff of 13, licensed their content, and rode the wave of the dot com boom ... until it went bust and all their clients went bankrupt. Undeterred, the brothers packed up for Los Angeles and a fresh start. After producing toys and books in addition to their animations, and even creating the Mr. Bananagrabber character on Arrested Development, things were starting to look up again. Then, suddenly, the JibJab brand launched into the cyber-stratosphere with the political satire "This Land."
An animated duet between caricatures of George W. Bush and John Kerry, "This Land" was released during the 2004 United States presidential campaign. "It was your typical five year overnight success story," laughs Spiridellis.

At the Festival panel he participated in, "Audience Wranging: How Are You Managing Your TV Audience," Spiridellis pointed out that the company had always taken advantage of the direct, one-to-one relationship possible on the web. They had long been collecting e-mail addresses of their viewers, so that when they released "This Land," 130,000 people had already opted in to receive information on new JibJab programming. Their 130,000 friends told their friends, and by the time JibJab released another political parody several months later, they had tallied 80 million streams of the videos.

Since "This Land," they've been regular guests on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, launching new videos there and getting huge visibility before they even go viral online, and "What We Call The News" was recently launched at the Bush-attended Radio and Television Correspondents Dinner in Washington.

"From the beginning we saw the Internet as an incredible opportunity for creators to connect directly with an audience in a way that was never before possible," Spiridellis says in our interview. By offering incentives for registration, like access to premium content and the ability to vote and comment on content, JibJab can develop a relationship with their audience that lets them not only sell targeted advertising, but evaluate the performance of their content. "It lets you measure and connect with your audience," he explains. "I know exactly how many people are watching something. I know how many people are sending it. These are all metrics that I can use to evaluate the success."