Amazon Wants Your Ideas for Original Children’s Programming

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Well, this is interesting. Having established its own publishing arm and film production shingle, Amazon is making its move into original television programming, with an emphasis on — wait for it — “original children’s programming and primetime comedy series.”

Of course, they aren’t looking for everyone’s ideas. Perhaps envisioning how quickly their servers would explode if every aspiring TV mogul started pitching them ideas, Amazon has made it clear upfront that they’re only optioning one a month — and the terms, at least on the surface, don’t sound all that great; I’m sure there’s more to the deal, but the AV Club only mentions that “Amazon will then pay its creator $55,000 and give them up to 5 percent of the merchandising revenues plus additional royalties.”

Not that $55,000 is anything to sneeze at — and a percentage of merchandising can add up to a whole hell of a lot, just ask George Lucas — but if those terms are ironclad and the project takes off, they can start to look pretty small. (Also, that five percent is from net merchandising.)

All that aside, this is still an intriguing avenue for anyone with a killer idea for a TV show and limited access to, you know, funds and/or distribution. Based on the kids’ projects in development at Amazon’s film studio, the field should be wide open on the TV side. Why, if I had an idea for a series, I’d send it in right now. Here’s what you should be pitching:

We are looking for character-driven original ideas that speak to children between the ages of 2-14. Series can be live action, animated, stop motion or mixed media. We are interested in preschool series for children ages 2-5 like Blue’s Clues, Curious George and Jake and the Neverland Pirates. Preschool series must have an educational theme or clear potential for one. We are also interested in ideas for children and tweens between the ages of 6-14 such as Phineas and Ferb or iCarly.

Anyway, if you’re interested, click here to get started. You’ll need to know how to write a screenplay, but there are plenty of books for that (and Amazon sells them!)

Jitterbug.tv

Jitterbug.tv and the Dawn of Curated Kindie Content

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Jitterbug.tv

Kindie culture is a burgeoning movement, but one of the most refreshing things about the scene — the lack of corporate machinery whirring around it — also works against efforts to raise awareness of the work. Unless you’re a devotee, it’s easy to remain unaware of some really terrific stuff. Hell, I spend a fair amount of time covering it, and I’m constantly finding out about artists I’ve never heard of. The commercially diffuse structure of the genre keeps the suits from taking over and ruining everything, but it’s also sort of a problem.

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One of the things that’s missing is the sort of third-party curation that usually comes with the maturation of a medium, which is one of the reasons why it’s interesting to note the arrival of Jitterbug.tv, a Web service and iPad app that aims to guide parents into a sort of walled garden of family-friendly nirvana. (Not Nirvana. Those guys aren’t allowed.)

What Jitterbug does, in surface terms, is collect music and music videos for kids, and plug them into a bright, easily navigable central space where they can be seen and enjoyed. It’s basically YouTube/Spotify for the younger set. The concept isn’t exactly new, but Jitterbug adds a couple of twists: One, they focus on independent artists who aren’t getting a lot of push from other family content portals, and two, they’re charging a monthly fee in order to pay the artists royalties.

Those are crucial points. If Jitterbug is successful — and that’s a big if — it could go a fair way toward helping kindie artists monetize their art. I don’t envy the company in its quest to find a suitable price point for the service, but if they can figure out a way to really show people what they’re trying to do, I think there’s a real market for Jitterbug.

The hangup is actually getting people to pay for it. Jitterbug follows a similar service, MyKazooTV, with a free model and a more heavily guided structure. At MyKazooTV, videos start playing as soon as you navigate to the site, rather than waiting for you to choose — a different and obviously in no way better or worse approach, but as most parents will probably say, “Hey, it’s free.

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I don’t mean to insult free — I like free — but as a model for driving creation, it kind of sucks. Which is why, despite experiencing some bumps in the road with somewhat buggy early versions of the Jitterbug app, I hope it catches on. I can vouch for at least one six-year-old girl who adores the app, much to her Coco Loco-loving younger brother’s chagrin; for her, it’s endlessly fun and fascinating to watch her favorite artists act out their musical adventures in clips for songs she knows by heart. I already curate my kids’ cultural experience pretty heavily, but if I were feeling a little lost in my search for family-friendly music, I’d definitely consider ponying up for a monthly Jitterbug account.

How much is it worth? Again, that’s hard to say. Jitterbug faces an uphill fight — as consumers, we’re already saturated with subscription-model entertainment, from the stupid cable bill to more affordable services like Netflix and Spotify. I think what the company might need to do is develop a freemium model a la Daytrotter, where ordinary users have access to a certain amount of content, but the really good stuff is locked away — and the key is stupidly affordable. Unfortunately, a lot of parents don’t think kids’ entertainment is worth paying for and/or aren’t particularly worried about the quality, which can’t help but marginalize the commercial prospects of independent artists who are actively trying to elevate the medium.

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It’s a catch-22, and so far, no one’s really been able to solve it. Services like this one could be part of the answer.

Why Kindie? Why Not?

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Every family entertainment writer has to write a post examining the state of the kindie music scene. Here’s mine.

People look at me all the time like I have three eyes when I talk about my love for kids’ music. But I always give them the same answer: I wouldn’t let my three-year-old watch Die Hard or Basic Instinct, so why would I have her listen to Radiohead or Kanye West? (poor analogy, maybe, but the point remains.)

The kindie music scene has given me many so many special parenting moments. Singing in the car to the Pop Ups, Justin Roberts, Ozokidz, or Lucky Diaz. It’s something that Kidz Bop, Fun., Hot Chip, or Adele would never be able to provide. Why? Because my daughter can connect to the words in “Subway Train” more than she’d ever be able to relate to “Over and Over.” Seeing her connect, understand, relate to and be educated by the lyrics are the moments I’m glad I stumbled upon the kindie scene.

Listen, I understand there’s plenty of adult music to play for kids. I weave plenty of adult music into my daughter’s mixes: Mat Kearney, the Head & the Heart, the Police, Bad Manners, etc. But she doesn’t respond nearly as much to those songs as she does to those intended for her.

I sent an email to a friend who had a daughter a year after our first child telling him about all the wonderful kids’ music out there available to him and his daughter. Here’s his response:

I have little need for kids’ music, preferring to go the the big kids’ stuff. I don’t need Jack Johnson to tame a White Stripes song that is already kid friendly just so it can make it into my mom’s radio rotation.

While he’s correct about Jack Johnson, he’s wrong about having little need for kids music. That’s the wrong mindset. It isn’t about him, it’s about his daughter. He may not have a need for it, but his daughters do — and he’s missing a great opportunity.

Desperate to get him to like something, I suggested Secret Agent 23 Skidoo. For those unfamiliar, Secret Agent 23 Skidoo makes brilliant, catchy hip-hop for kids. He challenges them to keep up; if they do, they are rewarded. But if you asked 10 dads about hip-hop for kids, you’d get 10 looks of bewilderment. So I was pleasantly surprised when my friend responded with this:

I dig me the Secret Agent 23 Skidoo. Nothing mind-blowing there, but the dude is making well-produced  hip-hop about things that matter to someone under the age of ten. I have not heard other hip-hop for kids that isn’t insulting and worthy of being peed upon. Well done to the secret agent man.

That’s progress, right? So how do you change this type of mindset? That’s the million dollar question. The same way you change any person’s opinion on politics, sports, and the like: Education, education, and more education. Kids’ music suffers from decades and decades of a terrible stigma that won’t change overnight.

Share your favorite songs and artists with your friends. Make another parent a mixtape of kids music. I do it all the time. Parents might not like every track, but if they find four or five songs that they can tolerate with their kids, I consider that a success.

So, in that spirit, Jeff and I have created a “starting point” Spotify playlist with kindie music for you to share with others — via e-mail, Facebook, or Twitter. Every little bit counts. And frankly, if this doesn’t change people’s opinions, it’s time to find some new friends. (I can’t believe Walsh put 311 in here. He really has a problem. –Ed.)