MEETING JIB OR JAB AT NATPE: Coffee with one of the 'bros' ....by Joyce Schwarz, on-location at NATPE, back in May of 2005, I blogged about Jib Jab and I even auditioned to be an audacious character they call "hula girl" ...here's an excerpt from that blog that now reads like a strange stream of consciousness--whatever was I thinking -- or was I thinking anyway it's always fun to look back...and if you read on you'll see I'm looking forward with Gregg the biz guy of the brother Jib Jab duo who are the leaders in branded animation for online humor and more to come.....
JOYCE SCHWARZ CYBER-AUDITION FOR JIBJAB'S HOOLA GIRL CHARACTER: 
(from May 21 Hollywood2020 blog coverage -- for full post go to JIBJAB TAKES A STAB AT CITIZEN MEDIA AND BUDWEISER ADS
blogger joyce schwarz cyber-audition for jibjab's hoola (as in hoola hoop) girl....
BEST STORY ON JIBJAB'S BUD(DY) DEAL (AT THE BUSCH SITE -- NO ,NOT THAT BUSH)Budweiser, JibJab Form Creative Team
JibJab Blog BLABBING ABOUT BUD
Pitchlizards : gregg & evan click on the thumbnail and the pix of the duo gets clearer as does their future in an F2F meeting with Gregg at NATPE --see this series of blogs on Hollywood2020 and news break on www.paidcontent.org.
JIB JABBING BACK IN HISTORY: Back in 1999 an investment banker and his brother an art school grad and animator in NYC were watching a small cartoon steaming over a telephone line and realized that you didn't have to go through a gatekeeper to get to mass audiences anymore....cut through the dot com/bomb era of the next 4 years when all of the duo's clients went out of business to a move across country from the Big Apple to a 600 sq foot office in Santa Monica and the two bros creating a breakthrough viral marketing success story like none other before. From their personal mailing list they had gathered over the past few years of 130,000 people which they sent their "THIS LAND" flash animation to they garnered 100,000 views the first day which sprouted up to 500,000 then to 1 1/2 million a day on a stored server, their now cult classic politico flash animation spoof took off with the help of a licensing deal with what is now called Atom/Shockwave.
MORE THAN EXISTING DESPITE CEASE & DESIST SUIT:
Despite a Cease and Desist lawsuit regarding the use of THIS LAND music, Jib Jab co-founder says their immediate goal was to "not be a one hit wonder" A spot on Jay Leno's TONIGHT SHOW resulted in an opp to do something special for Jay and so the brothers created a second election piece and premiered it on the TONIGHT SHOW and this time tied in with Yahoo.
FAME BRINGS 30,000 emails and some headaches too...yep the duo was flooded with 30,000 emails where Gregg the biz guy of the duo was sure that business opportunities were buried in the mountain of fan kudos. Reason for their success-- Gregg modestly cites the triple play of practice, hard work and luck but behind the old adages was a vision to be a "branded internet content company" and develop short form content in what was fast opening the door to a new medium for messages. Gregg explains that in those days artists were not versed in technology, today art students are embracing technology. Flash is still the tech choice of the duo because it 'does everything they want'.
COBBLING TOGETHER REVENUE TO LET THEM JIB AND JAB MORE:
From 1999 to 2004 from NYC to Santa Monica the brothers Gregg and Evan cobbled together revenue to pay the rent with projects from Kraft, Sony and licensing deals with Atom Films, Yahoo and now MSN. Other revenue sources include DVD sales, digital downloads (yes, they were among the first to ask for $2.99 for digital downloads--- mostly because their server could not handle the freebies) and Gregg credits their Yahoo store for taking 8,000 orders for their first DVD -- mocked up on their office computer with a draft cover straight from their Epson printer-- held up on what else-- THE TODAY SHOW ....
MERCHANDISE....MOBILE...NASTY SANTAs & UMBRELLA Brand replacing 'dancing collage presidents' according to Gregg's conversation courtesy of "coffee with" morning session on location at NATPE. Gregg says online humor is hot on the net and spills the beans about their future as he says that he sees something like a cross between My Space and Comedy Central. The famous CAA agency is repping them for traditional media including TV Pilot, film project of studios but according to Gregg that's not as exciting as the Internet, IPTV , wireless and other new media opps.
SO HOW DOES JIB JAB DO IT??????
Some time the early bird does get the worm and when moderator Hollywood Reporter Television Features Editor Andrew Waltenstein asks Gregg to walk us through a typical Jib Jab Project (is their such an animal?) the biz brain of the Jib Jab duo does just that. And my old-fashioned pen captures his info step by step and I'm sharing it here for all of you (and yes, for my own notes too):
JIB JAB STEP BY STEP PROJECT ARCH
Remember Gregg writes and his brother Evan animates....so they start with A) A rough idea B) They go to Music C) Gregg writes and they go D) back and forth E) come up with some Lyrics (F) use a bad microphone and G) pull it into Flash H) scribble some art in I See the piece in full and only then do they J) send it off to their animators to work on it.
Gregg believes this production process is one that would serve many producers and animators well -- discover the creative core and flesh it out before spending money on production....wise words from Jib or is it Jab -- and he explains that the name of the company was just kind of made up -- and somehow fit the brothers who seem to be extraordinarily complementary which is one of the other secrets to their success -- if you can't trust your brother who can you trust?
NEVER WORK FOR HIRE: in the next blog, Joyce Schwarz will cover why Gregg from Jib Jab believes you should never work for hire -- and why he sees that as leading to a death spiral for many creatives. Or should we say 'business creatives' which now seems to be a trendy term at NATPE this conference to explain better what a hyphenate used to be and a media entrepreneur aspires to be now.
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