Devoted to online marketing, viral marketing, and web marketing

We recently talked about the unusual experiment where "Quarterlife" was taken from the Internet and brought to TV.

The initial results weren't encouraging, as the premiere was only able to garner a 1.6 rating, which was the worst performance of any show in that time period in 17 years. Considering the strong promotion it received, it could only be called a disaster.

While it doesn't mean it's over yet, it will have to make some gradual improvement at minimum to be given a chance to go forward.

Creators of the series, Marshall Herskovitz and Edward Zwick aren't amateurs, as they are also the creators of “30something” and “My So Called Life," which was one of the major reasons Ben Silverman took a gamble with them. The other was that NBC didn't have to tie up much money, as Herskovitz and Zwick paid for most of it themselves in exchange for almost total creative control.

Not only did they use their own money in the show, but they also licensed it to NBC (NYSE:GE) at a much lower rate than usual; the reason being they were hoping a huge number of viewers would migrate to their social networking site on the internet.

One odd thing to me, was the airing of the series with shows that had been already been seen on internet video sites. When you consider the built-in audience would emerge from the Internet, that doesn't make a lot of sense.

It is obvious that what may be considered a hit on the Internet, is measured by different metrics on network TV.

But even taking that into consideration, it is being increasingly understood that views on the Internet can be gamed, and also the people watching on the Internet are basically a shows entire audience. Think of the hype about "Snakes on a Plane," which people thought was going to be a gargantuan hit because of the enormous activity and hype online.

The reality was the continual interaction was among a built-in number of people that didn't grow beyond its Internet base.

What that means is a lot of the same people can visit, communicate and interact with something online, which can make it look like a huge audience, but the truth is its a select group of people doing it over and over again. It's happened enough now so it goes beyond conjecture to being a pattern that we should include in the numbers we see.

In the specific case of Quarterlife though, even their online numbers are questionable, as their Internet premiere several months ago produced a respectable 789,000 views, while their last online episode was a paltry 1,200 views.

For Herskovitz and Zwick, it may be more important that they have received the attention they're getting in the online community, far more than what happens to the series on TV. They are attempting to build some type of online creative social networking entity which will provide outlets and interaction among creative types, along with an intern program. That may have the best chance at long-term success, rather than creating another hit TV show.