Nowheremen, Come On Down!

Our next contestant on “The Tip is Right” is a bit of an enigma to us, which is kind of saying a lot since pseudo-mysterious crap is pretty much all we deal with day in and day out. But try, just try, to parse the following sentence - which comes straight from their press release - without gagging: “Hollywood meets Web 2.0 in the new web series and companion social reality game, Nowheremen.” See? Brain seized up there on ya, huh.

Okay, I know what your first question is going to be: What the hell is a “Social Reality Game?!” Well your guess is as good as ours, dear viewers, as this appears to be a new term invented solely for this particular campaign. Which is entirely understandable, of course, since Alternate Reality Gaming was one of the biggest, if not THE biggest, disappointments of 2007. In fact, we’re tempted to say it’s the biggest freaking disappointment of our entire lifetimes and we’re pretty fucking old, let us tell you right now. (Spoiler: Foul language alert! Oops, too late!)

Other interesting and intriguing buzzwords repeated throughout the announcement are such gems as “social graphs,” “webisodes,” “social reality,” “Internet social graphs,” and “social.” We suspect they may have an ulterior motive in mind which may or may not include some sort of “sociable activity.” Frankly, we’re against anything of the sort. We hate people.

Anyway, don’t listen to us. Apparently some folks are pretty into this thing already and if we’d actually done our research, we might have noticed that ARGNet has been on top of this since Day One (not to be confused with Year Zero). But research is for sissies and so is ARGNet! Hah!

Okay this really is going nowhere fast. Yes, we totally planned that horrible joke.

Completely dated and somewhat edited buzzword release after the jump!

January 7, 2008–Hollywood meets Web 2.0 in the new web series and companion social reality game, Nowheremen. X12 Productions, the new Los Angeles-based entertainment collective, debuts the series trailer January 8, and the first episode January 22 at 2:22 p.m. EST at www.nowheremen.net.

Nowheremen is a new community-based social entertainment experience that utilizes the full Web 2.0 medium of platforms to reveal the story behind the mysterious disappearance of a brilliant computer science student, Derek Border. The journey began in September 2007, with cryptic clues hidden throughout the Internet revealing Derek’s post-9-11 disappearance, with his fate unfolding across wikis, social networks, and photo and video-sharing sites.

The unique storytelling architecture of Nowheremen allows the audience to publicly solve complex puzzles throughout the Internet social graph. The audience’s discoveries unlock the secrets to Derek’s whereabouts and could help determine his fate.

Over the past few months, this ground-breaking interactive series has attracted a core audience without major network marketing, corporate sponsorship or studio involvement.

Nowheremen uniquely utilizes the emerging Internet social graph to engage consumers with a hybrid webisodic series and online interactive game that can’t exist in any one platform. The first episode will officially premiere on January 22nd, at 2:22 p.m., at www.nowheremen.net.

P.S. It’s funny because it’s profane. Remember kids, the Internet is Serious Business. Unless you’re a striking writer. Shhh!

P.P.S. Also, what the hell is a social graph? And did we point out the irony of the statement about Hollywood meeting Web 2.0? We did? Good, just checking.