Plentitube: Your Agent for Online Video

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Plentitube believes there is money to be made by bringing these parties together. If the company strikes a deal for a content creator, Plentitube takes a 5% commission. At the same time, Plentitube is trying to sign up more media companies as subscribers to its service and charge them an annual fee in the mid-five figures to gain access to content. Currently, subscribers can log onto a private Web site and search a database of videos. A more advanced version of the site to be rolled out early next year will let subscribers search the database and track the progress of a transaction.

Cinemax is the company's first paying subscriber, but Pulver and Labes say they are in talks with General Electric's (GE) NBC and other companies. Plentitube also is trying to raise several million dollars in venture capital and bring on some more seasoned executives to round out its management team. "We're expecting a lot of deal flow with diminishing development budgets," says Labes, a former producer of Wallstrip, a daily financial Web show purchased by CBS (CBS) in May 2007.

One-Stop Content Shopping

Chris Spencer, senior vice-president and general manager of marketing and creative services for Cinemax, says Plentitube offers a useful service in an age where network executives see the opportunity of the Internet but don't have enough time to scour through YouTube. "You can get lost on the Internet," says Spencer. "Plentitube offers this one-stop-shopping model for content."

Despite Spencer's excitement, this is the first time the company has licensed content from an Internet producer. Cinemax is running the episodes of Eli's Dirty Jokes as "interstitial content" before its weekly Saturday night movie at 10. It aired the first of eight original episodes on Nov. 8 and also licensed 15 older episodes for its on-demand channel. In addition, the movie channel secured two options to order batches of 10 more episodes. If the episodes generate positive feedback, Spencer says the company will probably order more.

Although Spencer believes upstarts such as Plentitube are not going to put the big talent agencies out of business anytime soon, he says they have a good shot at playing an important role in the entertainment industry. "Plentitube offers a very interesting model," he says. "If you find good stuff on a consistent basis, we will form a long-term relationship."

Ante is an associate editor for BusinessWeek.