Next New Networks, Revision3 Get into Indie Music [NewTeeVee]

Online studios Next New Networks and Revision3 are both launching music shows. But rather than confront the labels on their own turf and get into sticky rights issues, both startups are going the indie route. This will be NNN’s first foray into music, whereas Rev3 has already experimented with shows like XLR8R, a companion to the magazine of the same name.

Next New Networks today released its new 99 Dollar Music Videos channel, one of the most innovative ideas we’ve seen yet from the New York City-based startup. Basically, NNN hooks up emerging bands with emerging filmmakers each week, gives them $99 to make a music video, and releases a making-of show as well as the video itself.

NNN starts off with an exclusive hosting of the video for three months, but after that the band owns all the rights and can modify and redistribute the video wherever they want. And as a first for NNN, the network has a sponsor at launch: Verizon FiOS. The first video, for a band called La Strada and made by 99 Dollar coordinator Jack Ferry, is embedded above. Watch for yourself and see if a cheap music video from a band you’ve probably never heard of is compelling enough content.

Meanwhile, Revision3 is going to license and distribute Sun Studio Sessions, an existing web video show that tapes interviews and performances by up-and-coming artists recording at the famous Memphis recording studio. The San Francisco-based company told us this week that it was working to line up advertisers and figure out a release schedule for the show, which it expects to launch sometime in the first half of this year.

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