We are definitely familiar with Netflix, Flixster, Imdb and the likes. These American social media sites which provide different avenues for television and movie lovers to get up-to-date news and information on the latest trailers discover new movies, learning about movies, renting and downloading movies as well as meeting others with similar taste in movies. These sites became so popular that there was an outright purchase for some of them by the big names in the entertainment industry.
Netflix was offered to Blockbuster for $50 million in 2000, but the sale was declined, Flixster was acquired by Warner Bros while Imdb was acquired by Amazon.com. As at today, these movie sites are house hold names and have played a prominent role in online film and television in America and the world.
What’s the point of this entire gist, enter iROKOtv. Africa’s first mainstream online movie steaming website, giving free and instant access to over 5,000 Nollywood film titles. iROKOtv is a part of iROKO Partners which is one of Africa’s leading entertainment companies, housing brands such as iROKING, an online music platform and its YouTube website, Nollywoodlove. iROKOtv was launched on 1 December 2011. Its parent company, iROKO Partners, was founded by Jason Njoku and Bastian Gotter in December 2010, it has been dubbed the ‘Netflix’ of Africa, and it is one of the world’s largest legal digital distributor of African movies.
Jason Njoku was just recently named Y! /YNaija.com’s Person of the Year 2013 read the story here . What does it mean for the Nigerian movie industry, I am hoping loads! IROKOtv works with most of Nollywood’ s top film production houses and purchases the exclusive online licenses to their films, in an attempt to distribute Nollywood films to a global audience. So, in the future, I see better pay for the actors and actresses that stare in these downloaded movies. I also see better scripts, improved acting and tighter editing as majority of iROKO’s audience is predominantly in the Diaspora, with top five countries including the US, UK, Canada, Germany and Italy.
So what do you guys think? Is iROKOtv the desired change we see for the future of Nollywood?
