Shira Lazar - FishbowlLA

Creative Arts Emmys Add Three Interactive TV Categories

Richard Horgan — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 06:45:48 +0000

When the nominations for the 65th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards are announced at 5:35 a.m. on Thursday July 18, a big change will be the number of categories honoring interactive TV. From Variety awards editor Jon Weisman‘s Monday item:

Chief among the changes is the establishment of a competitive award for outstanding interactive program, saluting either a standalone experience or one that serves as a companion to a TV program. In the Emmy context, “interactive” denotes anything that encourages proactive engagement from the audience — not to be confused with video content delivered via broadband, such as Netflix’s House of Cards.

This category can have zero or multiple awards as determined by the Academy’s 12-year-old interactive media peer group, which currently counts 627 members. The other new interactive TV awards categories cover multi-platform storytelling and visual experience/visual design, to go along with the existing brackets of original interactive program (not tied to an existing TV show) and social TV experience.

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Marc Maron Talks Up New IFC Series

Richard Horgan — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 18:00:10 +0000

Fun interview from the SXSW Samsung bloggers’ lounge in Austin by What’s Trending host Shira Lazar. Thanks to her opening compliments and willingness to drink from the same plastic cup, guest Marc Maron wasn’t sure if this was an interview or a date.

Around the eight-and-a-half-minute mark, Maron tells Lazar about his upcoming IFC show Maron, an offshoot of his podcast success debuting in May. “If you haven’t had your fill of me, there’s more me coming in a different format,” the comedian joked. “It’s all I have.”

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Magician David Blaine Thanks Shira Lazar for the ‘Electrified’ Boost

Richard Horgan — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 10:00:52 +0000

Remember that crazy “Electrified” stunt David Blaine put himself through last fall above New York City’s Pier 54? Attending CES for the first time to publicize a related documentary made in partnership with Intel and VICE, Blaine sat down with What’s Trending‘s Shira Lazar to itemize some of the biggest challenges of what he has said is his final endurance stunt.

It turns out there was a special connection between Lazar and Blaine with regards to the stunt. It was her idea to send down to the location the aptly named musician Reggie Watts.

“We were in LA doing a Google Plus hangout with him while he was doing the stunt in New York,” Lazar tells FishbowlLA. “We knew Intel wanted to get musicians to join in and we knew we needed to get someone who was fun, Web centric and had their own performance art style. We reached out to Reggie and he was available, so he showed up on site in New York City that day. It ended up being a perfect alignment.”

As Blaine tells Lazar in the clip above: “Reggie was so incredible. As soon as he started playing, it was like all of the pain went away and the rest of the stunt got easier.”

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Academy of Web Television Awards Show Runs Into Streaming Problems

Richard Horgan — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 09:00:19 +0000

Talk about an awards show that really should have a mastery of the whole Internet stream business. Last night, things got off to a rocky start at CES for LA’s International Academy of Web Television (IAWTV) when the website stream for their 2013 awards show could not be properly viewed. Luckily, the organization had a back-up:

Another thing that’s kind of strange is that at this hour, there is still no list of the winners posted on the IAWTV website; still partying in Vegas, perhaps. Anyway, via Twitter, the organization let followers know who and what was landing ultimate kudos in 33 categories as the evening wore on.

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YouTube Space Los Angeles Opens Its Doors to Content Creators

Richard Horgan — Fri, 30 Nov 2012 08:50:40 +0000

When the owner is YouTube, the focus viral Web content and the reception area the size of a small airplane hangar, press coverage of a new Playa Vista 41,000-square-feet hybrid production facility is not a problem.

Reports about this week’s official opening of YouTube Space Los Angeles include John Jurgensen for the Wall Street Journal, Darren Franich in Entertainment Weekly and Shira Lazar of What’s Trending. She in fact did a live broadcast from the location during Wednesday night’s cocktail soiree (excerpt above). From Jurgensen’s report:

YouTube will assess proposals submitted online, along with each applicant’s track record of acquiring subscribers and working with other YouTube creators. If approved, they’ll have their run of the facility for a period of three months. On site, a 20-person staff will keep people on track with a minimum of hand-holding. About 25 channels will be represented in the first term, starting in January.

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Arnold Covering All the PR Bases; Goes from 60 Minutes to Google Hangout

Richard Horgan — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 14:45:52 +0000

A media blitz these days touches many more bases than the major networks and leading daily newspapers. Witness our former Governor, who wrapped up his first week of Total Recall autobiography chest-thumping with a 2:30 p.m PT Google hangout chat hosted by What’s Trending maven Shira Lazar.

The global audience made possible by this technology was plainly obvious. Commenters awaiting the event’s start were chiming in from Germany, Lithuania, Poland, Macedonia and points beyond.

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83-Year-Old Rapper Starts Making Media Rounds

Richard Horgan — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 19:00:29 +0000

Yesterday, 83-year-old Downey resident Stanley Hoffman (a.k.a. Kwayzar) was a topic of conversation on Current TV’s The Young Turks. All thanks to his unlikely Reddit-relaunched rap song “I Can Still Do It.”

Today, he dropped by the Hollywood studios of Shira Lazar’s daily Web show to talk about what is just the beginning of a huge viral surge:

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Shira Lazar’s What’s Trending Goes Daily

Richard Horgan — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 10:30:22 +0000

Hollywood Reporter website editor Chris Krewson goes the extra mile this morning to populate his Internet station, reporting about today’s revamping of Web talk show What’s Trending from a weekly one-hour Wednesday operation to a Monday-to-Friday noon PT 20-minute endeavor.

Host Shira Lazar and business partner Damon Berger have been busy since launching in May 2011. As far as the big question – how does the show make money? – here is Krewson’s answer:

What’s Trending garners about 150,000 views per week on all its platforms, including YouTube. Revenue is drawn from advertising – What’s Trending has worked with AT&T, Samsung, Virgin America and Vizio – as well as syndication.

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Bryan Singer Reacts, Live, to Some YouTube Parodies

Richard Horgan — Fri, 03 Aug 2012 10:00:10 +0000

Here’s a wonderful bit of video from Shira Lazar’s weekly Web talk show What’s Trending.

She had writer-director Bryan Singer on as a guest and cued up some of the parodies of his feature film work populating YouTube. Then, she threw up his live reactions to what he was seeing, picture-in-picture:

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Suspended Colorado Newspaper Reporter Walks Away from Reinstatement

Richard Horgan — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 16:10:40 +0000

A crazy end to a crazy story.

Yesterday evening, not long after doing a brief Skype interview with LA-based What’s Trending host Shira Lazar about his recent suspension without pay from the Colorado Springs Gazette, reporter Barrett Tryon tweeted that his job had been reinstated. And… that he was no longer interested in resuming employment with the paper, after being suspended for linking on Facebook to an LA Times article about a change in his outlet’s ownership.

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Internet Show Host Gives New Meaning to ‘Landing an Interview’

Richard Horgan — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 12:30:23 +0000

It honestly doesn’t get much cooler than this. To inaugurate Virgin America’s LA-Philadelphia route, What’s Trending host Shira Lazar has today bumped her usual Wednesday 10:00 a.m. PT broadcast slot to 1:30 p.m PT / 4:30 p.m. ET. So as to accommodate a live stream interview with fellow passenger Sir Richard Branson, with whom she crossed this great broadband land of ours today, west to east.

The conversation will take place on the ground at the Philadelphia end and will incorporate live viewer chat as well as questions submitted @whatstrending. Lazar will later share interviews done during the flight with It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia cast members Wiz Khalifa, Amber Rose and Glenn Hower.

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Shira Lazar Returns to Playlist LIVE

Richard Horgan — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 10:00:27 +0000

These days, What’s Trending Internet show host Shira Lazar is on the road a lot, from Austin for SXSW to Orlando this weekend for the second annual Playlist LIVE conference. The latter location is where she also got some great news from her boyfriend in Los Angeles.

“He texted my dad and I very late last night,” Lazar tells FishbowlLA via telephone, “to tell me that the next stage of documents in my green card application arrived in the mail. I got the message this morning, when I woke up.”

A native of Montreal, Lazar attended Boston’s Emerson College from 2002 through 2004 before interning in Los Angeles for 98.7 FM and Ellen DeGeneres‘ TV show. After working briefly in Las Vegas for a local Fox TV affiliate on the recommendation of an Ellen producer, Lazar returned to the west coast that same year, 2004, and began her freelance career in earnest on the Hollywood red carpet.

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New ABC-Oscars Site Launches

Richard Horgan — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 17:00:11 +0000

We’re not sure who “Oscar Insider” is, but he-she-they have a unique claim to fame. As part of a new website officially launched today by the Academy and ABC Entertainment, they get to write for “The Official Blog of the 84th Academy Awards.”

FishbowlLA’s favorite blog entries are the ones showcasing older acceptance speeches. For example, before Marlon Brando took to boycotting self-congratulation affairs and sending Native American emissaries in his place, he was capable of being humbled like so many before and since.

There’s also some fun new video featuring host Billy Crystal and a gaggle of upcoming features: “Oscar Buzz,” a social media overview kicking off nominations day, January 24, with Shira Lazar; “Oscar Talks,” a four-part video conversation series launching January 29; “Nominated… with Dave Karger,” a ten-part analysis of the Best Picture race anchored by the Entertainment Weekly awards veteran; and “Best Dressed,” a fashion plate feature starting February 11 with KABC’s Rachel Smith.

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Shira Lazar Blanks Kevin Pollak in Vegas

Richard Horgan — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 14:00:09 +0000

In a battle involving two of LA’s highest profile online gabfests, Shira Lazar took it to actor Kevin Pollak last night in Las Vegas at the first annual IAWTV Awards. The ceremony is a successor to the Streamy Awards and was indeed live streamed, in conjunction with this week’s CES convention, from The Venetian Hotel.

Lazar (pictured) trumped Pollak in the Best Hosted Live Web Series and Best Host (Live) categories, while her show’s director Brett Register took it away from Pollak’s floor man Mike Rotman in the Best Directing (Non-Fiction) bracket. Ouch.

On the other hand, Lazar was probably much more in need of a pick-me-up at this event than Pollak. As some of you may recall, her show stumbled into a huge controversy last September when one of her program’s staff tweeted out a premature announcement of the death of Steve Jobs, via the official account for What’s Trending with Shira Lazar. Within hours, CBS News severed its affiliation with the show.

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Sounding Out Snoop Dogg’s Social Media Team

Richard Horgan — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 09:00:12 +0000

It’s always interesting to hear from those specialists tasked with managing the social media presence of major personalities and celebrities. This field, which barely existed a few years ago, is now growing by leaps and monthly-billed bounds.

In the case of Snoop Dogg (more than four and a half million followers on Twitter, 12.1 million likes on Facebook), the social media whisperer is LA’s Cashmere Agency. Company co-founder Seung Cheung recently told Entrepreneur magazine about two platforms they are funneling people like Snoop towards:

Viddy.com allows users to record brief video clips, apply various filters and then share with their friends… We helped Snoop Dogg get started on the platform and then we aided in launching an actual Snoop Dogg-themed filter late last month…

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