So you can buy tickets directly on Facebook for the star-studded Michael Jackson Tribute Concert this coming Saturday 8th October.
Yawn. That’s so Summer 2011.
If you really want to tickle your f-commerce fancy this Fall, you’ll want to experience this weekend’s tribute gig live at home but with all your Facebook friends in what is being billed as the “the first live Pay-Per-View event available to Facebook’s global audience.” Off the Wall. It’ll be a Thriller.
Although Jackson’s first top 10 hit was “Got to Be There“, actually you don’t, courtesy of f-commerce specialist Milyoni and Ridgeline Entertainment. For 40 Facebook Credits (which in human money is $4 (50 Credits or $5 if you pay on the day)), you get to see Beyoncé, Christina Aguilera, The Black Eyed Peas and other P.Y.Ts live whilst commenting, chatting, and sharing the concert experience with other fans on Facebook.
Will You Be There? If so, Milyoni is throwing up a pop-up Facebook fan-store with the livestream so you can buy your gig merchandise. Nearly as good as actually being there. Or is it?
Milyoni will Remember the Time, way back in Summer 2011 when they pionnered Facebook PPV live streaming, allowing gig-goers to attend the Austin City Limits concert virtually. It may Wanna Be Startin’ Something, but this weekend’s concert takes premium streaming on Facebook to a whole new – global – level.
For many, the tribute gig will be their first experience of Facebook as a media hub, and their first experience of f-commerce. Will they like it? Will the experience be good – or Bad? And compered to Livestream.com‘s experiment with PPV oncerts, will Facebook PPV Beat it? And more importantly, for this event, will it be better than paying a PPV fee to a TV network, or paying your local movie theatre streaming the event (many in 3D)?
Will the social aspect of Human Nature be a draw to Facebook PPV with its social features, or will TV inertia win over? Is the We are the World Facebook generation ready to say, Facebook, You Rock My World? Or will the promise of 3D send people off to their local movie theater for livestreaming?
Whatever the answers, and the situation is not Black or White, it looks like Pay-Per-View on Facebook just went mainstream, and Zuckerberg’s vision of evolving Facebook into a global media hub took a step towards its realisation.
