As part of a growing trend of Hollywood talent moving to the Web, "South Park" creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker announced this week that they will create 39 original animated shorts for the recently re-funded entertainment portal Shockwave.com. Each short will be two to five minutes long, with Stone and Parker maintaining complete artistic control and owning the copyright to all new creations. In an article published in the New York Times, Stone commented that they were attracted to the Web by the freedom it offered to go beyond the content and language restrictions of television. He also mentioned that they had been offered opportunities on the Web before, but turned them down because the technology was crude.
This new deal will create a training ground for new characters and shows that can be sold to television or other mediums. In the deal, Parker and Stone received less than 10 percent equity in Shockwave.com, which in return will share in revenues from any of the characters or shorts they create for the site in other mediums.
[For more information, visit: <http://www.shockwave.com>.]