Facebook Watch Aims to Reinvent TV With New Interactive Shows

By Andrew Wallenstein

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – Facebook Watch will launch a slate of new shows boasting interactive features like polls and quizzes to make good on the social platform’s intent to foster a greater sense of community between creators and users.

The new features will be employed across content like “Outside Your Bubble,” a new series set to premiere next month from Buzzfeed News that lets contestants guess what their opponents from the other side of the cultural divide are thinking. Other new programs include game shows that let viewers play along across live and on-demand video on Watch.

Fidji Simo, VP of product at Facebook, believes interactivity hasn’t advanced much in traditional TV beyond voting for contestants on shows like “American Idol.” “I think this is a mega-trend we’re seeing in this industry, where video doesn’t have to be passive or one way,” she said. “Now that video is happening on mobile devices, where there is input possible from people, you can imagine a whole range of genres for content to be reinvented with audience participation.”

The new functionality will be unveiled at Facebook’s first-ever “Creator Day” in Los Angeles where influencers the social giant has been more aggressively courting in recent years will convene to learn new monetization techniques as they attempt to build businesses on the platform. The features will also likely be touted at , the annual online video confab taking place in Anaheim, Calif., later this week.

Facebook will also be unveiling other new initiatives thi week intended to help influencers including the launch of Brand Collabs Manager, a new program intended to help marketers find the right creators for branded content efforts. Influencer monetization will also be helped by expansion of already launched initiatives to allow creators to implement ad breaks and subscriptions tolls.