MTV Roadies BattleGround - TV meets Web 2.0

MTV in collaboration Orkut has launched a new Reality TV show called MTV Roadies Battleground where contestants would be selected online through Orkut and all the activity would happen online on the official MTV community on the site. The proceedings of the show would also be telecasted on MTV.

MTV Roadies Battle Ground is an Online version of the popular Reality TV Show "MTV Roadies". The original format of the show has about 13 guys and girls selected from all across India through a series of rounds in the audition held at different cities. The participants then have to spend around 40-45 days together, moving from one destination to other on motor bikes. Through the journey, Roadies have to perform different difficult tasks to earn money, to win immunity, or to win advantage during the vote out s. Vote out is happens after each round of tasks and one roadie is sent back home. The Roadie who stands till the end, wins the title and all the cash earned during the journey along with the motorbike he/she has been traveling on. The show has already completed 5 seasons and is hugely popular amongst youth in India and its neighboring countries.

Orkut was recently awarded as the MTV Youth Icon for being the most popular online social networking site in India. The channel had created the community on Orkut for all the fans of the show. All the members in the community can discuss the happenings on the show and put up their opinions. This community too was a big hit and gathered thousands of members in no time. The USP of this community is that the moderators and owner of the community are guys from MTV itself who manage and put up relevant and first hand info on it.

Based on huge popularity of the TV show and the now the community too, the guys at MTV decided to take this a step further. They came up with the concept of having a show similar to Roadies, where all the action would take place in the cyberspace instead of outdoors.

Anyone who wants to participate, will have to create a profile on Orkut and add a little widget for MTV RBG on their profile. An entry form has to be filled and then GDs would happen at the community forum to select the 13 finalists. These finalists with compete with each other to perform some tasks online. The MTV RBG widget will keep you updated of all the action and my guess is that it will have to be used majorly to perform tasks, in case you are one of the finalists.

Orkut has recently added this feature to allow the users to add small applications(widgets) to their profiles and have fun using them with their friends. This concept was made popular by other social networking sites like facebook and myspace. Its picking up on orkut too, but with innovations like MTV RBG, it would reach a new level altogehter.

This marriage of reality TV with internet has been one of its kind in India and I must say this is a brilliant approach in capturing the attention of masses this way. All of the TV channels have their sites set up, and they encourage users to go online and vote for their favorite participants from a lot of other reality shows, but that isn't what i would call a real Web 2.0 approach. MTV RBG, however will truly qualify for that title. Web 2.0 is all about User Generated Content, collaboration, sharing info via different media, easy access to information through different channels and this concept has it all. Thousands of users would be participating online, sharing their stuff with other users, collaborating in real time. It would be an interesting trend to follow. True reality TV true Web 2.0.