The telethon was organized by MTV Networks and George Clooney, and other networks taking part will include the websites of MySpace, YouTube, Hulu, AOL, Fancast, VH1, CBS, MSN, Bing, Yahoo, Rhapsody, TV.com, BET and CNN. The event will be streamed by mobile providers AT&T, Verizon and Sprint, too. There will be more than 30 networks involved once all's said and done. Expect this to dominate both the Internet and the television tomorrow night.
A U2/Jay-Z/Rihanna collaboration and a jam including Kid Rock, Keith Urban and Sheryl Crow will be among the main events. They've got a little something for everybody planned, it looks like.
Most of the sites that are hosting this event haven't created pages to visit yet, but show up at any of the networks before the show starts and you'll find your way.
[UPDATE] See the bottom of this post for links and a livestream embed.
Live Chat: More Engagement, More Donations
Live chats managed by Gigya — the same company that did the MTV/Facebook/LG Avatar webcast with James Cameron — will accompany the MTV, VH1 and CBS webcasts.
Gigya told us that MTV Networks is working with them again to recreate the "lean forward" level of participation it achieved with the Avatar webcast. The live chat makes the donating experience public; folks in the chat will probably encourage one another to donate, and people will be more likely to donate if they know they can impress their friends. Gigya has found that these webcast chats drive more traffic and more word-of-mouth promotion, which will in turn lead to a greater volume of donations.
[img credit: iamguilty]
Livestream
Other Places to Watch the Event
- YouTube
- MTV