Texts From Last Night is a website where users submit raunchy, embarrassing, and funny text messages they either sent or received the previous night. Unfortunately, it’s a sign of our times that drunken behavior can be profitable. And TFLN is doing quite well for themselves, as ads from Apple and American Apparel must bring in some strong revenue. The site is a huge hit with America’s twentysomethings and is now reaching into different mediums.
After strong interest from several networks, Fox landed a multicamera coming-of-age project based on the popular Web site.
Called “a living document of twentysomething life in 2009,” it has become a Web success story since launching in February, averaging 4 million hits a day.
The show will be written by Steve Holland and produced by Sony TV and Happy Madison, Adam Sandler’s production company.
“The show is about twentysomethings in that post-college, pre-the-rest-of-their-lives limbo trying to figure out what to do, and texting is a large part of that,” Holland said.
A couple shows come to mind that are based around funny videos on the Internet. That is one respect in which content on the Internet has crossed over into television. However, “Texts From Last Night” would be the first scripted show spawned from an Internet site. I’ve never heard of that happening before, though it was inevitable. The site is good for a laugh, but because of the low-brow material involved, I’m already annoyed by the show. Doesn’t a better show exist in the lives people create for themselves on Myspace and Facebook? Maybe that was pitched ages ago and nobody wanted to take the chance. Even so, Texts From Last Night averages four million hits a day! That’s astounding, and certainly proves there’s a market for this kind of concept.
