Dumb Ideas Club: Livemansion makes a movie through social networking

Can you imagine a MySpace: The Movie, full of self-promoting emo kids, strippers, and dirty old men? How about LinkedIn: The Movie, with a cast of social-climbing tools who love to pass around business cards at parties? Yeah, not such awesome ideas. Which is why I'm beyond skeptical of the potential for Livemansion: The Movie, a movie created by entertainment and acting social networking site Livemansion, to be any kind of success.

My point is this: American Idol might still be hot, but there are some things in the entertainment world that probably shouldn't be left up to the "wisdom of crowds." Livemansion's contest is really a twofold one: in one contest, aspiring actors and directors who are members of the site vie for lead roles; and in the second, other Livemansion users create the concepts for the supporting roles. Yes, they have celebrity panelists like Jon Leguizamo and Spike Lee on board. But this is a social networking site, for goodness' sakes. There's going to be way too much focus on "hotness" rather than talent, and probably a penchant for the sensational. Yes, if Grindhouse is any indication, exploitation flicks are back in a big way, but I have infinitely more faith in the creative panache of Quentin Tarantino than of a C-list social networking site's user base.

Okay, fine, it's not the worst idea ever. That would be Webware: The Movie, a concept so horrendous it couldn't even be saved by the casting of Paul Giamatti as Rafe. Nevertheless, Livemansion's Livemansion: The Movie still really doesn't have legs. Audience manipulation of the movies was briefly cool with the Snakes on a Plane tagline "I've had it with these (expletive) snakes on this (expletive) plane," which was allegedly brainstormed by message board users who wanted the movie to have a quintessential Samuel L. Jackson line. It ultimately didn't help the movie. Sorry, we're so not into this. Next?