Vooza Wants to Steal Your Data and Entertain You At the Same Time

If you have never heard of Vooza it’s entirely possible you may think that it is a mobile web app that steals data from cellphones and sells it to Eastern European spammers — but it isn’t.  In fact, it’s not even an app.  Vooza is a video content company run by a bunch of funny guys (and girls) — or you know, comedians. Founded by Matt Ruby (yes, the first employee of 37signals), Vooza attempts (very successfully) to combine both the world of tech and comedy into one.

I sat down with Matt after his talk at The Next Web Conference (USA) where he covered topics like how many monitors you should have and answering the question of “What Would Steve Jobs Do?”  (while dressed like Steve Jobs in a black turtleneck, blue jeans, and sneakers — the resemblance was uncanny). Needless to say he had audience laughing pretty hard.

When it comes to inspiration, the tech industry seemed like the perfect fountain for ideas. Technology is becoming more prevalent in every day life, it’s not just us geeks who have an interest in tech anymore.  A lot of the ideas for video content come from reading an article or blog post.  When Matt runs across a story where thinks to himself, “this sounds ridiculous,” it’s then when he files it away to be used in a Vooza episode.

Once he has his inspiration, Mr. Ruby then works with writers to come up with the different scripts and after that it’s showtime.  Matt and his comedic bunch typically film every once in a while on the weekends, when they usually create about 8 to 12 episodes for Vooza.  Despite being scripted, I’m told that Matt lets people incorporate their own improv, which obviously has worked out very well.

When I asked what kinds of video content has performed the best for Vooza, the response was interesting.  Vooza focuses mostly on “reality” based videos as they have found that those are the ones that spread the most virally and are the most well-liked.  And if you think about it, that makes sense — definitely a good tip for all content creators out there. Another tip from Vooza creator Matt Ruby?  Have a schedule for your content.  When it comes to distributing content, a schedule is important.  People need to know when they can expect new content from you, so Vooza releases a new video every week.

Each episode of Vooza can stand on its own, which is great if you just want to dive in and start watching. So what are you waiting for? Be sure to check out a couple of recent episodes, including Fail Harder and What Is Skeuomorphism?

One last thing of note, when I asked Matt about the possibility of doing live Vooza shows at comedy clubs, he said it was definitely something he had been thinking about.

Here is one of the company’s early videos, which is just brilliant.