Fancy a Ramen Party? Seven mostly-local companies reached out to potential investors and partners last week, presenting their pitches to a packed house at ideaBOOST's inaugural launchpad event. But it was the aforementioned Ramen Party that won over the crowd. The interactive storybook designed for "preschoolers and hipster foodie parents" is the creation of animation filmmaker Lillian Chan and musician and producer John Poon. It follows "Mr. Ramen" as he gathers his friends to take them to a party, teaching children about food and language along the way. The team has launched an indieGoGo campaign to raise the remainder of its funding. 

 

It's not your typical accelerator product, but that's because ideaBOOST isn't your typical accelerator, focusing instead on digital entertainment companies that are pushing boundaries in the online realm. It's the first of its kind in Canada and joins a small but growing number of accelerator programs that are turning the hands-on mentorship approach on other industries. It's a derivative of the Canadian Film Centre's Media Lab, which was simultaneously celebrating its 15-year anniversary. The launch was hosted by Jian Ghomeshi and took place at the Steam Whistle brewery.

 

"Entertainment properties are driving the growth of the digital space," CFC's chief digital officer Ana Serrano before the event. IdeaBOOST is what she called an "entertainment ecosystem."

 

"The idea came about because first of all, we've been in the digital media business for a long time. I started the media lab in '97 before digital entertainment was even a name. It was the natural evolution of the work we’ve been doing at the CFC media lab since '97, which is building talent to producing and experimenting with products to now commercializing products and helping to build sustainable companies. It’s a natural evolution for a very short 15 years."

 

Rollers of the Realm, a video game produced by Toronto's Phantom Compass, mentioned in a previous Yonge Street article that ideaBOOST as an alternative way to receive funding for them. After wrapping up the four-month program, they were looking for a publisher to help bring their games into the next realm, ahem. They received quite the audience cheers when they discussed why they chose to make their main character, Rogue, female. 

 

The Ghost Town Project turned some heads with its plan to evoke crowdsourced-funding initiatives to repair buildings and towns that have been destroyed or have deep historical value. In a moving promo video, the Montreal team went down to the Jersey Shore and walked the coasts of a shoreline devastated by Hurricane Sandy, interviewing residents and business owners about the significance of rebuilding.  They plan to make this a glossy production show with the help of a broadcasting company. Each episode would document the drama and beauty that comes with a restoration of this type. 

 

The most entertaining to watch was perhaps AsapSCIENCE's Mitchell Moffit (pictured above). With his charming and undeniable passion for science education, it is hard not to liken him to the great Bill Nye. AsapSCIENCE has already made a name for itself online with short, informative and light-hearted science YouTube videos viewed by millions. The team consists of Moffit and his business partner Gregory Brown, who is teaching overseas. Their YouTube channel is self-sufficient, but they want to support a larger team and have the means to consider branching out to other channels such as AsapFITNESS. 

 

Other participants include the Buffer Film Fest, who aim to "celebrate, award and curate" original YouTube videos in a high-budget Awards show presentation, Yamantaka Sonic Titan, a band that hopes to transcend their music and theatre "rock opera" backgrounds to develop a sonic game app called "Your Task: Shoot Things" that culminates all of their material and helps them reach new audiences, and the Path, an interactive television show that hopes to open a "two-way conversation" with its fans, allowing them a say in the narrative. 

 

The companies were selected to participate in the accelerator based on online audience voting and "socializing" (Twitter, Facebook, etc.). Companies looking to participate must create a page similar to an IndieGOGO campaign on ideaBOOST's website. They must use this to socialize and generate public awareness, points, and votes. 

 

"Our core founders -- Corus, Google and Shaw -- are entertainment companies as opposed to venture capitol companies so their needs in terms of the types of companies that they're looking for to invest in and or to use in their core businesses are slightly different then the traditional accelerator," Serrano said.  

 

ideaBOOST is currently accepting applications for its second cohort. The last day to submit is April 18, 2013. At press time, eight companies had submissions online and were receiving Boosts.