Timeline (A work in progress)

At present, the "five minute sitcom" is more of a philosophical conceit than an actual thing. The current term is "webisode." The wikipedia article on the subject is barely 100 words long, but it helpfully points out that webisode is a portmanteau of web and episode, then provides another helpful link to explain portmanteau. The etymology is a little muddy, but it dates back to New Media Bubble guys operating in the mid-to-late 90's.None of which does anything to explain what the term actually means. Hopefully, by putting the major developments of the medium in some sort of context, it will help build a greater understanding.

A work in progress outlining the state of the union of the medium. A lot of the dates for projects are approximate - it's frequently hard to figure out when these shows debuted.

1995 - TheSpot.com. The first web show, an online soap opera. Broke ground, and coined the word "webisode," the favored term for online shows. By 1997 it was off the air, a victim of the net bubble and the fact that bandwidth was super expensive back then. Status: So dead it's nostalgia.

2001- Channel 101 launched. The idea: a roving film festival that allowed comedy pros to produce short pilots and submit them before an audience. The most well recieved spawned more episodes. Finally, famous people were given an opportunity to shine on the web. Status: Spawned a VH-1 reality show, helped solidify the careers of Rob Schrab and Dan Harmon, who went on to make a lot of money in Hollywood, to the envy/joy of nerds everywhere. Nice guys.

2006 -
The Burg - A hip show about hipsters in Williamsburg. Initially, episodes ran about 15 minutes, but the producers quickly scaled them down to about five minutes. Cheerfully mimics numerous single camera, comedy tropes. Status: Aspires to make the jump from webisode to cable/broadcast. Experienced a brief flurry of net fame in 2006, but has died down, slightly.

Chad Vader - Originally spawned on Channel 101 (see above), Chad Vader follows the misadventures of Darth Vader's little brother, Chad, who works as a manager in a supermarket. Status: Despite the shameless theft of a Lucasfilm Trademark, the show is irritatingly popular and has been translated into five languages.

2007 - Minisodes begin floating around. Bastard hybrids of webisodes and real TV, minisodes are created by cutting actual episodes of TV shows down to clip form. Tech bloggers seem to universally disdain these, and generally make a joke about how they're for people who found the original SILVER SPOONS too hard to follow. Status: Mercifully, they don't seem to have taken off and they might be killed for good by the terms of the new Writer's Guild contract. I have my fingers crossed.

BuddyJackson.com - A single camera sitcom with admirably high production value. Status: As of this writing has served up 24 episodes.

PlanetUnicorn.TV - Really gay, really funny. The theme song alone counts for 90% of the virality, it's the sort of thing you WANT to forward to your friends. Status: Hipsters, gay bois and digerati eagerly await episode 6. If this doesn't get the creators a deal with Logo, Bravo or similar there is no god.