The name “Vooza” has emerged on the tech scene in recent weeks with some pretty entertaining videos that do straight-faced impressions of the worst of today’s buzzy startup culture (check out their latest one, which is embedded above.) While Vooza itself probably isn’t for real as a company — as Wired UK has pointed out, its supposed CEO Matt Stillman is a dead ringer for NYC stand-up comic Matt Ruby — its knack for making hilariously catchy videos is, having caught the attention of the likes of Dennis Crowley and David Karp.
So it’s interesting to see Vooza teaming up with Switch Video, the totally legit company that makes animated product pitch videos for startups. Vooza and Switch are running a contest to give away a free “explainer” video.
It doesn’t seem like this is actually what Vooza is looking to do full-time (I’m thinking it’s more just a very clever publicity tool for Ruby’s show biz career) but this could be a pretty sweet one-time deal for someone looking to launch a startup or product. I mean, there’s nothing worse than a startup video that aims to be funny but falls flat — and the people behind Vooza do have what it takes to make stuff that’s actually humorous.
The contest runs in three pretty straightforward rounds:
- In round one, interested people can sign up with their names and contact information, and spread the fact that they entered via Twitter or Facebook.
- Then there’s round two. “In this round we find out who really has what it takes to leverage the power of video,” Vooza says with a wink (I think.) This is where people fill out a more detailed application about why they should win.
- In round three, Vooza and Switch will pick the ten top entries and put them up for a public vote. The voting will start August 22nd and end at noon Pacific Time August 29th. “At the end of the day, the epic startup rockstars with the most votes wins,” Vooza says with tongue planted in cheek (I think.)
Anyway, it seems like a fun summer fling, and should produce a pretty interesting video at the end of it all. Check out more details here.