Will branded wikis be enough to inspire conversation

A rather clever idea by our friends over at Picture Production Company has just launched: a [tag]wiki[/tag] for Fox’s Fantastic Four film release.

The idea is simple, viewers can change, edit and submit to the website in [tag]Wikipedia [/tag]style. The base level content is everything you expect to find on a film site – background, trailers and more about the Marvel comics.

Without the need for registration, no one is accredited for adding to the site. And I wonder if this makes a difference. Do fans want to have their names associated with the film content? My gut feel is that they would love their names in lights – an ego thing!

It is also rather difficult to see what has been recently added. So looking through, it is impossible to asses whether fans have made a contribution yet. It seems the site has only just gone live so may take some time to develop. May really take off when the film launches in each country and the trailers and PR machines start up proper.

A quick check on Google shows that it already has 19 links from niche sites and bloggers. Technorati uncovers 30 sites linking to the URL and a good positive sentiment. One would hope that this increases as the film rolls out.

I have to say, I love the idea. It is [tag]participation[/tag], and relinquishing control of a brand, at its best. Created in multiple languages it allows for regional variations too. There is also a sister site that lets you download and grab games for your blog and website. A very cute way of ensuring the spread of information and branding across the web.

The bit that appears to be missing, and in all fairness might be in the pipeline, is alerting the [tag]blogosphere[/tag]. A bit of relationship building with influencers would help spread the word. The conversation activity so far seems to be a bit organic and random. A general thumbs up from me though: great to see companies experimenting with wikis.