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Knowlera Media LLC today launched MonkeySee, another in the growing scrum of instructional video sites. Seeded with more than $1 million from angels, including at least one former AOL executive, MonkeySee is headed by former Anystream executive Greg Letourneau and based in Great Falls, Va.

Letourneau and chief operating officer Will Jerro says that MonkeySee is different from the many user-generated video aggregators and entertainment-oriented instructional sites because it produces some of its own content and gets material from experts, rather than relying entirely on content uploaded by outside contributors. Although the company will mostly rely on attracting online ads, MonkeySee also will charge companies to produce and post promotional content, although the videos themselves must remain (more or less) editorially neutral. A steakhouse, for example, could pay MonkeySee to produce a video of its chef preparing a steak. That video will be featured along with a link to the steakhouse's Web site, as well as an introduction touting the chef's credentials.

Although that sounds a lot like advertising in certain respects, Letourneau insists that MonkeySee will police itself so that "the promotional aspect is there, just not in the video." He adds that for some companies, this type of promotion may be more effective than traditional Web advertising because consumers are more open to a pitch when it comes from an expert. Whether MonkeySee decides to test consumers' patience in this gray area remains to be seen.

Letourneau says that MonkeySee's most direct competitor is British "how-to" startup VideoJug, while another is Expert Village. He downplayed its similarity to aggregators of user-generated video like Spark Capital-backed 5min.com, noting that some of those sites even feature "borderline pornographic" content.

MonkeySee will assess its fundraising options again in a few months. Although Jerro expressed doubt that the company will need more capital, the fact that MonkeySee produces its own videos suggests a more capital-intensive model than some of its competitors. - Paul Bonanos

See Jan. 14 post press release from MonkeySee
See Jan. 11 post from Tech Confidential
See Jan. 14 story from Broadcasting & Cable

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