Bolt.com made headlines when a recent Wall Street Journal article mentioned the user-programmed site for its battle with NBC Universal - the company's lawyers demanded Bolt remove NBC clips, including the much hyped SNL digital short "Lazy Sunday." In response, 23-year-old Bolt employees Luke McCormick and Geoff Gresh posted a "Lazy Sunday" spoof, "Hazy Monday," and invited others to do the same. Now, traffic to their site has spiked and they find themselves advocates for openness on the Internet. Gresh, a former film major at Vassar, and McCornick, a former English major at Skidmore whose father Doug McCormick ran iVillage until it was acquired earlier this year by NBC, answer B&C's questions about their video, user-submitted content and their new celeb status (also covered in this week's Flash!).
How'd you join Bolt and where did the video come from?
Luke – Basically I graduated college looking for a gig – I have talent all over the place – a little bit of music, a little bit of video production, a lot of writing, just kind of a multitalented guy. Bolt was just starting to build what was Bolt right now. It was a very exciting time. I was just like an ideal member – somebody who does a little bit of everything, but isn't a professional.
The video basically was our response to what the NBC lawyers wanted us to do, which was to remove their content and that was the end of it. We would sort of pluck from the site and then there would be this hole left. Geoff and I wanted to say this isn't what the Bolt user is. The Bolt user is creative, smart, witty and returns with an answer, and "Hazy Monday" was our answer to NBC wanting to punish our community for taking part in a media revolution which has been building steam for years now. I've been downloading music and movies since high school, and here I am a player in something that's far bigger.
By Anne Becker
