BELIZE CITY, Belize—BoyZone, a free social-networking site for gay and bisexual men, has launched television and radio stations on the platform owned by European internet protocol TV provider TV Polari. The social network hopes to establish a new revenue model under which free online content will be paid for by advertisers on its broadcast-media outlets.
TheBoyZone.com, launched in September, already has attracted more than 10,000 users from around the world, a spokesman said. The TV Polari deal is expected to bring in even more.
“We wanted to bring a fresh approach to the rather ‘old hat’ idea that gay sites should be pay sites,” BoyZone founder and Director Danny Lee said.
The advertising spots available on TV Polari’s TheBoyZone Radio and TV channels—available via a set-top box that connects to both the web and traditional television sets—are designed to attract companies that want to target gay and bisexual men. Already BoyZone is in talks with several well-known brands, Lee said.
“We wanted to offer a 100-percent free site to all our users and bring them some great additional services,” he noted. “With members from over 140 countries, and growing faster than we could ever have predicted, we are very proud of what we have achieved so far.
“We have the potential to be in half a million homes within the next 12 months, which is great for our advertisers.”
TheBoyZone.com offers chat, instant and private messaging, photo uploads and personal blogs. For more information, contact Lee via email.
