IT USES a crowdsourced itinerary — that’s the main idea behind AXN Philippines’ newest travel show, Adventure Your Way, which started airing on Feb. 8 on the Sony Network channel.
Hosted by Atom Araullo, every week the show poses two Philippine destinations on its dedicated Facebook page and asks visitors to vote on which experience Mr. Araullo will do.
On a post dated Feb. 12, the show put “Torpedo Boating” up against “Inter-island Ziplining” in Samar and asked fans which activity would appeal to them more. A casual inspection of the comments showed “Torpedo Boating” to be the more popular choice.
“I think it comes with the times as well, we felt that it was a good opportunity for us to combine the TV platform as well as the online platform,” Armi Malaluan, director and business head for Sony Pictures Television Philippines, told BusinessWorld during the show’s launch on Feb. 1 at Cities Events Place in Quezon City.
In its pilot episode, which aired on Feb. 8, Mr. Araullo was taken to Cebu where he went skydiving for the first time as well as trekking to the less well-known Tinubdan falls. On the second episode, Mr. Araullo went to Sagada to visit the Blue Soil hills. The activities were suggested by the show’s viewers
“The crowdsourcing helps a lot because it gives suggestions wherein there are adventures that are not even in our options… [because of this] it’s more exciting than what we used to do,” Ms. Malaluan explained.
She described the 30-minute show as “spontaneous” and “actually engages the audience.”
“It’s not like a full-scripted production show,” she said.
Aside from airing every Thursday at 8:30 p.m., Adventure Your Way also uploads its videos on its Facebook and YouTube pages.
“Now, on a local production we are encouraging viewers to be more engaged. We can’t just say ‘we’re TV so we’ll stick to TV’ — we also want to attract the younger audience by being on social media,” Ms. Malaluan said, adding that more of the network’s productions will be utilizing social media more and more.
Adventure your Way airs every Thursday, 8:30 p.m., on AXN. AXN is available on Cablelink ch. 38, Cignal ch. 121, Destiny Cable ch. 49, Dream Satellite TV ch. 20, G Sat ch. 51 and SkyCable ch. 49 (HD is on 247). — Zsarlene B. Chua
