At The LiveFronts in New York City on Tuesday, the leaders of Viacom Labs revealed how they’re using a new technology to put fans in the livestreaming driver’s seat.

“We’re always looking for new ways to connect with our fans and to co-create with them,” explained Susan Claxton, co-head of Viacom Labs, a division of the company dedicated to innovation in media. “We found this piece of technology that basically takes your mobile device and turns it into a production track.”

The new technology allows fans who are already using apps such as Instagram, Periscope and Facebook Live to input a specified hashtag that triggers a live broadcast from their personal mobile device and inputs it in a TV program.

Viacom piloted the technology by partnering with MTV Australia and having fans broadcast their own video alongside music videos just by simply typing in a hashtag.

“We took an hour of music videos and asked fans to put in the hashtag ‘MTVStepUp.’ We could instantly port them into the TV,” Claxton said. “We could put a graphic on top of the music videos with fans dancing along to Gwen Stefani.”

This type of innovative fan engagement is at the heart of Viacom Labs’ mission.

“The mission for Viacom Labs is to explore the future of fan experiences and fan engagement,” said Claxton.

“What I’m most excited about is that we can really start to think about what media could and should be doing in the 21st century,” she added.

But first, Viacom is focusing on what new media innovations we’ll see in 2017.

“Priorites for 2017 for Labs are AR [augmented reality], mixed reality and VR [virtual reality]—so I’d love to push and see how those technologies can make livestreaming an even more immersive experience,” said Claxton.

Claxton’s co-head of Viacom Labs, Kiel Berry, agreed: “Immersive livestream social experiences could be the next iteration of where livestream goes.”

But first comes monetization. “There’s always a place for brands in every medium,” said Berry.

“I think we’ll start to see new types of advertising that are native to livestreaming that we may not have seen yet,” Berry added. “There’s so much white space on how that engagement is going to happen.”

Aside from questions around monetization, legal issues are another challenge.

“There’s a lot of risk,” Claxton said of livestreaming TV. “You’re putting people on TV, you don’t know what they’re going to do. So we’re working with our legal team – making sure people aren’t putting on logos, playing music that’s not cleared.”

But Viacom’s Lab team is constantly looking toward the future. Berry admitted that he looks past millennials to his young cousins who are all Generation Z for inspiration.

“If you look down to the younger kids, they’re looking at livestreaming now and that will be old to them when they get to 10, 15 years old.”

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