So don't treat it that way.
Producers, directors, actors of web series, take note:
The Huffington Post reports that Netflix is going to release the entire new season of Arrested Development All. At. Once.
I've been stressing to a few people working on web series that the last thing you want to do is have an entire season of 13 episodes and release them only once a week.
It.
Doesn't.
Work.
You know why? Because the other channels, like Facebook, Cracked, and Twitter, etc are way more interesting on the internet. If I watch one episode of your webseries, I MIGHT come back a week later to watch another, but only if you're my friend. I won't bookmark it. I won't remember to come back. You are going to have to annoy everyone on your facebook feed that your webseries' new episode is up and link to it so I'd watch. Maybe. But you won't get repeat viewings from people you don't know.
Because the truth is, most web series are not that good. The production value is low. There's sound issues. The visual quality isn't that great, and sometimes the actors are crap.
But if you have a good episode, and I can click on the next episode? Guess what. I'm going to click on it. I want to be instantly gratified. Because I'm at my computer and that's how I watch tv on it. I will go on Netflix streaming or Hulu Plus and watch an entire season of a show I like in a few sittings. I'll watch 3 episodes of a comedy at once. I'll sit through 2 hours of a drama in the same night. If I like something, I want to watch it. Even on my DVR, if I have three episodes of my favorite tv show waiting for me at home I want to watch them back to back to back. It's fun!
Television is changing. In ten years, (and most likely, way less than that) we'll get most of our series in one fell swoop, and we'll watch television shows series by series. We'll have big tv viewing parties, and they'll become entertainment events - where there's behind the scenes, the making of, and minor characters who spin off onto their own online webseries, that's right, ALL ONLINE. And the website they have with all their extras is also loaded with advertising, so the studios are making even more advertising money.
So if you have an indie webseries, and you know it's good, you know the production value is great, you know the acting is phenomenal -
Release the whole series at once.
Because people will watch an episode, and if they like it, they'll watch another. And another. And another.
And if it's bad - if I can watch another episode, I WILL. Schadenfreude.
