Unless you are what is commonly referred to as an internet geek, or a very anxious television executive, chances are you will not have been following the adventures of Codex, Bladezz, Vork, Tinkerballa, Zaboo and Clara in recent months. They are the lead characters of a zippy sitcom called The Guild, but don’t waste your time searching the television channels to find it. The Guild, written and produced by the splendid Felicia Day, is a web serial.

If that brings to mind sad adolescent boys skulking in their bedrooms, obsessing over low-quality images of equally sad wannabe celebrities, think again. The Guild is original, skillfully performed and funny. It has received some impressive accolades already in its short life: the SXSW, YouTube and Yahoo Web Series awards for 2008. And then check out its numbers: 9m web-wide hits for the 10 episodes of its first series, 55,000 subscribers to its YouTube channel. This, be assured, is the future of comic performance.

If you are a budding comedian or scriptwriter, you now have a viable alternative to schlepping around TV studios trying to appeal to jaded middle managers who have already seen half a dozen unfunny hopefuls that week, and will almost certainly not get the joke anyway. Here is the solution: bypass them entirely. This is the clearest possible indication that a whole tier of cultural brokers (and we must include newspapers in this) is about to be confined to the margins of the creative industries.

If you watch an episode or two of The Guild over the internet as a result of reading this column, you will be taking part in something of a revolution. Day, red-haired, quirkily beautiful and as skilled in the portrayal of neurotic self-effacement as the early Woody Allen, says she felt a square peg in Hollywood’s round hole when trying to pitch her idea for a sitcom about a community of computer gamers.

She was trying to put the final touches to a half-hour pilot before embarking on the joyless trawl of studio auditions when a friend had a better idea: why not put some short segments from the episode online? Day, a self-confessed former gaming addict, needed little convincing.

She had enough money, and goodwill from colleagues, to put two short segments online. From episode three, a small band of viewers began to make voluntary donations to keep the series going. Today the show’s website lists 400 individual donors.

The really clever thing about The Guild is that it is an extended joke on internet geeks. It has made a self-referential bond between medium and message. It preaches to the converted, or at least the afflicted. And it refuses to patronise them: production values are high, scripts finely honed. Already at the end of its second series, it remains to be seen whether the joke can be extended much further.

Whatever the medium, the most difficult task in all of situation comedy is knowing when the laughs have been drained from the situation. It is no coincidence that Fawlty Towers and The Office, each pulled by their creators after two series, are considered the landmarks of the genre. But Day has already made her mark, not least with her empowering conclusion from her experience: “You don’t have to have permission to make your art.” She says the series was born from an “I’ll show you” attitude towards the broadcasting authorities. “And I hope it rubs off on other people.”

. . .

It’s rubbing, all right. Another intriguing web serial finding success at present is the ominously titled Star Trek Phase II. Yes, I know what you are thinking. Boys in their bedrooms again, except that the bedrooms have been turned into the deck of the Starship Enterprise, and an unhealthy amount of emotion has been expended on the creation of pointed ears.

Well, it is a little like that. But there is an air of solemnity about this recreation of the original series from the 1960s that is strangely appealing. The episodes have been made by fans, mixed with participants from the original show (most notably George “Sulu” Takei). They are properly scripted, designed and performed.

The makers of Star Trek Phase II, have a cast-iron justification for what seems like an unseemly retreat into their childhoods. The characters of Kirk, Spock and McCoy, the stars of the original series, should be treated as nothing less than cultural archetypes, “like Willy Loman from Death of a Salesman, Gandalf from Lord of the Rings or even Hamlet, Othello or Romeo,” they say.

Well, perhaps. The point is, they have the unprecedented technological means with which to enact their thoughts and feelings on the issue. Any air of pomposity that surrounds the enterprise, as it were, is dissipated by its cheerful democratic nature: “Volunteer recruitment for Kitumba [the eighth episode] has begun!” trumpets the website’s home page. “Visit our recruitment page to volunteer.”

This is truly a startling age for culture. Its traditional mediators and arbiters of taste are going to find it difficult to adapt to what is a dramatically different landscape. They may be dispensed with entirely; or they may, in more limited numbers, become even more important in drawing attention to the gems amid the dross. Kitumba beckons. Take it seriously.

peter.aspden@ft.com
More columns at www.ft.com/aspden