Singapore microdrama boom: SupermodelMe & more
Source: The Straits Times
Published on: 2026-04-15 06:32
SINGAPORE - In 2009, Singaporean producer Karen Seah launched the reality modelling competition SupermodelMe as a web series. The same year, she founded Refinery Media as an internet-forward production company. She believed in the digital revolution: YouTube launched in 2005; Netflix began streaming in the United States in 2007, and by 2009, the majority of Singapore households had broadband internet access. Ms Seah bet that Singaporeans would watch a long-form show on their laptops and internet-linked televisions. She was wrong - SupermodelMe's first season's viewership numbers were lacklustre. "We had to walk back the concept of a web series. We were too ahead of our time. People were not watching shows online as much as they do now," she says. All was not lost. Traditional platforms liked the concept, so the show in which women are judged on modelling skills thrived on cable and ...
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