How to land a book and movie deal through Twitter

When I first started following the updates of Justin, a 29 year old guy who lives with his 73 year old dad he had 40.000 Followers. Justin Halpern started ‘Shitmydadsays’ in August 2009 and now has over 700.000 people following the daily rants and remarks of his dad, who, until a few weeks ago, knew nothing about his son’s activities. Through his 72 tweets about his dad’s remarks he has now landed himself a bookdeal first and now a TV deal with the creators of will and Grace.

Yet another example of a creator of interesting content going directly to the users, this time incredibly fast…

Here’s some more information about the book- and TV deals

When moving in with your parents can land you a book deal | Technology | Los Angeles Times
latimesblogs.latimes.com | November 10, 2009
Quote: Justin had been scribbling down his dad’s rants and quips in a notebook since childhood. In the last year or so, he began updating his Google Talk instant messenger status with quotes to laugh about later with friends who know his dad. One of them, who had become quite adept at Twitter, suggested Justin use the service to actually preserve the fragments. (Google Talk statuses are not archived.) For a week or so after he created the account at the beginning of August, Stuff My Dad Says had five followers — all friends of Justin. His buddy, who runs a fairly popular Fake Michael Bay Twitter page (“EXPLOSIONS!”), asked Justin if he could give him a shout-out on the weekly #followfriday ritual, where Twitterers suggest friends to their followers.

Twitter fave Shit My Dad Says heads to TV
The Hollywood Reporter | November 10, 2009
Quote: Twitter sensation Shit My Dad Says is headed to television. CBS has picked up a comedy project based on the Twitter account, which has enlisted more than 700,000 followers since launching in August and has made its creator, Justin Halpern, an Internet star. “Will & Grace” creators David Kohan and Max Mutchnick are on board to executive produce and supervise the writing for the multicamera family comedy, which Halpern will co-pen with Patrick Schumacker. Halpern and Schumacker will also co-exec produce the Warner Bros. TV-produced project, which has received a script commitment.