Alibaba just showed us the future of TV. But it’s kinda lame.

Last night I watched what was hailed as “the future of TV” – an epic gala performance broadcast on TV and streamed live over the web, directed by veteran Hollywood producer David Hill, famed for his Super Bowl and Academy Awards shows. Indeed it was Hill himself who made the bold claim for his largest ever production.

The live stream was interactive, tying strongly to online shopping in a way that I’ve never seen before.

The focus on shopping was inevitable because the gala was put on by Alibaba, China’s biggest ecommerce firm. It pulled out all the stops for the hours-long extravaganza, promising appearances from some of China’s hottest celebs alongside Katy Perry, Scarlett Johansson, and Kobe Bryant. The whole thing was designed to lead up to midnight and the beginning of today’s Singles Day shopping spree as China’s consumers grab discounts offered by pretty much every shopping app and website.

The gala live stream greets me with weirdness.

Photo credit on all screenshots in this story: Tech in Asia.

No idea when it started, but I watched the thing – inside Alibaba’s Tmall shopping app – for about three hours. The stream already has 450,000 viewers when the first guest star I recognize is wheeled out – Kobe Bryant.

An ad floating on the side distracts me from the hyper-friendly Bryant banter and antics, so I click it. It’s a pillow. Magical.

60,000 of them are up for grabs at a low price. The sales pitch has begun already.