The United Talent Agency, connected with people such as Vince Vaughn, Jack Black, M. Night Shyamalan and Dick Wolf, has created an online department to search for unknown creatives that can produce quality online video content and look to place them in online productions or in old media.
It's interesting to see how much the Internet has disrupted so many things in the entertainment industry. Anybody can find those that are creating unique online experiences and hire them directly. The talent agencies obviously understand the threat that this poses to their current business model.
“It starts with just helping identify people on both sides of the aisle,” said Brent Weinstein, head of the new division, UTA Online. “The barrier to entry is so low, everybody is now a potential artist. So there’s this great unwashed of talent out there, 99.999 percent of which is probably not good enough to have a traditional film and television career. But on the Internet, a lot of different types of things 
go. And yet for buyers, this is a wall of people, so how does a brand know which one of them can help it execute?”
With an understanding that they aren't necessarily seeking to use people they discover to immediately turn over to Hollywood, I think this is a good strategy. They understand that there's an insatiable demand for online content that puts them in a good place to provide.
Other talent agencies are already online, but most of them are simply using it to leverage their existing clients, rather than find new ones to represent, with an online focus being the primary purpose. This will be an interesting experiment to watch to see if online creative people will want to be represented by an agency.
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