Apple is moving forward with its reality TV show ‘Planet of the Apps’

Apple has been working on an unscripted TV series for a few months now. The TV show should be about the app economy, but it’s unclear how Apple is going to distribute it. Apple just announced an open casting call.

Thanks to this call, Apple is sharing a bit more about the show. It’s going to be called “Planet of the Apps” and feature app creators. The viewer is going to follow these developers as they receive advice from tech experts, funding from “top-tier VCs” and promotion in the App Store.

They’re going to shoot the show in Los Angeles starting on October 21 as you need to have a beta version of your app before then. 100 candidates will participate in this first season.

Propagate is co-producing the show. The production company is somewhat new — the Biggest Loser’s Ben Silverman and MasterChef Junior’s Ben Silverman are behind it. The singer/producer/thinkfluencer Will.i.am will also work on the show.

Also interesting, Product Hunt is helping when it comes to the open casting calls. The startup will organize four meetups in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Austin and New York to meet app developers.

It’s still surprising that Apple is distributing an original TV show. Unlike Netflix, Hulu and Amazon, the company doesn’t have a subscription-based movie and TV streaming service.

But Apple could also be using this show to promote the Apple TV. For instance, if the show is a big hit and is only available on the Apple TV, it could drive sales for the device.

But I wouldn’t bet on this strategy as the entire iTunes catalog is available on all of Apple’s devices. Splitting its customer base between multiple devices wouldn’t make sense now that people are increasingly watching movies and TV shows on different devices and not just the TV screen.