A Morrisville self-publishing venture, Lulu.com, has formed an Internet video cooperative that will pay filmmakers whose homemade videos register the most online visits.

The new feature on Lulu.tv was introduced last week as a business model to bypass Hollywood and other syndicates that control access to getting films made and distributed. Lulu's founder, free-market enthusiast Bob Young, founded Red Hat, the open-source software company in Raleigh that allows users to modify the programming code without violating copyright.

Lulu.tv is one of an increasing number of free Internet sites dedicated to private videos and films. The sites have gained in popularity with the spread of high-speed Internet connections.

Anyone can post video clips at Lulu.tv, as long as the material is not violent or pornographic. The company's team of moderators -- about five interns aged 22 to 25 -- pick their favorites to showcase on Lulu's home page. The rest can be viewed by category, such as animation, artsy, cutesy, geek, parody, twisted and weird.

But Lulu.tv is trying to differentiate itself from popular video sites such as Youtube.com and Metacafe.com. Lulu wants to host video content that will be viewed by a larger audience, not just homemade clips for family and friends.

Toward that end, Lulu has added a financial incentive to reward talent by creating a new class of members who pay $14.95 a month into a communal pot that will be distributed to the makers of videos that generate the most online traffic. Lulu.tv will keep 20 percent of the money as an administrative fee and distribute the rest. The video that gets 10 percent of the traffic will net 10 percent of the fund. Lulu.tv, which has gained 15 paying members so far by word-of-mouth, is seeding the pot with $5,000.

"The general public is the rating system," Young said. "The videographers are paid based on the popularity of their videos."

Lulu was formed in 2002 to let people publish electronic or print editions of books. The company has produced 55,000 self-published books and employs 60 people, 45 of them in Morrisville.

Wilmington filmmaker Rob Hill signed up with Lulu.tv to gain exposure for his video work. Hill directed "The Fort Fisher Hermit," a 2004 documentary about the mysterious disappearance of a local recluse. The documentary is available on DVD from Lulu.com.

"I'll spend 2 to 3 hours just surfing video on" lulu.tv, Hill said.

Hill doesn't expect to strike it rich with Lulu.tv and considers the monthly fee as a cost of doing business. But the occasional home video that achieves cult status and is viewed over and over by millions of people worldwide could come out smelling like roses.

Each month, paying members will tell Lulu which videos they want to enter in the contest. They can enter multiple videos, month after month.

The popularity of the videos, which determines how the money is distributed, will be calculated using a formula, said Lulu engineer James McDermott. The public won't know which videos, out of the hundreds on the site, have been entered in the contest that month.

Video producers can't inflate their score by repeatedly clicking on their own film, but they are encouraged to rack up points by generating traffic at the site.

"The people who'll be successful on Lulu are people who bring an audience with them," Young said. "If you have 10,000 friends and they're willing to watch your lame video, then yes, you can scam Lulu and get paid more than some who don't have 10,000 friends."