Can you survive on a tropical island with a smartphone?

Forget Corné Krige and Mark Fish. If there is someone you want to be stuck on an island with it’s Discovery Channel’s Survivorman, Les Stroud. In fact, unless your mortality was inextricably tied to a round-the-palms triathlon relay with Wilson, the ball from Castaway, I’m convinced the duo of South African sporting legends would prove rather useless.

SOS Island: Survival of the Smartest

What am I talking about? Well, Corné and Mark will be leading South African viewers through another tedious chapter of Survivor, the show that just won’t die. Les Stroud (an actual survivor of things) is doing something altogether new. And rather smart. He’s teamed up with Samsung to highlight the Samsung GALAXY S4 zoom and GALAXY NX in a new global online reality television show – SOS Island: Survival of the Smartest. And instead of winning a wooden statue called ‘Immunity’ you win the whole island!

Here’s how it works

Les Stroud will train 16 global contestants in the art of survival on a tropical island in the Caribbean. The eight strongest contestants will then be marooned on SOS Island and compete in challenges designed by the survival expert himself. Contestants will be armed with only the GALAXY S4 Zoom and GALAXY NX camera and will have to use the smartphones and cameras to streamline their daily experiences live to the world. Yes. Live. To the world.

SOS Island will broadcast on YouTube and Facebook from 30 September to 31 November. Viewers will have a chance to vote for their favourite cast away on www.sos-island.com. The ultimate winner will be announced on 9 December and will win their own private island experience, a prize valued at $100 000.

‘This will be a really big adventure for the contestants and the online fans,’ says Les Stroud who is, as you’re reading this, scouring the globe for creative thrill seekers who have the endurance to compete in unique and creative challenges in part one of the series in the Caribbean. Think you have what it takes? Go on, take a swing. Even if you don’t win you’ll come out of it with real-world survival training, which is always handy to have.

How you can enter

Global casting for SOS Island is currently underway and closes on Monday 2 September, which means you have one week to apply.