File Under "That Really is a Train at the End of the Tunnel, Dave"
Dave Van Dyke, president of a radio industry consulting firm, Bridge Ratings LLC of Glendale (Los Angeles County), said most podcasts are by nature amateurish, and called their audience a "blip on the radar.'' Less than one-tenth of 1 percent have even heard about it,'' he said.
Still, the rise of podcasting and booming sales of portable digital audio players is causing the radio industry to take notice, not necessarily because it poses a threat, but because it represents a new method of distribution, Van Dyke said. "
Hmmm... not as easy and straightforward as one might hope or think. My Adobe Premiere Elements software is not here yet, but I should check the online documentation to ensure it can edit MPEG4 clips. So far, not much can, including (believe it or not) the Ulead SW that came with my Xacti camera.
So, I told my wife last week, after leaving the Mariners-Padres Spring Training complex, that I’d bet the newspaper in San Diego (Union-Tribune) would love to show its readers video clips of the Padres warming up in Spring Training. The paper certainly cannot afford to send a reporter this early to Arizona to cover the team. Heck, I’d be willing to just have the team link to this blog and see Jake Peavy warm up and take a glance at beloved former Padre Dave Winfield.
It’s the future: citizen journalism. Let’s put aside the fact that I was a newspaper reporter and columnist for more than 10 years. Even if I were an untrained person with a video camera and I shot 10 minutes of the Padres walking from the clubhouse to the field, I’d bet fans in the San Diego area (as well as San Diego expats) would eat the content up with a cyber-spoon.
The paper doesn’t need to pay citizen journalists. Just link to my site and let me monetize the traffic (if I want) via ads. Most reasonable citizen journalists would be willing to agree to a code of conduct; heck, if the paper is willing to drive traffic to my site (after it gets traffic to its site and improves its brand image), why on earth would I or any citizen journalist want to kill this golden goose? Yes, there will be people who take advantage and do things on their sites that is deemed inappropriate; I will guarantee you this (as a veteran newspaper person), it won’t be anything worse than I have seen in the paper over the years. I can recall a typo in a Seattle-area newspaper where the Milwaukee NBA team's name was printed with the letter above and to the left of "B" on the keyboard.
It’s not just events like Padres Spring Training. It’s all sorts of micro-local content that is outside the economic constraints of the newspaper’s coverage parameters. It includes meetings, festivals, social gatherings and "stuff" that people in the community care dearly about. Today, and in the future, newspapers will have to do far more with a lot less. Why not turn avid (and talented) readers into citizen journalists?
This will evolve in a few ways:
Newspapers will begin to tap into citizens as extensions of their local coverage. The paper will appoint an editor who will review content to make sure it’s fit to print. The paper will link to the CJ’s site. I think newjersey.com did this. It still might.
Newspapers will develop an ecosystem using a product such as iUpload (and others) to allow individuals to develop content for the newspaper. This platform contains a workflow engine so the citizen journalists can be tightly integrated into the newspaper’s process. There are many permutations of this scheme.
Citizen journalists Websites (such as Backfence) will emerge to build out community newspaper solely built on the talent of local writers, photographers, Videobloggers and Podcasters. Some of these sites will employ a workflow process and a template to ensure continuity; others will just go free form and post individuals’ contributions as is.
I have to tell you, it’s really cool to participate in this citizen journalism trend. It’s amazing the number of people who have something to say or are willing to jot a few notes about an issue of local interest. As newspapers get further away from being to afford micro-local coverage (hyperlocal journalism, so to speak), and the big Medias Titans (Yahoo, MSN, Google) take an interest in local content, the greater the impact of citizen journalism. Newspapers are warned.
There are tons of skeptics out there doubting the veracity of this trend. To them, I say, “Why not?”
Oakland A's rookie relief pitcher Huston Street is destined to be a fan favorite. We saw him save the championship game of the Arizona Fall League last year. He has stuff plus poise.
Spring Training games are a week away, but the players are here and getting ready. These clips are a few hours old from the Mariners and Padres Spring Training camps. Once my video editing software arrives, I hope to create a short "show" with titles, transitions, etc...
I'd like to see a show of hands of people who want to hear NASCAR racing events on radio.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. on Tuesday said it would broadcast NASCAR (news - web sites) racing starting in 2007, adding another pricey sports package to its roster, but said it would sell advertising on a channel devoted to the hugely popular auto racing circuit.
My Sanyo Xacti camera has arrived. I had to make some poor USPS employee work on Presidents Day. She said she was only getting regular pay, but she was moving kinda slow so she won’t be covering a lot of turf today. Must be a tribute to one of our lazier Presidents.
I am impressed at the expedience of the camera delivery given it was shipped from out of the country. The camera did not come with a memory card. So, we’re off to Costco for a 1GB SD memory card.
This all popped into my head at once. I will no doubt write abut this in greater length and detail with Mike as part of our ongoing research.
We were watching “$40 A Day” and Rachel Ray was in Salem, Oregon (for some reason). She pulled out a newspaper clipping and showed a breakfast recommendation that was listed in an old story. I told my wife that’s really inefficient, but couldn’t think of a better solution. I mean who doesn’t have reams of newspaper clippings in folders, on desks, clipped to bulletin boards that turn yellow around the edges, outliving any usefulness.
On the other hand, consumer content management is hot. Ask Jeeves buys Bloglines, Yahoo! Adds a denser RSS-based My Yahoo!, plus all those companies at DEMO (most notable, Pluck). The problem is that all of this content management happens on your PC. So, in the case of content foraging, you don’t have access to all that “managed” content outside the PC.
So, here are a few premises:
The mobile phone guys will never get it. They will never figure out how to deliver content other than ringtones and maybe some MP3 tunes. They will never understand the user needs to be in control. They may try, but historically, they have not been able to pull it off, plus, in the future WiFi and other broader high speed connection schemes will knock the heck out of their commodity cell phone service. (Skype plus WiFi= the death of mobile phones)
If Adam Curry can build a simple software product to manage Podcasts, Ipodder, then it could be just as easier to build an RSS engine that transports text and other formats from PC to device.
If the iPod is a hard disk with lots of storage, it can handle a lot more than just music.
If the iPod has a cool interface that simply facilitates music management, it could do the same for any content.
If the iPod (well, any device) employs a black & white interface, it could build a color one just as easily.
The world of content management is striving to manage content on any device.
So, imagine this: you have a RSS organizer that allows you to stream headlines from The New York Times (or stories from this blog) onto your iPod (or any similar device). You can save and organize these feeds using one of the emerging content management interfaces. So, when you go to Salem, Oregon, and you want that breakfast review, you take out your “MP3 player” and there it is. On this device you have your directions, your reviews/recommendations, your news, etc.. And, by the way, you still have your music.
You want to see something really cool—check out ESPN Sports Nation and see animated versions of some of the network’s best commentators give 30 second sound bites on what’s hot in the sports world. As the folks in the UK would say--"Brilliant!"
Those ESPN folks are ALWAYS ahead of the curve. ESPN 360 was a nice taste of the future. I can hardly wait to see what’s next from those guys from BristolUniversity.
The New York Times Company announced today that it has reached an agreement to acquire About, Inc., a leading online consumer information provider, from PRIMEDIA Inc. (NYSE:PRM) in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $410 million. The acquisition is subject to customary regulatory approvals and is expected to be completed late this quarter or early in the second quarter.
Guess I am missing something here. The only far-out idea I have is that The New York Times turns About.Com into a citizen journalism stronghold. They’d better kill off those annoying pop-ups and get better guides if they want the idea to work.
This is reason number no.10 that I know we are back in the dot.com era. In the mid '90s, everyone would say, "our secret sauce is..." referring to "the thing" that makes their product or service different or better than anyone else's...
In the past month, I have heard at least 10 companies refer to their "secret sauce" in 1 on 1 pitches. Who knew the fast-food burgermeisters would have added so much to our lexicon?
This is how Napster happened. Consumers wanted music downloads and couldn’t wait for tardy record labels to figure out how to legitimately offer them. So, entrepreneurs who didn’t live by standard rules, didn’t wait for cumbersome market research studies to see a market opportunity and built a powerful P2P network. The folks from Napster basically opened their eyes and saw the need.
So, we’ll see if the folks from News Corp/Fox wake up and smell an opportunity. Since folks from the UK are illegally downloading episodes of “24,” wouldn’t it make sense for Fox to offer them legitimately? It’s not that consumers want to be pirates, but in today’s digital universe, if there is a compelling demand, folks will figure out an illegal way of fulfilling that demand if powers that be fail to offer the legal means.
We’re not talk about episodes of “24” on cell phones. Ugh. We’re talking next day, one-time viewing of “24.” With the advent of such remote viewing services as Orb Networks and Sling Media, the need for Fox to offer such a time-shifted deal is more than compelling; it’s a darned near necessity.
Think this topic will be discussed at the big News Corp. strategy pow-wow in New York? I doubt it!
Been a while since I looked at Icerocket. Whoa. Very interesting. Not only does the ‘Rocket search the Web, it searches multimedia files (with links to legit sites where you can download the discovered media), blogs, phone pix (really) and personals. It does some sort of metacrawl through all sorts of personals sites to find the right someone for you. Pound for pound, Icerocket is a player.
Question—shouldn’t the site be called Icemaverick given its owner owns the M’s and not the Rockets?
I read the story on the front page of the WSJ today about SBC’s plans to offer IPTV services. What I read gave me a chilling reminder of efforts of yesteryear—Time Warner’s Orlando project (the set top boxes melted through testers’ TV sets); the Columbus, Ohio QUBE system; Interactive Networks; TV Answer, etc.. It’s now a graveyard of broken dreams and misunderstood consumer behavior.
I am not here to say SBC will fail at its IPTV project. I am saying there are serious issues. Among them:
*I am not convinced people want to buy all their services from one provider. Sure, you get one bill, but one provider means no competition meaning the one “triple or quadruple play” provider can easily get fat and lazy. (not to mention stupid) The one bill story is old and tired. Is it difficult to pay more than one bill? I don’t se it as an edge.
*I am totally unconvinced that any large provider knows what consumers want to watch. Time and time again, big providers have tried and failed. The 80-20 rule applies for most satellite and cable users—80 percent of the people watch only 20 percent of the available programming. The rest is just there for show. Who knows what I want to watch on TV more than my friends and peers. They are my TV network. If you give people to ability to share and recommend programming, and enable them to become self-programmers and viral content sharers, then you are good to go.
*Tangential to the previous thought, I spoke with the CEO of Xfire yesterday. XFire has a million users, perhaps 60,000 simultaneous at a peak time. Their ability to virally share games with one another makes you wonder how they would be as TV programmers for one another. Allow one “super connector” (A Tipping Point term) the ability to find a cool, old episode of “Twilight Zone” and share it with people he or she knows would like that episode, then you have a real IPTV network. You want business models? There are many that work here. My friends and peers know what I like; the telcos and networks do not.
*While IPTV begins to shape up as a formal service, informal broadband television rapidly emerges. TV search and P2P sharing is spearheading this revolution. Short four and five minute clips (Atom Film, iFilm, Jib Jab…) are feeding this frenzy. Videoblogs are feeding this frenzy. People see something they like and then email it to their five best friends, and so on… If you think videoblogs and the like are a bunch of amateurs you are way off base. If you don’t think CNN is in peril as people look to create citizen built, home-brewed local and national TV news networks (Fueled by citizens), then you are watching the world pass you by.
*Lastly, the critics are salivating. One misstep, one big tech trial, one delay and the pundits will be all over the formal IPTV networks as another pipedream. It will be another joke along the high-tech cocktail party scene. Execution, marketing and programming will have to be flawless. Formal IPTV networks will have to work like your instant-on TV or the technorati will be all over the providers tearing them limb from limb. We’ve all seen it before.
Will IPTV work? Yes. Will IPTV as a formal service work? Yes, but not in the form described today in the WSJ. Stay tuned.
For three days, I have been a shadow attendee at a local tech conference that had an odd policy on outside research analysts. Whatever. As a shadow delegate, I have met with some folks whose companies are in my “research space” since they were in town.
Anyway, while waiting for a meeting, I overheard one of those conversations you can only hear in the lobby of a conference hotel. As background, the hotel was also hosting a group of osteopaths. The scene was a husband and wife (I assume an osteopath and his wife) and a younger man, clearly a marketing sort for a conference organizing company.
Conference organizer: You know, we’d better make our plans pretty soon, because cadavers are expensive and in short supply. If we need a few for the conference, we’d better lock in a date.
Osteopath: You’re right.
Conference organizer: Now that we have that settled, let’s talk about the most important item on the agenda—are you free for dinner tonight? There’s a great steak place up near PinnaclePeak.
At that point, I got up and left otherwise I would have lost my lunch.
I just purchased (online) the Sanyo Xacti MPEG-4 camera. After some discussion in the videoblogging news group, my take was confirmed: since I am not interested in making home movies, a camera that uses MPEG-4 and is based on digital storage, is the way to go.
After sitting next to Serious Magic’sMark Randall at dinner last night, I guess I’d now better make good on my promise to him—have a cool new “TV show” online by mid-March.
SBC Communications plans to launch a new digital download service to compete with Netflix and other movie rental subscription firms as part of a new broadband entertainment initiative.
Is the best way to plan for the future to point to what the other guy is doing and think you can do it better? If all the telcos plan on offering over their new networks is same old, same old (in the guise of IPTV), then they are doomed.
Great announcement from the BBC, but I don't see distribution of "Kumars at No. 42" on its list. Just a bunch of borning drawing-room dramas and documentaries. Wise up.
Movielink and BBC Worldwide Americas Expand Content Offering to Include Additional Documentaries and Literary Adaptations; Movielink to Unveil New BBC Branded Section on Service
I have mentioned before that my wife is a big fan of Ronn Owens on KGO (810 AM, San Francisco) . Today, one of his guests is an expert on teenaged behavior (yes, an oxymoron). She cannot listen live on her PC, so I am capturing it (don’t ask how) and will save it as an MP3 for her to listen to later.
Note to all radio stations: PLEASE OFFER PODCASTS. If Mike and I can do it, you can too! Your advertisers will like the extended shelf life of their ads.
I actually watched the Grammy ® Awards from darned near cover to cover. I liked a lot of the live performances and could even tolerate Queen Latifah (nee Dana Owens). I have no problem with the Queen, but her hop scotching from street cred to parlor room acceptance is something to see. She can go from “Yo, yo yo with da homies” to round tabling at The Café Carlyle piano bar ala Bobby Short in one split second. That’s great marketing. Or at least a great attempt at same.
I liked the U2 performance (I was a lucky person who scored concert tickets) and even marveled at Marc Anthony’s voice as he duet-ed with J-Lo. Difficult to believe he played a thug in one of my favorite action films, “The Substitute.” My two big moments were Kanye West doing “Jesus Walks” and Stevie Wonder belting out three notes from “Isn’t She Lovely.” Damn, Little Stevie still has it.
By and large, the country stuff bored me, except the Southern Rock tribute that brought my wife to her feet, hopping and bopping in the kitchen. She lived in GA in the ‘70s and was lucky to be at the epicenter of the Allman Brothers, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Charlie Daniels, etc… BTW, where was Charlie and his fiddle made of gold? It was good to see Loretta Lynn, but in my mind’s eye, I imagine Sissy Spacek, the coal miner’s daughter, as Ms. Lynn. (From the movie of the same name).
The TV commercials weren’t very good, and I mostly left the room to see how many people STILL are coming to this site to see Nikki Capelli news. No, you will not find any nude pictures of her here. Just sarcasm.
Now that Mike and I have mastered the elements of creating an ongoing ‘cast (we call it a MADCast), I am ready to move on to the next step, creating a videoBlog/Vblog/TV program (whatever you want to call it). I have been holding off buying a camera til I had an idea.
So, I am going to create “The Low-Tech TV Network” as part of this site. Here’s my plan: I am going to buy a video camera of some sort. I will get away with as cheap as possible at this point. I then will build a small set somewhere in my home. I will enlist the assistance of my budding videographer to be camera-person and assist with the editing. Think of something that sits between the late, great Tech TV (hence the title homage) and “Wayne’s World.”
Each program (figure five minutes in length, the length of a long TV news feature) will focus on a tech topic. I will be the talent. Before you roll over from laughter, I must humbly admit I have a good deal of TV experience. Without going into detail, I hosted a cable TV program, On Video, (sometime, I will digitize and post). The show appeared on Tempo TV, the predecessor to CNBC. I also helped produce the show. For a while, in the mid-‘80s, I also appeared as a regular on the ABC-TV program “Home” with Robb Weller and Sandy Hill. Enough about that, the point is, I am experienced and will work cheap. BTW, did you know Robb Weller invented “the wave” when he was a Yell King at UW?
I plan on using this great SW from Serious Magic to pull this all together. From what I gather, Visual Communicator will allow me to knit together such elements as Web pages, presentations, etc… into the final product.
Once I have an actual show in hand, that’s when the fun begins. That’s when I try out my idea to build and distribute TV content using all sorts of great conduits such as Grouper, Mercora, etc…
I am shooting to have my first show done by mid-March. Stay tuned!
Mega kudos to GM (yes, the car guys) for launching a “Podcast” from The Chicago Auto Show. One note: the only way of accessing the ‘cast is by pasting the XML code into a RSS reader (such as Pluck or Bloglines). There also must be the means to simply click on an MP3 button and hear it “live.’ The need to offer instant gratification is a must.
I have to wonder....if GM continues to see the value of Podcasting, will it continue down the path of supporting the dead-end proposition of satellite radio?
I am becoming a huge fan of Skype. Skype is a computer phone client that allows users to communicate PC to PC and from PC to phones over the phone network(PSTN). While I attempt to figure out how to record Skype as an Audiocast resource, I marvel at its inherent capabilities. The sound quality is amazing and certainly will get better over time. I also am startled at the millions of people logged on to Skype at any given moment.
I read today about a few companies who are looking to add Skype to their devices (such as the Blackberry ®) and use wireless Internet as the delivery medium as opposed to cell carriage. If I were a cell company, I’d be NERVOUS.
As I mentioned in my Super Bowl ad review, the Go Daddy ad featured Nikki Capelli. I thought it was the same name as a character in the movie, 'My Blue Heaven." I was right. Wonder if it was intentional? Click below.
I have read the rumors of AOL eyeing the online storage business. A great move, if you ask me. I wrote yesterday about the emerging “blogosphere,” and if you want to add anything to your blog beyond text or low-res graphics, you will need remote, hosted storage. You cannot imagine how space adds up when you bang out a few 15 minute Audiocasts (aka Podcasts). Once Vblogging becomes even more mainstream, storage will be even more of an issue. The Bloggers (the blogging SW/service component of Google, that is) of the world do not offer the ability for users to store multimedia files. It will be a BIG business. It's why GoDaddy bought the Super Bowl ad; to tell the world about its hosting capabilities and storage. Think that message got across?
The advancement of blogspheres at the major search and Portal sites is a huge move forward for the distribution of independent content (off all types).
I am still not crazy about the phone quality of the MADCasts. With my current set up, though, it might be as good as it gets. The best quality I have produced was last week when I recorded our call to an audio recorder and then actually placed the recorder next to a microphone and fed it into Audacity. Sad, but it worked best. My attempts at direct recording have failed.
To do it best, we need a digital hybrid system. At this point, I am not sure I want to invest $500 or more for something for a “test” system. Given the nature of our project, we cannot get sponsors less it will destroy the credibility and objectivity which is essential for our work.
I am going to try and get Mike to download Skype, an Internet phone product that allows computer to computer recording. I think I know how to record those calls.
*If you go to the Go Daddy Website, the ad that did not run is there plus an explanation from Go Daddy’s CEO, Bob Parsons. I am not prude, but there is something somewhat questionable toward the end. One more thing—am I just a crazy film buff, or did the ad feature Nikki Capelli as homage to a character in the Steve Martin film, “My Blue Heaven?”
*I totally missed the MSN Search ad. I saw it this morning on the iFilm page. It’s a decent ad, but nothing spectacular.
*In my review of the ads, I didn’t mention the car ads. Mostly because no one buys a car based on a TV ad. Or least no one in his or her right mind.
*The Vcast ad for Verizon does not mention the cost of the service, the cost of a new phone or the fact that current Verizon service holders probably must extend their service agreements to get the broadband content. Until the cell companies allow current customers to just buy new phones WITHOUT a penalty, these new services will flounder.
Here’s a quick look at Super Bowl 39 commercials. By and large, they were tame and not memorable… that is unless (like me) you miss M.C. Hammer. Hammer was in two ads (Ameriquest and Frito Lay)
**Olympus M:robe—Who cares about the commercial. I like the form factor of the product!
**FedEx Kinkos—My favorite. I smile anytime Burt Reynolds gets kicked in the groin.
**GoDaddy—I swear the local paper here reported that the ad was rejected by Fox. It aired nonetheless. It was as raunchy as the ads went this year. Had nothing to do with an Internet naming service. Stinko!
**Ameriquest and Nationwide—Best set of ads. “Life comes at you quickly.” The one with the guy holding the cat by the tail in a vat of tomato sauce was good.
**McDonalds—The Lincoln French Fry was flat out bad.
**Napster—Did anyone other than the technocrats understand what Napster now is selling?
**Careerbuilder—Monkeys? Are you kidding me? I do like when they Xerox ® their butts.
**Anheuser-Busch—Clapping for U.S. service people in the airport. Nice touch in light of the generally horrible beer ads during the game.
**Pepsi—P Diddy arrives in a Pepsi truck. X-to-the-Z saved that spot from disaster
**Degree—Mamas Boy dolls. A bit overboard. Had nothing at all to do with the product.
**NFL Network—Maybe the very best ad. All the players who didn’t make the Super Bowl (Rothlisberger, etc...) singing “The Sun Will Come out Tomorrow.” Nice touch.
Notes: The beer commercials stunk. My wife liked the ones with the animals for Budweiser, but I didn’t get it. The Heineken ad with Brad Pitt was trite but very well produced.
I donwloaded a copy of Mixcast Live, a new Podcasting SW package. From an initial look-see, it seems worth the $39. It won't resolve my issues with recording phone calls, but it will allow me to use music effectively for intro-outro.
In my line of work, I come in contact with all sorts of cool companies. Many think they are cool and are somewhat clueless. Some don't even realize how cool they are.
I thought it might be worthwhile to mention a few every now and then. I won't go into great detail--not a good idea vis-a-vis my job and work with paying clients--but a simple heads-up is certainly within bounds.
Yahoo Japan, owned mostly by Softbank and partly by Yahoo, on Tuesday launched a test, or "beta," version of Yahoo Japan Blogs, a free service that lets users post blogs and up to 2GB of images, comment on other blogs, and associate their blogs with animated representations of users known as avatars.
"This is a basic community service," said a Yahoo Japan spokesperson who asked not to be named. "Last year there was a blog boom in Japan. Lots of portals have blogs now. So we came in late. But when we start, it will have an impact on a lot of Internet users here."
The launch could have implications for Yahoo users in the United States, too
I get energized when I get to talk about the work Mike and I are doing. Today, I was lucky enough to present in front of a gathering hosted by iCrossing and Overture. The event was for the company’s dispersed personnel as well as their top clients. I did 40 minutes of Media Titans song & dance, and I think it went over well. For me, it was a 25 minute ride to the event, so it was low-impact dal which turned out to be some time well spent.
Because the event is being tuned to coincide with the FBR (nee phoenix) Open, iCrossing and Overture are hosting a corporate tent at the Open. I was invited to come along tomorrow and interact with those people who didn’t have time to pose Q&A today. My wife is just so sad that she gets to come with...
