Wednesday, March 23, 2005

Is the SUN setting on CLECs ? How will they survive in a UNEP-LESS Post ERA? In the good old days 199x - 2004 a typical CLEC with a 50 central office (CO) HDSL build-out, the CLEC is able to break even with just 20 business customers, show net EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) of 20-plus percent over three years and become cash-positive in less than two years. With the recent UNEP ruling how will these xLECs navigate the vehement tumultous telecom sea and steer their company/ship away from the regulatory rocks so as not to shipwreck? One solution is VNAP http://vnap.ws and http://dv4.agileco.net/BizLocity Now Virtual Operators, xLECs, xSPs, Mobile, Wireless and Cable MSOs, and others can leverage this Virtual Network Infrastructure to redefine how services and products will be created and offer and break the tyranny of the DS0 and and the shackles of the unwilling partner. I will have more to say about this at a later time. 8:43:49 PM

BroadCasting Why The Long Tail of video is about to get longer. Broadband Directions: New forces are at work which hold the potential to flood the market with a torrent of new video content. This would dramatically lengthen the long tail of video programming, as it would be defined today. In addition, consumers will also have new ways to find, share and consume this video. While these disruptive influences are well-known, their effects are not yet fully understood. Broadband and IP have opened up a new path to deliver quality video directly to the end-consumer; wireless connectivity and new devices are redefining how and where video is consumed; production costs to create high-quality digital programming are low and getting lower; video search engines from Google, Yahoo and Blinkx, which extend existing internet usage behaviors, are becoming more sophisticated and widely adopted; and most importantly, traditional television advertisers are increasingly shifting their mindsets (and their bucks) from big brand-building campaigns to surgical, ROI-based online tactics prompted by consumers' heightened disdain for commercial interruptions. Examples of non-traditional publishers who are enticed by the potential of direct-to-consumer video opportunities abound. Recently I've seen video product demos on CNET and print reporters doing video news and features on USAToday.com and NYTimes.com. TheKnot.com is planning bridal related programming on its site. Last holiday season, I watched Amazon's short films. Meanwhile, a resurgent AOL.com is preparing a fall relaunch of its site with a video-centric strategy. Plenty of more announcements are on the way. Via CyberJournalist.net [unmediated] 8:25:12 PM

Tuesday, March 22, 2005

MSNBC: "HERE COME THE VLOGS MSNBC: "HERE COME THE VLOGS". MSNBC: Ready for your close-up? Here come the vlogs is a great snapshot of videoblogging by Michael Rogers. He namechecks all our favorites including Rocketboom, Ryanne, Jay, Human Dog, Steve Garfield, and Dylan. He also mentions the tools making it easier to find videoblogs, such as ANT and MeFeedia. And, inescapably, Serious Magic's Vlog It! software, which nobody I know actually uses. Check out Rocketboom's aggregation of SXSWi video/audio/pics/text and the official video coverage of SXSW for all the geekery you'd ever want to munch on. If you're just looking for fun, please immediately watch Dylan's latest vid, Toys of Our Lives, where Dylan's dolls engage in sick and hilarious romantic shenanigans. Then why not see me "shake my thing" (am I saying that right?) on 6th Street in Austin for DanceFlash - it was like a mini-Burning Man. Via Blogumentary [unmediated] 8:22:44 PM

Blog, Vlog, Podcast, Mobcas Blog, Vlog, Podcast, Mobcast. So many new words, so little time. Blog (web log), Vlog (video web log), Podcasting (including audio in your RSS (really simple syndication) feed for download into an Apple iPod or other MP3 player) and Mobcasting (mobile podcasting) an Andy Carvin acronym which posits the use of smart phones to create podcasts -- are all relatively new words that represent one extremely big idea -- unfettered plebeian access to the fifth estate. Until a few years ago, governments (secular or non) had almost complete control of information. That made (and continues to make) information a form of currency -- like the military and other stores of economic value. These "new words" are much more powerful than the technologies they represent, they speak a new language of information and, to be sure, currency. The value you will place on this information is in direct proportion to the use you have for it. Most people won't care about the rantings of a technophile or a housewife lamenting her need for appropriate child care -- or will they? Imagine a world where a group of protesters use their cell phones to acquire and document their experience with government forces and aggregate (and spin) that audio/video experience on the web. How about a simple group of friends witnessing a car accident or something worse. We are at the dawn of a new era -- not the cliche version of the phrase -- "new era" the home game! Imagine the power of an individual when they are able to publish and internationally distribute audio and video more efficiently than CNN or Fox News. That's not years in the future ... it's already here. Want to believe? Check out some of the websites like http://tv.oneworld.net or http://www.audiolink.com or http://www.audiolink.com and just play the tape .. err ... file to the end. [unmediated] 8:13:00 PM

Monday, March 07, 2005

Ten To Watch in Mobile Content Ten To Watch in Mobile Content. This is not a definitive list, just a list of smart young blood in the mobile content sector. Notice that except for one, none of them are CEOs (yet), but you’ll hear a lot from and about them in the next few years (that was the criteria). Just a way of recognizing the people in the second wave of mobile content (in no particular order): » Greg Clayman, Vice President, Wireless Strategy and Operations, MTV Networks » Rio Caraeff, mobile head at Universal Music » Thomas Ryan, Senior VP, Mobile Development, EMI Music » Mark Levy, VP content at InfoSpace Mobile » Lucy Hood, VP, Content, News Corp » Shawn Conahan (end of page), CEO, Intercasting Corp » Adam Flick, Chief Marketing Officer, Airborne Entertainment » Robert Tercek, Chief Strategy Office, mForma » Manish Jha, Senior VP, ESPN Mobile » Russell Beattie, Yahoo Mobile I realize this is a US-centric list, and if you want to add to my list of the people influencing our fast growing sector, post them in the comments below… [unmediated] 9:58:47 PM

Saturday, March 05, 2005

http://dv.open4all.info/?postid=107 Hoobastank - Pieces. A reader has sent a link some great AMVs (anime music videos) by articnightfall. So here is the sample ... Torrent Name Category Seeders Leechers Completed File Size arcticnightfall_pieces.avi 0 1 0 38 18 MB Download [DV Guide] 10:48:52 PM

Jon Stewart on Blogs. Jon Stewart on Blogs. Jon Stewart's segment about blogs, blogging, political correctness, Jeff Gannon and all of that ... Taken from onegoodmovie. Torrent Name Category Seeders Leechers Completed File Size ds021605bloggers.mov 0 3 0 47 9 MB Download [DV Guide] 10:48:02 PM

Tuesday, March 01, 2005

Jeremy Allaire starts new compay BrightCove Jeremy Allaire recently founded BrightCove http://www.brightcove.com/ (2004) to meld television and the Internet. It would be truly awesome to see BrightCove and iComCentral http://dv3.agileco.net/iComCentral to find a way to work together.   10:00:17 AM

Monday, February 28, 2005

Wireless Companies Turn Their Eyes To TV (Investor's Business Daily). Investor's Business Daily - There's a major push under way to bring more TV content and video to wireless devices. Asia's big consumer electronics firms, as well as Europe's Nokia and U.S.-based Qualcomm , have jumped into the fray. They're supporting a number of different standards for beaming digital TV to mobile devices. [Yahoo! News: Technology] 9:11:10 PM

Sunday, February 27, 2005

Game Boy On Your iRiver iHP-140. Rockbox is an open source replacement firmware system for your Archos Jukebox, iRiver and one or two other players. There's a new plugin for Rockbox in development called Rockboy, which allows you to port the gnuboy emulator over to your iRiver iHP-140 (only?) and play your favorite GameBoy Color games. Rockbox only supports monochrome, so you're stuck with that, and playback is pretty slow, but it's a neat concept nonetheless and not faked like those Sonic-on-Archos pics. Still, we're not sure when/if it'll be widely available, as it appears they're still in the relatively early stages of Rockbox for iRiver. More pictures after the jump. (Thanks, BiLo!) Rockboy Plugin [Rockbox] [Gizmodo] 8:00:18 PM

Is videologging the next big hype storm?. At last weekend's Northern Voice conference I was interested by a small community of people who were doing video blogs. There was a session there and the videos ran from the emotional (one guy gave his last will and testament on camera before dying a month later) to artistic stuff, to boring talking head stuff. I linked to a few video blogging sites to get you started in case you're interested. Michael Verdi seemed to get the best read on why vlogging is cool. Here, watch his "Vlog Anarchy" post. My favorite line comes right at the end: "I'm making stuff up and putting it on the Internet and you can't do s**t about that." [Scobleizer: Microsoft Geek Blogger] 7:22:19 PM

The latest Daily Podcast feed is up.  It contains a poem, discussion on jumping the shark, information about NY Hotel Bars, Podcast safe music from Jersey and more.  So go over to my new audioblog experiment, "The Daily Podcast Feed" and listen to some of the podcasts in it! All of the tools (GigaDial, Blogger, FeedBurner, WebJay, Smoothouse Webjay wizard, Fabricio's XSPF MusicPlayer ) I am using in my latest audioblog experiment are free and available right now on the web.  That fact opens the potential for a group of pioneer podcast feed producers to evolve using a set of open free tools.  Below is a list of descriptions of some of the tools I use to create "The Daily Podcast Feed": GigaDial  GigaDial.net is a new approach to radio programming. You can use it to create and subscribe to podcast-powered stations composed of individual episodes from your favorite podcasters. Outputs RSS 2.0 XML feeds. Blogger  Free blogging authoring software.  Enables  the distribution of Podcast feeds through the embeding of audio players and links to RSS 2.0 feeds using the weblog platformy.  Outputs an ATOM XML feed that can be inputted to other services such as FeedBurner. FeedBurner  Can converts a ATOM feed to RSS 2.0 XML file.  Using it's SmartCast feature, FeedBurner will take the first anchor (<a>) tag that it finds in your posting content and convert the linked URL into an RSS 2.0 <enclosure>.  Is the case of Audioblogging 2.0, the RSS 2.0 enclosure file type is also a RSS 2.0 file.  Feedburner turns the feed item into content that future audioblogging 2.0/podcasting clients can potentially use to produce "show channels". WebJay  Mother of all music playlist generators.  It allows you to take a RSS 2.0 file with mp3 enclosures and convert it to a XSPF playlist to feed into Fabricio's XSPF MusicPlayer. Smoothouse Webjay wizard  Assists in the generation of the correct HTML for linking/embedding a Webjay playlist in Fabricio's XSPF MusicPlayer. Fabricio's XSPF MusicPlayer XSPF Web Music Player is a flash-based web application that uses xspf playlist format to play mp3 songs. XSPF is the XML Shareable Playlist Format. The software is written in Actionscript 2. Player can be embedded into a weblog post using weblog authoring software like Blogger. Many of the tools above contain other features that do a lot more then the features I described.  My explanations  focus on the features used for creating "The Daily Podcast Feed" and what I call Audioblogging 2.0. 1:16:41 AM