Infinity and Beyond

If you know me, you know that I can’t resist any opportunity to lambast Steve Scher, Senior Host of KUOW’s Weekday program here on Seattle’s NPR station.  Now, Steve Scher in the past has had some real awesome shows…again if you’ll know me you’ll know these are three of my favorites:

• “Best pho restaurants in Seattle” - this insightful hour told us that all the best pho restaurants in Seattle were located…in San Diego.  Thanks Steve!
• “Birdwatching at Marymoor Park” - Steve invited local Audubon Society members on the program to talk about great bird watching in Marymoor Park.  Conclusion: at the time of the broadcast sometime in winter, there really weren’t any great birds to be seen in Marymoor…but come Springtime….
• “Weekday Halloween Special!”  - call us and tell us about your scary costume, or what you would think would be a great scary costume.  Describe it to us.  In detail.  The show featured calls from locals such as King County Executive Ron Sims, who pretended to be the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.  Nice!  

Yes folks, that’s right.  Call in to the radio show and help them create a wiki on the air.  Excuse me for getting technical, but Wikipedia defines a wiki as:

 

A wiki is a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content, using a simplified markup language.

I am a Duran Duran poster archivist in Bellevue, Washington. As curator/owner of the world’s largest collection of Duran Duran-related posters, I have a unique perspective on one of the biggest artists ever to emerge from the 80’s.    

-Durandy

One of the most interesting aspects of my archive is the comparative study of how Duran Duran has been promoted and embraced across cultures and over decades. 

The band’s influence has been felt in nearly every creative realm –from film, art and video to fashion and music. My collection offers an unprecedented look at Duran’s legacy, showing how the band has evolved, adapted to a changing musical landscape and continues to break new ground in the present day. It is a niche that I never expected to fall into, but one that has yielded an amazing journey for me over the years. 

Milestones have included a loan to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland Ohio, two public exhibitions, and recognition from the band and fan community. Posters offer a wealth of insight and information about the bands being promoted. When viewed on an international, comprehensive scale, a music artist can be appreciated in a most revealing and rewarding context. 

My website: www.durandy.com

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So I have two “WTF” factors for this post.  One is Fred, the other is the ZipIt.  There is this YouTube dude called Fred (his YouTube page) (or his home page).  I just don’t get it.  I don’t get it at all.  I stumbled upon his blog post from Videogum, which talks about how Fred is now advertising for some bullshit my-first-Blackberry device called the ZipIt.  Which he now uses in his craptastic videos.

If you haven’t watched anything from Fred, you can try watching Fred talk about his attempt to run for class president:

Now, I don’t usually swear online (hahah), but I really have to classify this in the What The Fuck category.  I just…don’t….get it.  Are 2.5 MILLION other people also viewing this video just for the What The Fuck factor?  Judging by the comments, there are a ton of people who are either lying through their teeth, or genuinely think this kid is funny.

And i very much agree with the author of the Vidoegum post, Gabe, who says:

I think there are definitely a few things that I would totally buy after watching a Fred video, like noise-canceling headphones, or an industrial grade eye-shower, or a gun with one bullet in it.

I’m trying to think back to childhood…I know many of the things I liked growing up were probably stupid and lame and awful and unbearable if I were to watch them now (Pete will tell you that’s SeaQuest but I still stand by it)…but Fred?  Really?  Huh?  Barney is forgivable because 3-year olds just don’t actually know what’s going on.  But 14 year olds should have started to develop some kind of taste for the non-shittastic.

I wonder if Fred will really drive sales of the ZipIt.  It has some “interesting” features.  It’s an “All-in-one WiFi Messenger” which only costs $49.99, plus a $9.99/month service contract.  You can chat with up to 99 friends at the same time. 99?  Damn.  It does “let u chat, control ur IM accounts, and set IM options.”  What is good about it is that they let you send and receive text messages to other cell phones, and your parents will “luv” that there’s never any (why not “ne”??) overage charges or surprise fees.   Built-in mini-SD card for showing off “ur favorite pics” (again, why not “ur fav pics”??).  Interestingly you can listen to music and also stream live internet radio from “ur favorite stations.”  ”How much do you <3 that?”  I <3 that a lot.

So…this is almsot like a glorified pager.  For $50 that’s really not that bad, and I suppose I’d much rather see parents buy this for their kids than an overpriced smartphone.  I don’t really see this taking much market share away from mobile phones though.  Kids are going to want to have gigabytes worth of songs.  They’re going to want to surf the web.  They’re going to want to make phone calls.  They’re going to want to take pictures and send them via MMS.  So while parents will be stuck with a heftier monthly bill, I don’t really see this product taking off, unless it’s with kids who aren’t quite at the point in their social lives where they’re wanting to talk on the phone all the time.  And honestly I don’t think a 12 year old needs a) one of these, b) a mobile phone, or c) anything more than an iPod Shuffle.  

Plus this device looks huge…definitely not hip and trendy at all.  That being said, I almost want to buy stock in the company, because if even a fraction of Fred’s fans go out and buy this silly device, there’s big money to be made.  Sadly, Fred is probably getting a decent chunk of money for this.  Which is annoying.  Just like the Kev Blaze video featuring Fred.  Who the hell is Kev Blaze?  And more importantly, how did “Fred” manage to get the username “Fred”.  I suppose that means he should get some kind of “props”.  But not from me.

Update:  CNN gives a glimpse of who is behind Fred.  Ending with “it’s really incredible…”  I consider this to be…incredible yes…but I’m glad I haven’t rocketed to stardom this way.

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Given that I made the post about mailing STD e-cards to those you’ve had fun with, Google is now displaying localized STD testing ad links in my right-column ad space.  I wonder if that will generate a higher click-through ratio.  I also wonder what their eCPM is and my earnings for clicks on those links.  Are the STD clinics rollin out the big bucks for online ad spend?  We’ll find out!

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Ever watch a video on YouTube and been inspired to buy the album? Instead of using iTunes to listen to :30s previews of songs do you often find yourself on YouTube listening to the entire thing? What about video game trailers; I know I geeked out when I watched ‘Halo 3′ ads when they first came out. I was watching anything I could with the Master Chief running around and blowing things up. Lucky for you YouTube has the answer to all your purchasing needs.

YouTube Blog

This past Tuesday YouTube announced on their blog that they would be ‘taking our first steps to providing YouTube users with this kind of instant gratification, by adding “click-to-buy” links to the watch pages of thousands of YouTube partner videos.” The post goes on to say that the links will be non-obtrusive and placed beneath the video with the rest of the community features that have led to YouTube’s great success. To start they will be ‘embedding iTunes and Amazon.com links on videos from companies like EMI Music, and providing Amazon.com product links to the newly released video game Spore(TM) on videos from Electronic Arts.”

This is naturally just the beginning as the site slowly shifts to become a strong eCommerce platform for the company. When Google purchased YouTube it wasn’t entirely clear what their motivation was. Why spend so much money on a site that was drawing huge traffic numbers, but not as many advertising dollars? Well, I think we’ve found our answer. As this develops further and we see more and more product links attached with videos the site will become half user generated nonsense (as it always has been) and half corporate sponsored commercials. If only MTV had a way to have done this for television 10 years ago.

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After a bitter loss to Sony’s Blu-ray HD system Toshiba is looking to make their next move. Predicting that optical disc have their days numbered anyway they are skipping ahead to sell players employing the SD cards that you might find in your digital camera. While I don’t think anyone disputes the fact that digital SD cards are the future of receiving content, I’m not sure if the public is ready for this step. The wireless potential is huge as well, as seen in the Eyefi SD card. Good of Toshiba to be thinking super long term, but right now with the economy in the toilet people are having a hard enough time converting to Blu-ray players let alone an entirely incompatible new system.

The potentially not so distant future will see companies like Mod Systems, who provide digital kiosks, taking off and leading in content distribution. In the same way that Blockbuster wanted to reduce store sizes and move to a digital kiosk based platform, Mod Systems would provide retailers with a kiosks that can quickly download content onto an SD card. Toshiba recently invested $24-million into the company to ensure it’s future.

Blockbuster CFO Tom Casey recently warned of this shift saying “”What you need to understand is we really have a market that we address that’s nearly $36 billion in size. Video-on-demand is actually pretty small.” In an apparent shift of strategy Blockbuster is going to increase fees in order to pay for store upgrades. This will include remodeling some of the stores to include gaming stations and cafes. Now I don’t know who would want to go to Blockbuster for a cafe experience aside from 12 year olds unchecked by their parents, but this doesn’t seem like their wisest decision. I full supported their move to go forward with kiosks and digital downloads but increasing their already alarming high rental prices in order to make their stores more of a destination seems strange.

Blu-ray does costs more for them to stock so I could see a higher rental fee for Blu-ray discs. If the future, as Toshiba likes to think, is in digital downloads to an SD card then this is the wrong move.

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Apple’s iPhone/iPod Touch App Store continues to draw some heavy criticism this week. It appears that some applications which could be considered to compete with Apple’s own apps are being rejected because they duplicate functionality. Seeking Alpha reports that the a developer created a program called Podcaster because it “duplicates the functionality of the Podcast section in iTunes.” Turns out Podcaster actually offers some features above and beyond what Apple currently offers–thusly making it an arguably better app.

The blogosphere is going crazy with cries of anti-competitive practices being used by Apple.  Then again…it’s Apple’s product, Apple’s phone, and Apple’s App Store…so, it seems to me that by right they can pretty much do whatever they want.  While they are doing themselves a favor by providing devs the ability to create and deploy apps via the App Store, Apple could easily give everyone a giant middle finger and pull the plug.  That being said, it does seem like a pretty lame thing to do.

This follows on the heels of reports of applications getting rejected based on “limited utility,” such as the ill-fated Pull My Finger app.  You can watch the video here or below.  A more detailed explanation of the rejection is here.  Many people are wondering what’s up with “limited utility.”  And why should this matter with regards to free applications?  Why is Koi Pond not considered to have “limited ability”?  Does the fact that Koi Pond is supposed to be soothing allow it to pass, while Pull My Finger is only humorous to some?  Or what about the More Cowbell application?  Its seems that part of the fun of having applications on your Smartphone is so that, for every useful application you’ve got, you can download at least three more which are stupid but fun…

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My how the Internet has affected this years presidential election. From YouTube campaigns to blogs controlling stories and at times even setting the tone for major news networks like CNN. Over the last week blogs and the Internet have been five steps ahead of the mainstream media. Could be because as bloggers we are able to access news stories as soon as they happen and check sources much quicker and with less restrictions than someone like MSNBC. Sometimes we get it wrong but often times we are just slightly off course. The truth normally comes out hours later.

Here we don’t tend to report on breaking stories that have a ton of opinion (until we write about them anyway), but those sites often times have more impact on the mainstream media than not.

Take for example of the newly elected VP candidate for the Republican Party, Sarah Palin. She is such a novelty that this will be my second post about her, and I cover entertainment news. While she has certainly provided me with an abundance of entertainment this week; politics is something we generally stay away from here. Unless of course the FCC is up to no good.

Maybe it’s the fact that nobody knew anything about her two weeks ago, or maybe we were all looking for something new to talk about but, she has caught the attention of Internet folks everywhere.

The media has always been last to know everything new about her. In the year that seems to be controlled by bloggers like us here I look forward to seeing what else we can do to change the world.

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Canadian’s often feel overshadowed by American media. I mean, aside from Bryan Adams and Alanis Morissette, Canadian pop stars are fewer and farther between than their American counterparts.

But now Reuters reports that Canadian’s who have been rubbed wrong by the lack of Canadian generated porn, and their boredom with American porn, can anxiously await the launch of the Northern Peaks adult pay-TV channel. It will be “Canada’s first adult video channel offering significant Canadian adult content.” Canadian regulators just approved the channel.

What’s more significant is that while Canadian regulators require 15 percent of content to be Canadian-generated on channels, Norther Peaks is going to have no less than 50 percent of Canadian-generated content. This will likely spur a large number of auditions to star in new channel content–and of course a large collection of “auditions” and “outtakes” for later use on the channel or direct-to-DVD production.

Most interesting is this though:

“Northern Peaks will be restricted to certain types of programming including long-form documentaries, dramatic series, feature films, game shows, mini-series, sitcoms and made-for-TV movies.”

So, let’s just think of this for a few minutes…adult pay channel content in the form of:

• Long-form documentaries (a. “long-form” hahah b. “documentaries”??)
• Dramatic series (aka porn with too much dialog)
• Game shows (what are the prizes??)
• Mini-series, sitcoms, etc (can we see a new take on “Twin Peaks”??)

Sorry if that was a bit immature, but I couldn’t resist. Here is an interesting hook however: a featured Xtube [NSFW] users amateur hour show. Xtube is a Canadian-based company, so this completely makes sense and would make for great cross promotion.

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OK, this is NSFW if you’re not wearing headphones. And it isn’t really relevant to anything. But it’s hilarious. And I suppose it shows the the power of user generated content.

Watch this first:

And then this:

Thanks Elliot!

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ZDNet News ran an article with details of NBC’s upcoming revamp of NBCOlympics.com and the goal of making it an online success, including live Web casts of the events plus archived footage.

The site will launch with an improved video player and other enhancements in time for the start of the 2008 Olympic games.  Over the course of the games, 2200 hours of video footage will be generated and accessible to users through both live and on-demand streams.  That’s good news for fans of various events that don’t get much, if any, television coverage.  Fully 25 sports are expected to be covered online which won’t really be seen on TV.

NBC hopes that the star of the Olympics will be Microsoft’s Silverlight, the web applications framework chosen by the company to power the new site.  It’s been in development for nearly a year now and is currently undergoing a number of UI tweaks.  They will be testing the site with live video during the Olympic trials.  The choice of Silverlight represents a win for the technology Microsoft has put forth to compete with Adobe’s highly popular Flashsuite.  

While choosing to use a Microsoft technology to power the site, NBC chose to go with DoubleClick to power the advertising, as opposed to Atlas platform which Microsoft acquired when it purchased aQuantive.  The Silverlight player will integrate with DoubleClick to display “dynamic ads” to viewers.  I’m assuming this will be your normal targeted ads, but perhaps they’ll be doing something new and amazing.

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