They have a 3.2megapixel sensor and a Xenon flash. And they're not digital cameras. They're Sony's latest mobiles in the form of the K800i and K790i.
Marking the first phones to carry Sony Ericsson's Cyber-shot branding, the K800i and K790i are designed to be the must-have handsets for the roving photo-blogger. They include features such as red-eye reduction and 'supersteady shot', plus blogging, RSS reader and web search software, courtesy of a deal with Google.
They are also PictBridge ready, meaning shots can be printed direct to a printer.
'With the Cyber-shot phone we aim to create a new lifestyle of "imaging communication" by combining Sony Ericsson's unique mobile applications and Sony digital imaging technologies,' said Rikko Sakaguchi, Senior VP, Product and Application Planning, Sony Ericsson. 'Our aim has always been to innovate and create new values for the mobile life, and with the Cyber-shot phone we will enable anyone to enjoy an entirely new level of communication - taking quality pictures of anything, anytime and
They have a slightly weedy 64MB internal memory, expandable via a Memory Stick Micro slot. There's also a media player with support for numerous audio and video formats; and they can handle SMS, MMS, email and push email services, too. The only difference between the handsets is that the K800i has a VGA camera for video calling.
Steve Rubel points out today that Nike has put up a basketball blog, but there are no comments or trackbacks enabled. I guess that's one way to deal with control issues. It is very snazzy looking.
McDonalds has taken a very different approach with their new blog. It's written by the head of the Corporate Social Responsibility department, is full of comments and is immediately engaged with controversy both in the blogosphere and in regards to their business itself.
It will be interesting to see how long both of these are maintained and which model works better for the companies. Anyone else have favorite examples of consumer facing corporate blogs that take on the social aspects of the medium?
Stonyfield Farms was a commonly cited example in the early days of small biz blogging. The company has a number of blogs, the most general interest one titled "The Bovine Bugle." That blog is even using YouTube video! Unfortunately, it hasn't gotten a single comment all month. Ouch.
LOS ANGELES - Amateur filmmaker David Lehre first screened his short film "MySpace: The Movie" about a month ago at his 21st birthday party.
Since then, the spoof of the popular networking site has been viewed more than 6 million times through various online sites and has prompted a development deal offer from MTVU, contact from Hollywood managers and a complimentary e-mail from MySpace co-founder Tom Anderson.
"I've never had stuff go as fast as it is now," Lehre, who still lives at home with his parents in Washington, Mich., told the Los Angeles Times.
Lehre started making films with the same cast and crew in 10th grade, after he and his friends where denied parts in the high school theater production of "Little Women."
"I thought, 'Let's make a movie.' They're like, 'Do you know how to make a movie?' I was like, 'I don't know. I'll figure it out,'" Lehre said. "I was sick of other people deciding if I could entertain or not. I thought, if they won't give me a chance, then I'll make my own movie."
"MySpace: The Movie" was posted Jan. 28 to Lehre's personal Web site, DavidLehre.com, and three days later it was placed on YouTube.com by a user named "eggtea," who downloaded it from Lehre's site and uploaded it to the popular video sharing site.
About 20,000 videos are uploaded to YouTube each day and more than 15 million are watched. With 3.4 million viewings, "MySpace: The Movie" ranks as the site's most viewed video. (Read More)
Yesterday, I hung out with International Activist Singer/Songwriter/Blogger David Rovics in my home town of Port Townsend, WA. We did a podcast, shot some b-roll on the street, did this music video on the warf, he and his West Coast Tour Mate, Attila the Stockbroker from England, put on a 2 hour concert at Quimper Unitarian Universalist Fellowship and did a video interview in HD and we all went to dinner at the Sweet Water Cafe at the end of Taylor street (located at the bottem of the stair case in the backgroud of this video).
Podcasting and vodcasting may not yet be entirely mainstream, but with the popularity of Apple's iPod portable music player (and competing brands) and its podcast-ready iTunes music software, that's not far away. Ergo, these new media formats should become part of any newspaper's content strategy. Indeed, for a small but growing number of newspapers, they already are.
Why podcast? The reason is simple enough. Young people, especially, are spending more of their time on the Internet and listening to iPods, and less time on the printed word. For newspapers, it's imperative to reach news consumers via digital channels. They can deliver the news directly via podcasting or vodcasting as an alternative to people reading the print edition, or add value to the printed-newspaper experience by offering audio and video content that supplements what's in the newspaper's paper edition and Web site. (And all the while, adding a new revenue stream to the company mix.)
"Our story begins with the December 17th airing of Saturday Night Live. During that episode, a pretty funny rap video entitled Lazy Sunday: The Chronicles of Narnia was aired. The clip, starring Chris Parnell and Andy Samberg as a couple of incredibly lame rappers walking through New York doing incredibly lame things, was uploaded to video download site YouTube.com, where it became something of an instant hit. Although we don't have statistics on the number of downloads, the video made enough of an impact to be featured in a New York Times story on SNL, and has been credited with turning a new generation of viewers on to the show.
Enter the lawyers. This week, NBC's lawyers sent a letter to YouTube, requesting removal of the video from its servers. The site complied with the request, and placed a short note on its blog explaining the removal and stating that 'YouTube respects the rights of copyright holders.' The video was also belatedly made available for free on the NBC web site, along with being offered as a US$1.99 download from the iTunes Music Store. As a side note, videos streamed from the NBC web site only work on Windows machines." (Read More)
NOTE: Interesting - This story is not being discussed on the SNL boards.
Citizen Journalist J.D. Lasica recorded a short interview with Elisabeth Shue during a special screening of Davis Guggenheim's, Elizabeth's husband, film "Teach" at a Creative Commons event in San Francisco last night. (Read More)
J.D. Lasica is one of the world's leading authorities on citizens media and the personal media revolution. A writer, blogger and consultant, he is the co-founder and executive director of Ourmedia.org.
MediaPost Publications - Points North: Consumers Crave Web-Based TV - 02/15/2006: "ONLINE MEDIA COMPANIES MUST ARRANGE to make their content available on consumers' TV screens as well as their PCs. That's the conclusion of new Points North Group research to be released today, which found that while 25 percent of Internet users are interested in watching downloaded TV shows and movies on their PCs, 38 percent expressed interest in watching that same video on their TVs.
'Getting Web-based content to the TV should be the industry's primary goal and will unlock by far the biggest revenue opportunities,' Stewart Wolpin, senior consulting analyst for Points North Group, said in a statement. Interest in watching content on TV is even stronger among 18- to-34-year-olds--at 68 percent, compared with the 45 percent interested in watching on PCs--concluded the study, conducted in association with Horowitz Associates. "
"At 3GSM World Congress 2006, being held in Barcelona, Spain, Motorola and Yahoo! today demonstrated the use of Yahoo! Podcasts on a RAZR V3x phone.
The mobile application lets users drag and drop podcasts directly from a PC to their mobile phone through the Yahoo! Music Engine, and also directly download podcasts over-the-air to their handset using an integrated application.
'Together with Motorola we are thrilled to be able to demonstrate the future of podcasting, letting consumers take their media experiences on their mobile phones to be enjoyed anytime and anywhere,' said Joe Hayashi, director, product management, Yahoo!. 'This demonstration showcases that with Yahoo! services integrated on mobile devices -- consumers can access the entertainment they want while on the go,' said Chris White, senior director, Global Product Marketing, music category at Motorola." (More)
"BT Group and Microsoft are set to team up with Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Mobile to launch what is expected to be Europe's first nationwide digital television broadcast service for mobile phones.
Confirmation of the roll-out of the service is expected to come on Tuesday at 3GSM in Barcelona, the biggest mobile phone industry gathering of the year." (More)
NY1's latest New Yorkers of the Week are helping some area school kids become the leaders of tomorrow.
While some teens spend their summer lounging at the beach, one group of students is learning about issues like the United States' foreign policy, the war in Iraq, labor rights, and globalization.
'Once our parents have passed, we'll be the next ones to decide what's going to be the fate of the world,' says Adana Austi.
Austi is one of the students participating in the U.S. in the World Initiative, a program that focuses on the America's role in international affairs. It was launched this month by Global Kids, a 16-year-old non-profit organization. Founder and executive director Carole Artigiani says the program helps students develop the skills needed to succeed in school and the future. " (More)
By Glenn Yoder, Globe Correspondent | February 12, 2006
* Video blog: A weblog (blog) that provides a video journal on a subject rather than text entries. Also called a ‘‘vog’’ or ‘‘vog blog.’’
"Apple has played a key role in the progression of the video blog, or ''video podcast' as it's called when associated with the iPod. Bloggers watched hits increase tenfold since the company released iPods with 2 1/2-inch color video screens on Oct. 12 and iTunes.com began hosting video podcasts for free public download. In addition to amassing vlogs for the public, Apple took the video podcast off the computer and made it transportable, said Charlene Li, an analyst at the technology market research company Forrester Research who specializes in blogs.
''The problem with video podcasting in the past has been that there was only one way to watch them -- on the computer,' Li said, adding that consumers will soon be able to download podcasts from TiVo, the digital television recorder. She said new technology in development is only going to push video blogs further.
''It's kind of a chicken or the egg situation; whether more devices are becoming available so people can create [vlogs], or the fact that the increase in video blogs is encouraging more devices to be developed for them,' she said.
As a result of the technological leaps, vlogs have become so accessible and portable that viewers are watching them everywhere, from the subway to the airport... " (More)
Visions :: UMR's eye on research: The Richard Show goes boom!: "Dr. Richard Hall, a professor of information science and technology, has been fascinated with the World Wide Web since the middle 1990s, when it was first becoming wide spread. Hall was quick to explore the web as a teaching tool in his classes and research. In fact, he became well known in the academic research community as a pioneer in this area. More recently, he has become fascinated by the role of the web in the emerging grass roots media movement -- web-based media created and syndicated by regular people. In particular, Hall is interested in video blogs, sometimes called video podcasts. In the fall of 2006, Hall will be teaching courses in Multimedia Development and Social Informatics, where his new interest will be a major focus. And he will be able to bring some practical experience into the classroom. His video blog, The Richard Show, has gained quite a following in the vlogosphere of late. Hall's work has even been featured on the wildly popular vlogcast, RocketBoom. "
To advertise on Rocketboom for one week in March will cost winning eBay bidder Starfinder5 $40,000.
That is $8,000 per show. Over $2 million a year.
The auction has set Rocketboom's minimum advertising bar. Smart. Very smart.
Pretty damn crazy!! This actually worked and the winner has been confirmed. We are talking with them now to discuss how to release the information, I'll update you as soon as we decide to say.
> It drives me nuts that Andrew perpetually insists that he makes the > show for free or close-to-free. It's cheaper than ABC World News > Tonight -- for sure! That's what should be celebrated, not this idea > that any kid in the barrio should be able to make Rocketboom with their > bus money (if they even have 85 cents for the bus). - Jen Simmons
My first reaction is: wow, you sound really angry. But I'll give you that... four jobs? That sucks.
My second reaction is, well, Andrew (Rocketboom founder) already covered this.
The point is, videoblogging is scalable. As soon as our $15/month account couldn't hold us any more, we were at the point where we could have started putting up ads, accepting sponsorships, just generally bringing in money to support server costs. We didn't do this, because we wanted to do things in a very specific way, a way that Andrew had saved up for years to make happen. - Amanda Congdon, Rocketboom talent
audioblogger: Ok...Do it!!!: "1 - 4 1 5 - 8 5 6 - 0 2 0 5 Alright, now all you have to do is call that number to make FREE audio posts to your blog.
1. Call the number (Listen very carefully to the Voice Prompts) 2. Enter your Primary Number 3. Enter your PIN, press # 4. Record your post, Press # 5. Press 1 to post, 2 to review, 3 to re-record. 6. Check your site! "
vSocial's 'Video Wall' Contest Celebrates Superbowl XL Ads, AdPlayer(TM) Sneak Preview: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance: "vSocial (www.vsocial.com) today announced AdPlayer, a hosted service designed for prosumers and small-to-medium sized businesses that makes it very easy to create branded, interactive video ads from uploaded video content. These ads can be embedded within web sites and blogs, virally distributed to multiple remote pages and integrated within ad serving networks.
To celebrate the offering, which is now available to beta customers, the company has created a video wall of Superbowl XL ads, and is running a contest this week. The way the contest works is that four of the ads on the video wall have been configured as AdPlayers. Participants need to watch the ads and make note of the advertisers to answer the mystery question at www.vsocial.com/superbowl. Participants that answer the question correctly are entered into a drawing to win a video iPod." (more)
A donation of goods and services from D-PRGRM.COM will allow the proceedings of a number of the Festival’s highly attended and entertaining events to be available as both audio and video podcasts to the general public.
“Each year we strive to raise the bar for our Festival. We show incredible films and host some of the most talented people in the entertainment industry. Now, through these podcasts, I’m proud that we can reach an even wider audience,” Festival Director Roger Durling said.
“We are committed to establishing the SBIFF as the premier technology friendly film festival and to providing an archive of the festival to be accessed by iPod and home computer users around the globe.” said a D-PRGRM director, Joseph Matheny.
Dedicated to the art of filmmaking, the SBIFF offers a broad array of international and independent films, with a commitment to diversity. It attracts more than 43,000 visitors each
year. The SBIFF endeavors to enrich the community both culturally and economically by presenting eleven days of films, seminars, symposiums and parties! Films from American Independents to major studio releases, to award-winning foreign films and international documentaries, cinephiles have the opportunity to discover mainstream and alternative films, as well as meet the filmmakers and talk with them after screenings. SBIFF is in its 21st year.
NOTE: In 2003, SBIFF panels and individual interviews were webcast. An archive of the videos are available at Digital Days.
NEW YORK (FORTUNE) - Should you be able to video yourself being interrogated by the police? With many of today's camera-cellphones, it's trivially easy to do from a technical standpoint. But it took Hubert Burda Media, Germany's largest magazine publisher, to get me thinking about it.
Two weeks ago in Munich, Burda hosted an innovative event it calls Digital Lifestyle Day. There Gabe McIntyre, a well-known blogger who lives in Amsterdam, showed a video of himself in a real-life experiment. Even in the relatively benign precincts of Amsterdam, he demonstrated that the police may not be pleased.
N A MOVE THAT'S SURE to cause a stir at ABC, as well as the other major networks, long-time Super Bowl advertiser Anheuser-Busch will use its buy in ABC's coverage of the game on Sunday to launch its own direct-to-consumer network. Details of the strategy are still under wraps, but the new channel, code-named "The Bud Screen," will debut sometime during the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XL, offering viewers the opportunity to download advertising, programming and branded entertainment content directly to their computers, iPods and other devices. The initiative is the most aggressive example yet in a growing trend of marketers utilizing broadband video downloading to bypass traditional TV outlets to deliver their content directly to consumers. Unlike previous direct-to-consumer video plays, the Anheuser-Busch deal is not a one-time, or limited test of broadband video distribution, but is the launch of a new, ongoing distribution channel that eventually is expected to be branded "Bud TV."
"This changes the whole concept of broadcasting out to consumers. Typically media companies have done that. With the Internet, we blow out that old model and enable advertisers to reach consumers directly without having the media companies sell the ad space," says Hilmi Ozguc, CEO of Maven, the Cambridge, Mass.-based company that will power the new Bud channel. (More)
Inspired by Rocketbooms three day success auctioning off 5-days of advertising time in March through eBay, Technology Evangelist has set up their own eBay page for exclusive ad placement in five upcoming HD videos.
They have a 3.2megapixel sensor and a Xenon flash. And they're not digital cameras. They're Sony's latest mobiles in the form of the K800i and K790i.
