Porn on iPods raising eyebrows (among other things)

Six months ago if you were to ask me to categorize the types of video that would immediately jump to the forefront in the then non-existent video podcasting space, I'd easily said (1) news, (2) religion and (3) porn. I'm therefore moderately intrigued by the resistance to immediately translate mass amounts of pornography for the new video-enabled iPod and the legion of knockoff devices it'll spawn.

What's of particular interest is that such definance apparently stems from major adult production companies themselves, wanting to avoid a littany of foreseeable lawsuits as a result of underaged people inappropriately accessing blue material. I must say I'm impressed.

It's like when Budweiser started running "don't drink and drive" ads - a new sensible maturity emanating from the San Fernando Valley. It's the kind of savvy PR tactic/right thing to do that makes me want to go out and rent a Jenna Jameson DVD, just because.

Everyone knows there's always been a strong link between sex and technology, so the issue isn't encouraging the distribution of pornography - it's controlling access by demography.

Companies directly involved with distributing such material want to contribute to the development of a parental locking control system on the iPod to prevent children from storing and/or accessing such material. And other DRM-esque features like age-verifying a user prior to downloading and copy-protecting adult content to prohibit transferring files between devices are in the works. But that's just the initiative from the big companies, the instant and immediate targets of class action suits, not the cease and decist-caliber independent publishers giving people their jollies for $11.59 per month.

In time these efforts will give rise to new and interesting ways of delivering content in the Digital Age. Lessons learned will trickle down in a retroactively progressive fashion, if you will, to more traditionally mainstream classifications of content. This will mean better, more reliable, more secure and legal distribution models for all types of multimedia (text, audio, video, imagery), helping to address the ever-present quandary of piracy.

Portable porn has been envisioned for a long time, and the adoption of such content on the PlayStation Portable and iPod is, dare I say, critical to the success of mobile video overall, both technologically and in terms of a reliable revenue model. Adam Curry, the father of podcasting, predicts time-shifting adult material being phenomenally huge towards promoting portable communications, interpersonally and for business. Adult entertainment has for years been the litmus test that validates the commercial legitimacy of a new platform or product; everyone relies on it, but no one talks about it.

There are already several services, paid and otherwise, that produce mature mobile content for the PSP and other video-capable devices. Stag images and movies, custom formatted for portable video devices, are popping up left and right, motivated specifically by the expected commercial explosion of the video iPod. Several independent, DIY online services have already produced softcore and/or hardcore feeds that can be subscirbed to and downloaded in freeware RSS aggregators like iTunes, copied onto a portable device, and then played back. Suicide Girls joined POVPod.com as being the first to get a lot of press in offering content suitable for the new iPod's H.264 video, 768 Kbps, 320x240 hi-res, 2.5" LCD screen. And those sites followed the footsteps of Sam Sugar's PSPPorn and Porn4PSP in offering content suitable for Sony's mobile communications device.

In the grand scheme of things, porn continues to innovate, if you want to call it that, and whether you admit it or not.

Fantasy football, Week 8: getting the most out of your Hurricanes

This is a printable version of the segment on fantasy football for the 2005 NFL season I host on my TV show, "JockTalk" on KUAM-TV8.

This week we're doing something special to commemorate the halfway mark in this NFL season - we're taking a special look at players from the University of Miami. Great schools have scores of guys in the league - Ohio State, Michigan, Florida, USC...but no other institution of higher learning has as many players in the league than the "U".

BYE WEEKS
Keep in mind the bye week teams - the Falcons, Colts, Jets and Seahawks all have the week off, so that means no Reggie Wayne ('01), no Edgerrin James ('99) and no Vinnie Testeverde ('87). Too bad, because the first two are fantasy studs, so you'll have to resort to your bench. Vinnie gets to rest his aching Achilles' heel in preparation for the Chargers next week.

WHO SHOULD PLAY
As for who you should play, how about the guys from the national championship team of '01? Clinton Portis won it all in Larry Coker's first year in South Florida, but only has 1 rushing TD this season. Still, he's always played bigger than his 5'11", 212-lb. frame, and has the lowest center of gravity of any back in the NFL. He can bust a 150-yd game at any point, but expect him to be better in the red zone against the Giants.

Also play his fellow redskin Santana Moss (Class of 2000). He'll be in the Pro Bowl this year for his speed, and he leads the league in receiving yards and is second in TDs. He's found a home in D.C., and should have one on your roster. Also in that game, Jeremy Shockey ('01) is averaging 5 rec/game and 17 yard/rec, so he's good for points. He also gets a lot of looks with the giants revamped aerial attack, and is among the league leaders for yards after catch for tight ends. Staying with that position, another tight end to play is Bubba Franks ('00). The Pack is devastated with injuries, so play Big Bubba...he's a deeper threat than most give him credit for, good for a score.

What about '02's Ken Dorsey? Unlike most Hurricanes, he's not from the Sunshine State. The former Heisman finalist hails from California, but he's starting for the Niners against the Bucs. Alex Smith's injury might mean 2 TDs in Dorsey's 5th career start, and although he faces a good Tampa Bay secondary, the home cold of the Bay Area gives him an advantage. Jarrett Payton ('04) isn't such a bad fantasy choice for the Titans, given Chris Brown's injury and Travis Henry's suspension. Expect maybe a TD, but not big-time yardage from the the "Son of Sweetness". Lastly, 2002's Willis McGahee is a fantasy goldmine. The Bills probably won't get the win in Foxboro against the Pats in the Sunday Night game but McGahee can put up numbers - 150 YDS, 2 TDs.

WHO SHOULD SIT
OK - what about the 'Canes that you should have riding the pine? Roscoe Parrish ('04) has only played in one game this season, is is outshined by Buffalo's Eric Moulds, Lee Evans and Josh Reed. Last year Andre Johnson ('02) made the Pro Bowl, but this season he got hurt for the first time in his career and was putting up sub-par performances anyway. And Najeh Davenport ('01) is on injured reserve. And even though Kellen Winslow, Jr.'s only played 1 game in his first two seasons, but the man has skills and is a good choice to draft next year. Also something to think about - on the defensive side of the ball, Ray Lewis ('96) & Ed Reed ('01) are both hurt, so play as many Steelers as you have on your Roster - Ben Roethlisburger, Jerome Bettis, Hines Ward, Willie Parker...all can get big points for your league.

No BCS love for 'Bama?

I wouldn't want to be around Bear Bryant right now - he'd have the BCS committee running gassers until they puked. All I watched, heard, read and received (as in SMS messages and e-mail notifications) in college football this past weekend was how the nation's six undefeateds did. All but one.

Virginia Tech took care of business against BC. USC stomped Wazzu. Texas got off to a rough start and then blew Oklahoma State out of the (Still)water. UCLA had arguably the day's best finish, routing Stanford in OT. Georgia, minus fifth-year senior quarterback DJ Shockley, wound up with the short end of the stick in the World's Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party. But somewhere, somehow, lost in all the hype and pageantry and glitz and media and tradition and BCS and bullshit, the spotlight forgot to shine on Tuscaloosa.

Have we forgotten how good Alabama is this year?

Sure, the Crimson Tide didn't make it into most sports show's first 10 minutes because they oddly had a non-conference game this late in the season, hanging 35 on Utah State and allowing only a field goal. But lest we forget they play in the SEC, arguably the nation's toughest conference across the board. Any and every conference game is a must-see. And Bama's right at the top, 8-0.

Pride of the Tide Brodie Croyle is having an outstanding year under center, and even after losing junior slot receiver Tyrone Protho to what's one of the more stomach-turning injuries you'll ever see, he's still got weapons. But rare are the national sportswriters who give them their due cred.

They're at Mississippi State next, then play what should be the featured game of the week - pulleeeze, ESPN? - hosting LSU. And then, ah yes, the Iron Bowl at Jordan-Hare Stadium on November 19. And yet they continue to be on the outside looking in within most discussions about a BCS-determined national championship. The relative strength of SEC inter-conference play should give them leverage, vaulting them past the Bruins in the BCS Poll now that the 'Dawgs are out of the #4 spot.

Everyone has pigeonholed Texas-USC as Pasadena locks, and pundits with a decent dialectic can plead a case for Virginia Tech. But 'Bama just isn't mentioned. Had we a proper tournament - need I remind you that NCAA Division I-AA, Division II and Division III all use, to great success, such a format - to determine a national champion, taking the top teams in the Big Ten, Big XII, Pac 10, Big East, ACC, SEC and a pair of at-large berths, Alabama would be right up there, possibly meeting the Hokies or Longhorns in the semis. Wouldn't that be sweet?

Arguably, they haven't had the toughest road to hoe. They beat Steve Spurrier's Gamecocks in Columbia and then demoralized his former team, besting a very confident Florida squad. But that's about it. Still, they've gotten the work done.

My point is that Alabama has proven itself. And they deserve better.

The Sheen-Stamp connection

Ya gotta love AMC. And having IMDB around's not bad, either. It's a permanent fixture of my remote's quick buttons, and I catch at least one good movie every night. I just this past weekend realized that Charlie Sheen and Terence Stamp have more than 1987's "Wall Street" in common (easily my favorite movie...the one that made me go to business school). I can't believe all this time has passed and I never realized that they were both in Young Guns" just a year later.

As soon as the credits started on AMC, it hit me that Sheen's "Dick" and Stamp's John Tunstill both have significant roles...and neither makes it past the halfway point in the film.

Book review: "Murach's Java Servlets and JSP"

The one quality that makes "Murach's Java Servlets and JSP" (buy from Amazon) a clear winner is the quality of the content and clarity of author Andrea Steelman and Joel Murach's writing. They use a friendly, humorous voice that eases the normal tension accompanying such a complex topic as programming Java servlets and designing JavaServer Pages. I'm a C# developer, so this was most appreciated by someone like me. You'll also be thankful for this tone as the book takes you through some very challenging scenarios in developing winning browser-based apps.

The book is the rare breed of tech manual that stays relevant to the neophyte reader and the experienced developer alike. It's outstanding as a college-level classroom reference, with oversized dimensions (it's a large book, height- and width-wise) are loaded with rich illustrations and healthy amounts of code with thorough explanations of the concepts behind then. Physically the book is ready to sustain the harsh conditions of the learning programmer. Its rigid design will survive a reader's rampant paging through chapters to find that one code sample and stretching the book's spine, in the classroom as well as the web shop.

The book presents the reader with the holistic JSP experience, and the organization of the chapters is very logical. I particularly enjoyed the chapters dealing with JavaMail programming, working in SSL environments, database access with JDBC and MySQL, working in the HTTP pipeline, custom JSP tags and use of XML. Also featured are basic discussions of incorporating componentization in your projects through JavaBeans. I also liked wrapping up my reading with the capstone project: designing, coding and deploying a very practical Music Store web app.

The accompanying CD-ROM is outstanding, including the Java 2 SDK for Windows, Tomcat 4.0, MySQL, and trial versions of HomeSite and TextPad.

In criticism, I felt the book to be ironically a little light on servlets themselves. I would have liked to see more on servlets and beans programming discussed, and perhaps highlight a bit more some of the key classes in the Java 2 API. The book also I feel neglects the object-oriented programming concepts that are so critical to modern-day development. Maybe such topics are out of this book's range, but simple class design would have been nice. However, the best-practices approach to development - use of patterns, proper system organization and implementing MVC architecture greatly offset the book's very minor shortcomings.

I fully recommend this book to anyone looking to get into beginning to intermediate JavaServer Pages programming. It's essential to becoming a well-versed Java programmer.

First-to-market: rolling out Guam's first vidcasts

I announced how my station would be supporting video podcasts as part of a new broadband channel service I'm developing. I finally bought the paid version of ImTOO MPEG Converter, which works a lot more efficiently in terms of converting WMVs to MP4s than Quicktime7 Pro for Windows. I'd fully recommend that tool for my fellow Windows hackers looking to get into vidcasting.

This works better for my operations because our videos are inherently captured digitally as WMVs for storage in our Webcast Archives, so it's merely a matter of taking those files and converting them to MP4s. While I'm still working on hacking out iTunes-friendly enhanced podcasts using my Windows tools to do things like chapterizing, time-synched imaging & hyperlinking, but we'll see, given the fact that there are limited automated tools to do so.

• Download my audio promo introducing our new vidcasts
  
• Sample newscast

The coolest thing is that I just extended my company's existing RSS feed for news, which a ton of people already have plugged into their RSS aggregators (reader apps as well as dedicated podcatchers). We just added the additional s within the feed and referenced the video. Surprisingly, a lot of people are creating dedicated feeds for text, audio and video, rather than create hybrid feeds. (I admit, I initially did this, too.) Thank goodness for feed services like Feedburner that can differentiate between blog posts and podcast elements, and aggregators like Google Reader that can play embedded media.

This is a fun project for me, mainly because I wanted to be the first to do so in my hometown. This makes sense, seeing as how we previously were the first broadcast news station in the region to produce a series of podcasts and a royalty-free, RSS-based music subscription service.

I'm jealous of Mac folk

I'm pretty envious of my Mac friends for being able to use the Apple Podcast Chapter Tool. It's a slick command-line utility that binds XML metadata describing links, images and segments within a podcast in order to create enhanced podcasts. Granted, these only work for iTunes 4.9+, but it's a cool feature I'm trying to bake into my new broadband channel, which includes video podcasts.

Hopefully, there will be a Windows version or at least some equivalent utility hack.

Sebastian the Ibis is my vote for nation's top mascot

I've always found the Capitol One Mascot Challenge cute. As a marketing guy, it's a helluva promotion. It's a nice way to get fans to appreciate their beloved personifications of their teams, and for many schools is a chance to get more exposure (like I think Western Kentucky's Big Red, won last year). It's one of the reasons I love college football. I'm casting my vote for Miami's Sebastian the Ibis. He's part of the Captiol One All-America team, and has a rock-solid team behind him.

Major League Baseball has used popular mascots for years like The San Diego Chicken and The Philly Fanatic. Certain NBA teams (Seattle, Phoenix, Utah) do a decent job of promoting mascots, and the NFL is just horrendous at it. There's also something to be said about not using a mascot. Heck, my Michigan Wolverines don't even use a mascot, live animal, or anything other than their M Club. The Yankees don't have one.

At any rate, good luck Sebastian! (Vote for your own favorite mascot here).

Don't roll a Hummer through Berkeley

This poor Hummer got marked up in Berkeley, California, according to noahstone's photostream. He noted that the phallic iconography messed the windows up so much they had to be replaced. Damn shame.

There are about 8 Hummers on Guam at the moment...scant traces of H1's and several H2's. I've not seen any H3's but the brother of a friend of mine just brought back a sweeeeeeet sky blue H2 with the full chrome package.

The additional charges for shipping one of these babies is about another $8,000, usually from Hawaii. With no local dealership, they're a tough buy for the average auto enthusiast, so service rates are through the roof, and don't even get me started on fuel.

Wolverines face scary Northwestern squad

If you've not been following college football this season, hold onto your hat. Challenging the race for the Big Ten title is - GASP! - the Northwestern Wildcats?!?!? No, they didn't interrupt Darnell Autry's acting/modeling career and bring him back into the mix, they're just damn good. I don't fear a whole lot of things as a sports fan, but playing this year's club in Evanston has me reaching for the Pepto.

Quarterback Brett Basanez is Heisman-good, and we're already #25, with the 'Cats are #21. I'm hoping that the M Club bought a case of whatever Steve Breaston was drinking the past two weeks, because he'll need to run up the scoreboard on those NU boys. Their defense allows points (good for UM), but their "O" puts 'em up, too. Mike Hart is gimpy, so let's hope Chad Henne gets some rest, studies his playbook and gets frosh phenom Mario Manningham the ball early (and often) and lets Jason Avant & Breaston go to work.

Go Blue!

On Forbes' "Attack of the Blogs": behold the power of mainstream media

Chris Pirillo fired back as part of the blogging community's collective rejoinder to Forbes' "Attack of the Blogs" article, and touched on some very key arguments. The blogosphere is ripe with salvos of commentary about what's seen as a highly offensive piece...after the magazine admittedly took a very well-timed first shot.

Chris is dead-on in his blog post, but in so doing proves new media's challenge in winning over the unenlightened masses, those not yet living the web lifestyle: new media, in the grand scheme of things, still plays second-fiddle to mainstream media in getting the word out. MSM continues to own the world's greatest distribution channel - timeliness aside, traditional mass media still circulates way better than new media, because more people enjoy newspapers and magazines than their digital equivalents.

So whether the Forbes piece is a brutally honest look at what many in the blogosphere are too myopic to realize, or serves as a gross mis-report as a means to stave off something the magazine is threatened by, the damage is done. Forbes is institutionalized enough to influence those who aren't blogging to shy them away from it. And that's the power of today's big money media machine.

In many cases even the slightest exertion from a major corporation has more immediate influence and greater lasting effect to the fairweather consumer than years of passionate community drive and development. Take podcasting for example: you can argue that prior to the release of iTunes 4.9 this past June, the platform was still underground; it never really took off with mass appeal until Apple rolled out subscription support for DIY radio shows via the iTunes Music Store. A similar argument can be made for video podcasting - it won't really be "accepted" until Microsoft bakes support for it into Windows Media Player v.Next.

Being fortunate to simulaneously swim at both ends of the pool (being involved in MSM and participatory journalism), I'd like to comment on Chris' conclusions:

• Some magazines now use articles as a weapon, unleashing swarms of critics on their rivals.

Certainly. The typical bias and/or political siding of publications, networks and affiliates use their own products as catalysts to incite retort. This works either intentionally for or against you - there's no such thing as bad press.

• The print-driven haters have formidable allies amplifying their tirades to a potential worldwide audience of 900 million.

Ah, yes...misery loves company. MSM's numbers may be diminishing and support may be moving towards Internet-based distribution, but they still get the word out to a mammoth reader base. Here's a great example of a well-known, powerful player making a bold statement...in contrast to hundreds of obscure 'Netizens few outside the blogosphere know about posting their responses.

• Attack magazines are but a sliver of the rapidly shrinking periodicalsphere.

That's true. I'm wouldn't necessarily pigeonhole Forbes in the same category as The National Enquirer, but the article certainly did what it apparently set out to do: make a controversial statement that's polemical, not political. The amount of feedback generated from the article is HUGE. Which was probably by design. It'll sell magazines and get people talking.

• A magazine columnist can go out and make any statement about anybody, and you can't control it. That's a difficult thing.

I'm not so sure about this one. Most magazines, legit or otherwise, have rigid editorial practices with staffers that pore over every word as a means of projecting a message. Isn't the beauty of blogging, podcasting and the like the fact that we can react, create, publish and distribute our thoughts as raw as we want them to be, sans such editors? In new media we enjoy a lack of control...formal print houses still have to pay their writers, so there's "quality" enforced at some point.

• Even some magazine columnists see the harm they can pose.

Sure they do. It's the dream of any writer to walk down the street and have an entire community of people talk about their story, editorial, commentary, or report, in ANY context. It's critical to get such notoriety to advance your career to the next step. In this line of work, apathy towards your work is a fate worse than death. Get people to say something - anything - about your work to provoke a thought or invoke an emotion.

• Yet magazines edit and censor print content all the time - to protect their own interests.

Of course they do. And so do radio & TV stations, web sites, etc. - part of any commercial concern is to generate profit. Which means not pissing off the right people. (In this case such a community evidently excludes bloggers.) That's one of the main advantages of new media over traditional censoring: open feedback and constant interactivity.

So while we're going to salvage what we can and launch our own offensive against the piece, we've got a ways to go until we have an equal circulation chain and amount of credibility as mainstream newspapers and magazines. We've got the advantage in archival: the sheer volume of posts ripping the article already far outweigh and will likewise lean people to think the piece is inaccurate. I'm still pushing the concept of everybody being "the media". As a proud blogger I feel slighted by the piece, but the paid journalist in me also sees the point and gets the larger message.

We're getting there, but this round goes to Forbes.

ESPN's reheating of "Cold Pizza"

I'm a fan of the "new", more sports-oriented Cold Pizza on ESPN2. I did try to let the original concept sink in after sitting through the first few weeks of Season 1, but the notion of a morning show - in the very literal sense of the word, from a traditionalist TV standpoint - never caught on with me. And apparently, a ton of other people had similar thoughts. Being a guy in the TV business as a news anchor and sports producer, I was surprised ESPN took that big of a risk and deviated that far from the world of competitive athletics.

I catch CP at night because Guam's time difference from NYC means the 8am broadcast comes on for us at 11pm the next night, and the genuine morning show concept never really took. Not on ESPN. DVD reviews, fashion tips, recipes, mainstream news headlines & weather, etc...on a sports network??? I've got at least 4 other major channels I can find that stuff on, which is dramatically better. Right tool for the right job, says I.

The producers did cast experienced TV people, which is the smarter/safer thing to do when starting out, but neglected to stay focused on the network's core competency.

Fixing the show's big problem - lack of sports credibility - was key: ESPN got rid of cheesecake and stocked up on meat. Removed from duty were the peppy, bubbly personalities in Kit Hoover and Thea Andrews, replaced by experienced sportswriters Woody Paige from The Denver Post and Skip Bayless from The San Jose Mercury News (the latter two admittedly less aesthetic than the former by several orders of magnitude). Jay Crawford, the show's only remaining original castmember, co-anchors with veteran anchor Dana Jacobsen, both experienced broadcast sports journalists.

(And yeah, like any 31-year-old heterosexual male, it sucks not to be greeted by hotties every night, but the content's generally better and more on track for sports enthusiasts.) To the show's credit, there were some intriguing series and recurring segment during the first run, like "America's Best Sports Bars".

At any rate, I watch every night. "1st and 10" is nice to fall asleep to.

TV physics and the $1.99 price point

Here's an outstanding piece by Stephen Speicher on the economics behind network television programming and the pricing model within the iTunes Music Store. Right on target, Stephen.

How many audio podcasters will make the upgrade to video?

One thing that I've been toying with lately is re-subscribing to many of the podcasts I'd stopped listening to for whatever reason. I'm doing this with intent - to see if all the DIY radio show hosts are going to make the jump to video. I caught Adam Curry messing around with a couple of MP4s and video clips in his RSS feed, and I've noticed some of the more liberal podcasters out there with enough money and time put together little clips of their own. It's really neat to see such interest in the new medium. Let's hope it's not fleeting.

I'm embracing portable video myself in distributing my company's RSS-based content. It was always my intent, once the tools for content creation became in wide enough distribution and costs were driv, the publishing platform made hosting affordable and the price and availability of appropriate consumer technology became so low and so prevalent, to deliver video. It's the ultimate platform through which to marshal a message.

So fellow podcasters making the migration to moving pictures, I salute you. Good to see you taking the initiative to try out something new and make your shows that much more entertaining and valuable. But take it from me, 'cause I do it all: if you thought editing audio was hard and laborious, you ain't seen nothing yet. Literally.

The new media regime: mainstream vs. citizen

I was thinking abouyt an earlier blog post in which I said that although I fully support participatory journalism, I'm tragically not in favor of issuing press passes or credentials to citizen journalists. At least not yet.

An analogy I just thought of was the regulation Google uses between the sites, services and sources it lists and indexed within Google News and the new Google Blog Search. The former is very meticulous (or used to be anyway) in selecting resources to list and crawl, being only formal, legitimate news organizations. Obviously, the latter applies to the general blogosphere. A nice system of reliable control is therefore maintained, in being able to provide a very distinct separation between what's coming out of the mainstream and the word on the street. You might disagree, but I prefer this method.

I really am loving the fact that "the media" is no longer a separate entity from the general population, and further like how it's been delineated to what's mainstream and what's citizen-based.

As an interesting corollary, Steve Outing wonders whether MSM should train PJ. I thought that freedom to express onesself through open distribution channels was the point.

This is the stuff

I just got some Breyer's Reese's Peanut Butter Ice Cream. It looked interesting enough in the grocer's freezer, and it's the weekend, so my lactose intolerance is more managable. One word: whoa.

This is some seriously good stuff. It's rich as hell, but really good.

Has Google re-indexed my resume?

I'm wondering if Google's re-indexed my resume for some reason. Such would be curuous, seeing as how it's been online for at least two years off my old blog. I've gotten four job inquiries this week from hiring managers who said they Googled certain qualifications (ASP.NET and C#, mainly), and they all found me.

I try and keep my CV as current as possible, but it looks like people are sniffing at it more than usual these days.

Washington Post vidcasts look really good

The Washington Post, a publication I really respect for its liberal implementations of cross-platform media, has started video podcasting special features it produces. This is huge for the newspaper business.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/mmedia/vipod.xml

I just caught Rob Pegogaro's review of the video iPod, which is really cool. Great production quality - someone took care to shoot and edit the piece. (Heads-up, TV affiliates who are just rehashing broadcasts as MP4s in an RSS feed.)

Princeton is also doing vidcasts of its university journal, following in Stanford's footsteps.

Yes, dammit...I am authorized to work in the U.S.

One thing I enjoy about Google shaking up the IT world is the residual hiring frenzy its caused. I've been getting hit up a lot the past month by headhunters and corporate recruiters for various positions at some tech companies. I can tell things must be getting better (or more desperate) if they see from my resume that I'm from Guam and they still come after me.

But the one thing that gets me is how HR staffers or hiring managers never take into consideration that (1) Guam is a U.S. territory, and (2) we're not in the same time zones as the mainland. I've taken several 3am calls recently from prospective employers wanting to talk. They always get embarrassed for calling at such an odd hour, and always say "I've never dealt with anyone from Guam before, but I know it's in the Pacific...".

Also, deferring back to Point #1, people have a tendency to ask me if I'm fluent in English - in mid-conversation and despite the fact that my CV lists me as an American broadcaster. The kicker is also when they ask if I've got the proper visas or if I'm authorized to work in the Continental U.S. It's a running gag with me.

So yes, we out here - in a U.S. territory - enjoy full citizenship. And do keep in mind we're GMT+10.

Hail to the Flickr

Andrew Morrell's got an excellent Flickr photostream of Michigan football, notably the Wolverines' last-play victory against Penn State at the Big House. This is professional-grade stuff...he's got a really keen eye for detail and atmosphere. Really good wallpaper-worthy shots.

Good job, Andrew! Keep it up!

Apple software on Windows: oy, my aching PC...

I've been using more Apple software lately to setup our media files populating our vidcasts. Geez, the resource demands on those things is intense. Makes me almost want to buy a Mac (which I guess is the hook-line-sinker point). Alas, I have but yet 768MB of RAM on my 1.5GHz Windows XP Pro box at home. And that's a tad faster than the machines I use here at Camp Happy (work). And I still can't get Apple apps to fly.

I'm testing the time spent exporting a night's newscast in Quicktime 7 Pro for Windows, which I bought for $29.95, which takes insanely long on my Win2K Pro box in my office. I played with a 30-second commercial and 85 minutes later, I had an MP4. That won't work with hour-long shows. I've also used ImTOO's MPEG Encoder, which works great in Win32 environments and is a helluva lot faster with comparable quality. And unlike QT7, imports WMVs.

That might, as Jon Lovitz would say, be the ticket.

Linksys homepage display Red Hat test page???

A friend and I were surfing and found that Linksys' main page curiously loaded the default Red Hat Linux Apache page loaded (check out the URL in the image).

Hmmm....

Philadelphia Daily News makes cry for survival

FINALLY. Someone in print realizes that the medium itself is flawed and needs to change. Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Daily News wisely recognizes that high-tech concepts need to be used to deliver news or else the newspaper business will fall:

"We must be the message, not the medium, and so we must adjust to give consumers news in the high-tech ways that they are asking for, not the old-tech way that we are confortable with. If we don’t change, we will die – and it will be our fault. It defies all the conventional wisdom, but I believe that the Philadelphia Daily News can be an agent of that change – and not a victim. ..."

This is exactly the "change the platform, not the profession" concept I've been preaching for months, directly related to the inherent weakness of the print medium. It's a fact: you can only integrate a legacy platform in so many ways and for so long before it reaches its limits, not being able to cope with the new opportunities or complexities of a newer structure.

And that's where obsolescence kicks in.

TypePad now supports video blogging

Not to be outdone by Google's Blogger weblogging creation/hosting service, which lets you post to a blog from the web, a mobile device, e-mail and Microsoft Word, TypePad is supporting video publishing within its platform. I figure its only a matter of time (weeks, I'd project) before Google provides similar functionality, which is neat. Can't wait for vidcasts to really take off.

Safari's internal RSS reader is too cool

A stupid booting error on my Windows XP Pro box in which the OS won't load past the post-POST screen forced me to use a Mac OS X machine (I'm blogging on this now). I was messing with Safari, and noticed the 'RSS' link at the end of web pages that have such feeds referenced in their META tags. I clicked on it and noticed the FEED:// page layout (assumedly if a feed doesn't bind to an XSLT process) and the cool features, especially the ability to use a slide control to decrease/increase the length of an artricle. Absolutely amazing.

We have NOTHING like this in the Windows world (at least not with MSIE), but expect it in Vista. The only thing that comes close is Feedburner's default HTML layout, or the default page formatting applied for Blogger's Atom feeds, like mine. It apparently works for feeds that have the FEED nomenclature, as well as raw RSS 2.0 feeds.

And the screen captures are really neat. This is so much easier than the Win32 "Print Screen and copy into Microsoft Paint" gimmick I've used for years.

This is beyond cool.

APIs for marketers/journalists

Here's a novel concept: Web 2.0-ish public APIs for journalism shops and marketing agencies. I doubt it'll happen with any significant affiliates or networks, but good thinking, Steve.

Comedy Central announces new broadband channel

OK, now I realize that my announcement of my station's forthcoming broadband content delivery service (exclusive & personalized audio/video podcasts, streaming, imagery, etc.), but Comedy Central also announced its own service, Motherload. And Disney said they're doing more multimedia content delivery. Sounds pretty sweet - along the same line as MTV Overdrive.

If my PR forays are to be trumped by anyone, I'm glad it's Comedy Central. Or VH1.

If you're going to do an audio news podcast, don't use TV talk

I was listening to one of the MP3s off of WLS-TV ABC7 Chicago's hybrid mixed media news podcast, and while I appreciated the initiative of getting involved with new media, I can't say I was that impressed. It was an audio version of the televised show, which didn't make for seamless translation. Phrases the anchors used like "The imagery you see here...", and "As you can see..." referencing visualizations obviously don't work for a medium where you can only listen. Any audience would see the lethargy in production quality of this service.

My intent isn't to rip on a fellow news affiliate, much less one in a market much larger and significant than my own (Guam). Rather my point is to bring to light a growing problem from newspapers and broadcast stations that are adopting new media like podcasts, blogging, wikis, etc. If you're going to do something, do it right - and don't try and force square pegs to fit, because they never do. Either produce a new show catering to a specific medium, or write scripts in more platform-agnostic fashion.

My station has TV newscasts, which we stream (and soon will be vidcasting/vodcasting as part of my brodcast strategy) and then we also produce audio podcast versions, which are written more radio friendly to avoid such awkward translation mistakes. It's a lot more work, and has caused us to bend and flex in directions we didn't initially intend - but isn't that the point? Tech will do that to you.

ESPN.com combines the best of both worlds - producing original audio content for its podcasts, as well as time-shifting ESPN Radio programming like "The Dan Patrick Show" and audio tracks to TV segments like "Cold Pizza's 1st and 10".

Overall, I really enjoyed WLS-TV's work and remain subscribed to their RSS feed. It's just little things like this get to me.

TomTom coming out strong

A few months ago I found out that the TomTom car GPS navigation device includes roadmaps for my hometown of Guam. I've seen the TV ads on SportsCenter this week, and it looks like the company's gearing up for a big international rollout.

I'm saving up for the day when we here in TechnicalNeverNeverLand (where tech never grows up) can use DVRs. That probably won't happen anytime in the next 4 years, so I'm going to try watching L.A. affiliate programming on my home PC via a SlingBox at a friend's house. It'll be a trip to catch "Grey's Anatomy" when it actually airs, not two weeks tape delayed.

iPod owners more likely to be influential with tech

A curious study cites that iPod owners are among those most likely to consume and spread consumer-generated media (blogs, vidcasts, SMS, DVR). Tech breeds tech.

FoxxyNews: butt-naked vidcasting

Alright, who picked my brain?

OK, it's non-nude, but the women are hot. Perhaps in tribute to Canada's well-known Naked News (or not to be outdone by it), FoxxyNews offers gorgeous women, including several Playboy Playmates, delivering fake news over video podcasts. 'Nuff said. I'm sold.

Should citizen journalists have full media access & rights? Nope.

Here's the discussion topic of the week for people in my line of work. A recent inqiury by Pete Prodoehl, a videoblogger, asks the question if citizen journalists should have the same rights and priviliges as mainstream media photogs, video journalists, reporters, etc. That's a very compelling argument.

I'm about as big a proponent of participatory journalism while being in the mainstream as you'll find. I fully support empowering citizens to make their voices heard, and liberating the distribution of their thoughts. This tears down the dominance those of us in the mainstream information business have had over those not in it for decades. But in this case, I'd favor time-tested structure over potential anarchy. Non-MSM types shouldn't be granted press passes, credentials or be allowed to attend most official press conferences. I'm not proud of it, either.

For someone to just show up at a news event and say, "Hey, I'm going to cover this for my blog,", or "I'll be podcasting this event", isn't enough. This is one of the few instances where I'd say the professional training outweighs honest zest for being part of the process of the documentation of human experience. That doesn't make hobbyist or new media types any less passionate about their craft - or any worse at it than MSM reporters - just less accountable. And that's key.

I don't doubt that a blogger who showed up at a press conference would ask any illogical or unresearched questions, or conduct herself in a manner any less formal than me, a professional reporter. I'm just leery about making events that may be public domain open to be covered by any goofball with a cameraphone. Since the President of the United States is a public servant, should anyone wanting to ask him a question at a press event be allowed? Of course not.

If that does prove to be the case and enough people in significant decision-making capacities are in favor of it, sign me up - I'd love to take my cell phone inside the press room at the NBA Finals and create an ad hoc report. And I know at least 100 other people who would be willing, too. See what I mean? There needs to be a managable system of control over who's allowed and who's not. Anything less increases the potential for chaos.

Citizen journalists by their lack of association with an official source lack the breadcrumbs that we in the mainstream have. It's good old fashioned organizational CYA (cover your ass) in full effect. I've said for years that the true power of the the almighty press credential isn't where it can get me into...it's what it can get me out of. Such priviliges makesmy colleagues and I accountable in the event we screw something up, giving the person(s) or organization(s) being covered a source to take action against should we get something wrong. If I offend or misquote and interviewee, or get a story on someone completely wrong, the person has the full right to call my company, chew out my boss, ans demand my termination for being such an idiot. DIY'ers are exempt of such "luxuries".

And that's the delicate balance mass media manages with the people we write about, shoot on video, and capture in images. MSM diehards would argue, complain and make a stink about why their precious press passes separate them from the average citizen, and how they had to go to college for years to learn the craft, and then cut their teeth as an intern before finally "making it". But that's not the real problem. It's not the practice of journalism that's the issue - it's the audience. The masses aren't ready for such empowerment. And it's sad.

...and the Heisman invites go to...

After recapping who I had as this year's preseason Heisman hopefuls, I'm making up my own list of five players to invite to NYC for the Heisman Trophy presentation this year as finalists.

• Reggie Bush, USC
• Matt Leinart, USC
• Vince Young, Texas
• Drew Stanton, Michigan State
• Brady Quinn, Notre Dame
• Brett Basanez, Northwestern
  

I've still yet to see a performance that can mirror Bush's countless jaw-dropping runs, screens, or kickoff/punt returns this season. He's amazing. Every few years we get to see a player that every time he touches the ball, something special happens and the highlight blubs start a-poppin'. Think Eric Crouch. Think Charles Woodson.

It's going to be incredibly close between Bush and Young. Stanton caught my eye early and is a heckuva athlete, Quinn's turning heads, and Basanez is laughing all the way to the Big Ten title.

Should iTunes act as RSS blogreader?

I was thinking that Apple might want to add blog-reading features into iTunes, so that people could download audio podcasts, video podcasts, and read their subscribed journals all from a single application. This may not be such a good idea with web-based tools being preferred, and would be a really top-heavy way of reading simple text, but it's a thought.

Despite criticism of iTunes' RSS parsing capabilities (or lack thereof), it would make for consolidated information consumption. And, it would put less pressure on content creators to develop and maintain seperate RSS feeds for essentially information that should be hybrid within the same channel.

How USC could remain undefeated and wind up #3

Stupid BCS.

As a computer science guy, one thing I've always had against artificial intelligence is the constant hurdle we face when trying to replicate human thinking on a machine. Logic is easy, but common sense is nearly impossible to express digitally. All the theoretical mathematics in the world coupled with the most brilliantly written software can't replace human rationale. That having been said, can you believe that USC was booted out of the #1 ranking by Texas, thanks to some algorithmic process by the Bowl Championship Series?

I can, and I predicted it. And I'm not saying I like it.

So relying on good 'ol fashioned gray matter, I'd like to postulate how the still-undefeated USC - the two-time defending national champions - might wind up at the end of the season without a loss, and tragically ranked as the third-best team in the country.

USC's remaining schedule is pretty soft. They spent so much time on the road during the season's first half that they're only two remaining away games are at Stanford and at California, and only the latter of which will be even remotely competitive. So they lose out on strength of schedule, putting pressure on them to blow people out big time, because USC can't exactly tout a huge roster of Spurrier-esque 50-point annihilations. They rocked Hawaii and Rice, but haven't been dominant against the rest of the PAC-10, or Notre Dame. Except for USC, the PAC-10 hasn't been a nationally-intimidating conference in years. Pete Carroll's only real legitimate challenge is in the season finale at home against UCLA, who looks good. So there's a little bit of hope, but it doesn't bode well for the Trojans.

Texas has a moderately smooth ride to Pasadena. Their biggest opponets now lie in rubble behind them, having taken out Ohio State and Texas Tech, so they're looking ahead to Texas A&M and Oklahoma State (they don't play Nebraska this year). Mack Brown's Longhorns have their early season blowouts of non-conference and Big XII teams like going for them, so look for them to be #1 if they win out. However, consider the x-factor: the Big XII championship game has displayed a tendency to wreck a team's chances in the BCS poll in recent history. They'll probably face Missouri or Colorado, both of which are good, but will be summarily dispatched. So if all goes according to plan, count on the BCS favoring UT. And here's where it gets interesting.

#3 Virginia Tech, in terms of strength of schedule, has its work cut out for it - and has the most to gain. Should Frank Beamer run the table and finish the season with an unblemished record, the Hokies would have beaten Boston College and Miami - both assumedly ranked in the top 15 at the time they lock-up, and both of whom they play in Blacksburg. I'm also projecting a VT/Florida State ACC championship, to be held at a neutral site, which should make for a great game any way you slice it. VT started the season by obliterating the opposition by an average of 30 points (including a pair of 45-0 shutouts of Duke and Ohio). The only ranked opponent they beat was Georgia Tech (at the time #15), who they handled 51-7. So while they took care of business against lesser teams early, they'll step it up against ranked opponents later on in the season, which the BCS also factors. Were it not for Vince Young in Austin, we'd all be talking about Marcus Vick.

So even though 99.9997% of America's sportswriters (myself included) would have the Trojans face the Longhorns in the Rose Bowl, the BCS, based on its programming model considering schedule strength and margin of victory, may likely rank Texas #1, followed by Virginia Tech and then USC. This would mean, if we did truly have a 1 vs. 2 national championship game - which was the whole damn point of the BCS' inception anyway - we'd see Hokies and 'Horns.

It'll still make for a great game...albeit not the one many of us want to see.

Workaround for using .WMVs in Feedburner RSS feed

I've been messing with iTunes 6.0 and generating an integrated RSS feed, mixing textual blog post content with audio podcasts, with video podcasts/vidcasts/vodcasts/vlogs/whatever. One particular brick wall that I kept running into was iTunes not seeing any WMV files I was listing as legitimate items (surprise, surprise). Apparently Feedburner has this problem, too.

Here's a great workaround to get your Windows Video recognized in Feedburner.

Articles of interest today

I read at least 200 full-length articles per day and try and print out the best ones in terms ifo interesting topic, presentation of material, and writing style. Three really neat pieces really stood out from the blogosphere through Google Reader today:

• What obstacles exist for online journalism?
• The lowdown on mobile TV
• NetFlix movie downloads delayed
  

Will vidcasting be the death of streaming?

I'm thinking more about the impact that vidcasting (aka, video podcasting) is going to have on existing content delivery strategies now that some mainstream sources are using it creatively. Specifically, I'm pondering the effect its going to have on streaming technology. I'm realistically envisioning my own company's use of streaming being phased out for the most part by higher-quality, feature-rich, notification-based vidcasts, except for times when we need to do live streaming.

There's also PSPcasting - delivering high-res video to Sony's Playstation Port