66 posts tagged “unseen”
The Yes Men, those impervious impersonators of the world's most toxic rich people, are up to their hijinks again. Word over the wire is that they're coming out with a new movie, The Yes Men Fix the World, but their funny-bone still seems to be intact: t hey promise that "this film has one of the very few underwater ballet scenes you will ever see in a political documentary." Take a look.
UPDATE: Michael reminds me: Leo started streaming live video in early 2008.
2008 As I See IT - Nice Fish Films | Michael Sean Wright
What was the biggest “story” of 2008 for me? It wasn’t the meltdown in the financial markets, the forced inevitability of political change or company A introducing exciting product. This was the year of us SEEING network differently. One of the great innovators in social-tech is Leo Laporte, he puts ideas into action daily. This year over 271,000 people watched his live streaming “24-Hours of the iPhone." These are truly staggering numbers. More people were watching Leo live than were tuned into MSNBC at that moment. Laporte has assembled his own DIY television network. His “netcasts” are heard by hundreds of thousands. He’s figured out how to make this social-net work. While you will see many stories of social-tool A, B or C in the year-end re-caps, they have forgotten the BIG story of the year. Leo Laporte changed the reality of what can be done on the socialnet. Take notice: The Revolution has happened this year. It wasn’t Televised - it was streamed, for free.
UPDATE: Economy Crashes, Leo Keeps Going
A shocking round of economic catastrophes dominated the news in the fall and winter of 2008. Revision3 cut loose Sarah Lane and Martin Sargent, of Pop Siren and Internet Superstar. They appear to have at least a temporary home at the TWiT cottage, to acquire new skills and/or work on their next show. Leo's pragmatic, low-key business strategy coupled with openness and generosity are what endear him to so many.
Original Post:
Possibly the most well-known name in independent tech broadcasting, Leo Laporte is launching a low-key and yet bold move into internet television.
The TWiT.tv family of shows is going to go video, and Leo recently said he was planning to start with 25 hours a week of video programming. You tell me if that's a promise or a threat. He's been exploring tech options and I've watched some video via twitlive.tv Saturday and Sunday from 11AM onward. Leo is building out his office into a small studio, purchasing cameras and lights and talking about it during the process, as he did recently on episode 140 of TWiT.
Leo has a long history in broadcasting and his close pals from the defunct Tech TV include John Dvorak, Patrick Norton, Kevin Rose and D. L. Prager. Amber Macarthur, Steve Gibson, Paul Thurrott, Merlin Mann and Andy Ihnatko all do shows on the TWiT network, and the Buzz crew Molly Wood and Tom Merritt are frequent guests, as are Veronica Belmont, Jason Calacanis and Robert Scoble. Leo has had some great "gets" over the years, including such internet-famous persons as The Woz.
Leo runs a small empire which isn't swimming in debt and seems to make enough money that talent and rent are paid by donations, appropriate advertisers, and well-done interstitials. In stark contrast to the standard raising of a butt-load of money from VCs and having a burn-rate that isn't necessarily sustainable, Leo has a more pragmatic and less risky approach.
Leo is the underdog mogul. He's got the numbers, the experience, the personal brand, the industry contacts, and the good will of a huge audience. He's nobody's fool and a genuine nice guy whose likely success no-one will begrudge. I admit, I'll be watching with some fascination how Leo's foray into TV plays out over the next months.
Video podcaster Dave Mora did this interview with me after the KGO Live event last weekend. He recorded it with a Flip camera. Thanks, Dave!
All for the want of a freakin photo of Owen Thomas.
UPDATE (Dec. 2008): I found a copy of the video at the center of this controversy. Judge for yourself! (Original music video using a Billy Joel song and various internet images)
- Video (2:45): Here Comes Another Bubble - The Richter Scales (via "antifreeze")
See Also:
Copyright, fair use and the struggle against online image misappropriation (Law Geek)
Nalts Fans the Flames of Online Civil War (Mashable)
- A flashconf on fair use? (Scripting News)
Stopping a Civil War - A Civil War is Brewing (Furrier.org)
- Illegal Proposition: Abuse and Damage the Source (Letter to Lessig)
This post was written in December of 2007, but one year later, the video is still missing from YouTube; copyright and "fair use" of images remains an issue in spite of Lessig's efforts, and those of Creative Commons.
- Let's assume: high-resolution digital media should be licensed, "paid for" and not pirated.
- For lo-fi photos, lo-fi audio, etc. we could make use and re-use "free", "low flat fee" or "attribution only".
There have been successes making things free or very cheap, letting crowds and time do their magic. Then later you make money in sheer volume, in the tell-all book, the director's cut, the audio re-master, or the glossy magazine cover.
Ms. Hartwell should not have needed to yank all her photos; perhaps she could have replaced them with lo-fi versions, her name inside the image frame, and never made public her hi-res collections.
Most people should still use lo-res public galleries so people know where to go if they do want the "good stuff". Unless, of course, you have all the fancy rich clients you need, and don't care whether new people discover you.
The music industry has missed this exact opportunity as well:
(thanks to Alex Lindsay of PixelCorps.tv for providing a crucial piece long ago)
- Very-lo-fi DRM-free audio tracks everywhere
- Two levels of paid-for service: normal (limited hi-fi), or premium all-you-can-eat
- Playlists then make sense, because playlists should always "just work", and be portable
- Missing track is a thing of the past
- Lo-fi track is what happens when you are cheap or are trying before buying.
- General Solution: Make lo-fi versions of most every photo and audio track available, for free or very low cost, and make it easy for "creatives" to pay to license hi-res media, be it one photo, ten seconds of music, etc.
- Benefit: things don't have to be "taken down", just replaced with lo-fi versions where people haven't paid creators or gotten permission.
This could enable a whole bunch of non-commercial activity, and should the Richter Scales start becoming commercial, they'd license the work or get permission, maybe share royalty. If they used the photo out of laziness, and don't care about the fidelity, I think the argument leans toward their side. Maybe there weren't other recent photos of the "new media d***-bag" (Owen Thomas).
One shouldn't find the hi-res media by searching. One shouldn't find lo-res either if one is going to be sued or taken down after the fact. Perhaps this is Wired's fault? The implication is that Ms. Hartwell's snapshot is worth more than the final music video, which I refute. How can we let a lot of hard work and talent go down the (you) tubes because the rules favor accusers, corporations and lawyers and provide no clarity, no recourse, no compromise, no simple legal guidelines for simple artistic goals.
(I should mention here that Ms. Hartwell was very aware of the large number of views they were getting. She may feel robbed, but others may feel extorted)
I think what angers some is that briefly showing a likeness, photo and subject not unusual or artistic, requires a pre-negotiated license. I do not think it reasonable to make a career of selling licenses to use ordinary (in this case) pictures of people that you* have access to and others don't.
That would put you* half-way toward becoming a paparazzo, wouldn't it? A paparazzo who doesn't have to compete and has the cooperation of the "celebrities." These are big celebrities only in their small insular world.
We aren't talking Princess Di and Dodi, fer cryin' out loud!
you* is a "hypothetical" you.
Found this video on the interwebs today, via Twitter. An ingenious low-tech stop-motion animation executed with graffiti art. The artist's site is Blublu.org.
UPDATE: BLU in Berlin - November 2008 (via @laughingsquid)
Update: Oct. 2008 Internet Superstar was canceled along with several other Revision3 shows. Rumor has it Martin is planning a new show.
Internet Superstar Site
Revision3.com
Martin Sargent is an excellent host, very engaging and funny, and produces some of the best interstitial ads I've seen (for Netflix.) Gator is an excellent "straight man" for balance. Gator is dead, ZOMG!!!1!. He will be replaced by Jay Speiden. I hope Jim Louderback doesn't fire them anytime soon!
In the latest episode of Internet Superstar, Martin interviews Laughing Squid's "primary tentacle," Scott Beale.
About Internet Superstar
One after the other, Martin Sargent’s shows—on television, on cell phones, and online—have been brutally cancelled. When his most recent effort, Infected by Martin Sargent, was axed by Revision3 CEO Jim Louderback, Martin finally cracked. At the show’s final taping, Martin doused himself in gasoline and threatened to light his explosive-laden body on fire in desperate protest. Fearing a lawsuit, and that his fleece vest and perfectly coifed, John Edwards-like hair might get singed, Jim Louderback talked Martin down by promising him a new show, but with a major provision: except for the bandwidth, Martin will have to finance the whole thing himself.
Martin Sargent
Internationally adored farceur Martin Sargent has been delighting audiences for decades. Sargent got his start in media as a plucky young editor at PC/Computing magazine, and it is generally accepted in publishing circles that the periodical shuttered its operations as a direct result of Sargent’s exodus to pursue television projects. At ZDTV, TechTV and G4TV he hosted shows including The Screen Savers and Unscrewed with Martin Sargent. Since then he has done several pilots for such television powerhouses as Comedy Central and USA Network, and hosted shows on the Internet as well as mobile phones. Every show he has ever hosted or been affiliated with has either been cancelled or, in the case of his pilots, not picked up to begin with. He now hosts Web Drifter on Revision3, as well as Internet Superstar, a show he shoots in a shed in his mom’s backyard with absolutely no funding or support. In a nutshell, his once promising career, which reached its zenith in 2002 when he interviewed Vin Diesel, has utterly shat the bed.
He also has his very own blog - www.sargeworld.com.
GatorRIP Gator!Gator was a hard-drinking drifter who was raised by an ex-con Seminole Indian named Starving Crow and lived out of his truck in an abandoned lot in South San Francisco. He knew very little about the internet and less about technology. His main job was to make sure his "Internet Superstar" pal Martin Sargent didn't act like too much of a hotshot or get beat up by a guest.
He also held state carp records in Tennessee, Kentucky and Florida and could field dress a buck with a broken beer bottle in under eight minutes. He had no knowledge of his real last name.
Jay Who?
Plus, though Gator is irreplaceable, we can take comfort in the fact that sitting alongside me now will be my longtime collaborator Jay Speiden, who also happens to be Gator’s city cousin. Small world. Jay has been my main collaborator on pretty much everything I’ve done since day one of Unscrewed (not that that’s necessarily something you’d want on your resume), and I think you’ll really like what he brings to the show.
Shows are Live and On-demand at the GRITtv Site
Get Grit TV Twitter updates by following @grittv
GRITtv airs Mon-Thurs, at 8pm & 1am ET, on Free Speech TV (DISH Network ch. 9415)
UPDATE: Laura is in Denver broadcasting this week from the Democratic party convention.
Laura Flanders is the host of "RadioNation" heard on Air America Radio and syndicated to non-commercial affiliates nationwide.
She is the author most recently, of Blue Grit: Making Impossible, Improbable and Inspirational Political Change in America (Penguin, 2008) and BUSHWOMEN: Tales of a Cynical Species (Verso, 2004), an investigation into the women in George W. Bush's Cabinet. Publisher's Weekly called Flanders' New York Times best-seller, "fierce, funny and intelligent."
She wrote on Hillary Clinton in The Contenders (Seven Stories Press, 2007) and edited The W Effect: Sexual Politics in the Age of Bush, in 2004 for the Feminist Press.
Before joining Air America when it launched in March 2004, Laura hosted the award-winning " Your Call," Monday-Friday, on public radio, KALW, 91.7 fm in San Francisco.
Flanders' TV appearances include "Lou Dobbs Tonight" and " Larry King Live " on CNN as well as "The O'Reilly Factor," and "Hannity and Colmes," (FOX News) "Washington Journal," "Donahue," "Good Morning America" and the CBC news discussion program, "CounterSpin."
Her writing appears in The Nation, Alternet, Ms. Magazine, and elsewhere and her op-ed pieces have appeared in papers including The San Francisco Chronicle.
Flanders was founding director of the Women's Desk at the media watch group, FAIR and for more than ten years she produced and hosted CounterSpin, FAIR's nationally-syndicated radio program.
Shie is also the author of Real Majority, Media Minority; the Cost of Sidelining Women in Reporting (Common Courage Press, 1997) about which Susan Faludi wrote, "If only there were a hundred of her." Katha Pollitt called it "Funny, angry, factfilled and brilliant."
Related Post: Unheard Radio: Radio Nation with Laura Flanders
Via slashdot today:
Science News - Seeing in four dimensions
Dimensions-math.org - a tool for visualizing four dimensions. '
Oh look! A hypercube!
A walk through mathematics
A film for a wide audience
Nine chapters, two hours of maths, that take you gradually up to the fourth dimension. Mathematical vertigo guaranteed! Background information on every chapter: see "Details".
Free download and you can watch the films online
The film can also be ordered as a DVD.
This film is being distributed under a Creative Commons license.
More details on the download page
I Can Haz Cheezburger?
Fail Dogs
Engrish Funny
Totally Looks Like
You may think Mr. Huh is quite funny, but his numbers are no joke!
Ben Huh will be giving a presentation at ROFLthing in San Francisco Friday, August 29, 2008.
Irina Slutsky of the always entertaining show Geek Entertainment TV interviewed Mr. Huh recently:
Ben Huh, chief cheezburger of I Can Has Cheezburger has turned his love of LOLCats into a popular site and even scored a book deal. While at MIT for ROFLCon, he stepped into the role of Stephen LOLking to explain the mysteries of his Universal Theory of LOLS to Irina.
UPDATE: The AMC channel is planning on re-making this classic as a cable television series. Read more here: Coppola's The Conversation to become AMC series
In The Conversation, written, directed and produced by Francis Ford Coppola, Gene Hackman stars as a surveillance expert based in San Francisco.
What's not to like? Gene Hackman, San Francisco, Coppola, a lovely soundtrack, and subject matter that is extremely relevant today. If you haven't screened this flick, you are missing out.
It gives new meaning to the question "Can you hear me now?"
Most of the brilliant minds responsible for Mystery Science Theater 3000 are back with a new project entitled Cinematic Titanic:
Cinematic Titanic is a feature length movie riffing show and is an artist owned and operated venture created by Joel Hodgson, the creator of the Peabody award-winning Mystery Science Theatre 3000. Cinematic Titanic features the original cast and writers of MST3K, which is Hodgson (Joel Robinson), Trace Beaulieu (Crow), and J. Elvis Weinstein (Tom Servo). Filling out the ensemble is Mary Jo Pehl (Pearl Forrester) and Frank Conniff (TV’s Frank). Cinematic Titanic’s focus is to riff on the movies we love, which are ‘the unfathomable’, ‘the horribly great’, and the just plain ‘cheesy’ movies from the past. Our first feature length DVD Cinematic Titanic’s “The Oozing Skull” is available for purchase at EZtakes.com
Created by Joel Hodgson, creator of Mystery Science Theater 3000, Cinematic Titanic peppers The Oozing Skull with the kind of hilarious, rapid-fire commentary that fans of fine movie riffing have come to know and love. Joining Joel are his original Mystery Science Theater 3000 cast mates Trace Beaulieu and J. Elvis Weinstein, along with longtime MST3K writers and cast members Frank Conniff and Mary Jo Pehl. It's gonna get ugly, but then it's gonna get funny, so strap yourself in for the skull-oozing, gut-busting ride that is Cinematic Titanic.
Episode Two preview:
UPDATE: Episode Three available today. Here's the preview:
