The first BBC Backstage podcast: DRM and the BBC

Podcast group

The first ever BBC Backstage podcast kicked off in fine style on Wednesday 7th February.

We invited some of the most vocal backstagers in the long running debate over DRM, to come and join us at the BBC to discuss face to face what they felt about DRM and the BBC. The hour long discussion around DRM and the BBC included,

You can listen with the built in player below, or you can download and remix the MPeg3 file or the Ogg Vorbis file. Both are licensed under creative commons attribution. So as long as you credit backstage.bbc.co.uk, your good to go. Don't forget to check out some great action shots from the debate…

Dave tries to reason with Michela

Miles asks some difficult questions

Dave

Brian prepares to answer James

Tom listening to Brian

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Podcasts I’ve been in recently

I've been involved in a few podcasts recently.

The first one is a round table discussion with Paul Boag, Gary Marshall and Jeremy Keith for the .net magazine podcast. I've not heard this one yet, but I was calling with skype over a wireless network at work, so I cut out a bit.The topics for the show were,

  • Web Design techniques you cannot live without
  • Are their too many web conferences?
  • Image copyright infringement
  • Top web design mistakes of 2006
  • SPAM prevention techniques

You can listen to the mp3 file here or subscribe to the show with this RSS feed.

I'm also on the Boagworld podcast this week as the expert on video formats online.

Ian Forrester from BBC backstage and the Geek Dinners joins us to talk about online video. He talks through the different formats available (quicktime, real player, windows media and flash) as well as the different delivery mechanisms (steaming, download and progressive download).

I'm on about 28mins from the end and the audio level is scary. You can listen to the mp3 directly here or subscribe to the show here. Please note, I did record one copy about using Mp3 and Ogg streaming using shoutcast and icecast but it got too long and decided to keep it very simple and quick (if you can call 6mins quick). I also made
a joke about tubes and the straw dripping but deleted that one too.

I've attached the .net magazine podcast, so enjoy!

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Yahoo are at it again…

I think it was about a year ago when Yahoo tried to sweet talk everyone who used Flickr into upgrading to a Yahoo ID. Old Skool flickr members revolted and staged a large protest. Well its happening again, I wonder if there will be a large protest again? I just received this email from Yahoo.

Dear Old Skool Account-Holding Flickr Member,

On March 15th we'll be discontinuing the old email-based Flickr sign in system. From that point on, everyone will have to use a Yahoo! ID to sign in to Flickr.

We're making this change now to simplify the sign in process in advance of several large projects launching this year, but some Flickr features and tools already require Yahoo! IDs for sign in — like the mobile site at m.flickr.com or the new Yahoo! Go program for mobiles, available at: http://go.yahoo.com.

95% of your fellow Flickrites already use this system and their experience is just the same as yours is now, except they sign in on a different page. It's easy to switch: it takes about a minute if you already have a Yahoo! ID and about five minutes if you don't.

You can make the switch at any time in the next few months, from today till the 15th. (After that day, you'll be required to merge before you continue using your account.) To switch, start at this page:

http://flickr.com/account/associate/

Nothing else on your account or experience of Flickr changes: you can continue to have your FlickrMail and notifications sent to any email address at any domain and your screenname will remain the same.

Complete details and answers to most common questions are available here: http://flickr.com/help/signin/

Thanks for your patience and understanding – and even bigger thanks for your continued support of Flickr: if you're reading this, you've been around for a while and that means a lot to us!

Warmest regards,

– The Flickreenos

So as Neil and others have pointed out, the Yahoo/Flickr protest is back and this time Yahoo don't seem to be rolling over. So whats my beef with Yahoo? Well let me tell you in a couple of points.

  • I bloody paid for 2 years of Flickr not Yahoo.
  • My Yahoo ID is something completely different and getting ianforrester or anything close is going to impossible (trust me I tried)
  • I don't want my non-commercial licensed photos involved in Yahoo's promotional warez.
  • Sorry but I preferred to have my own ID not linked to Yahoo, simple.
  • Why on earth does Yahoo want to know Birthday and Postcode? Is this needed just to share pictures?

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The Tom and Ian Show?

Recently I've been doing more podcasts, and finally not cringing when I hear my deep voice. Me and Tom Morris have started a podcast in the vain of the pretty dead Gillmor Gang. The MP3 file is on Archive.org and you can subscribe to the feed here.

Between all the outages and bad quality of my voice, there is a pretty good discussion about a whole host of things including RDF/A vs Microformats, XHTML vs HTML5, the semantic web vs The Semantic Web. Tom is working on some clever notes system which I assume uses RDF or OPML to clever effect.

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I’m a founding member of the Media 2.0 work group

media 2.0 workgroup

I'm proud to announce I'm also a member of the Media 2.0 workgroup, along side people like Ben Metcalfe, Suw & Kevin, Steve Boyd, Chris Saad, etc.

The Media 2.0 Workgroup is a group of industry commentators, agitators and innovators who believe that the phenomena of democratic participation will change the face of Media Creation, Distribution and Consumption.

I think you will agree, this is certainly a noble cause. And when Chris outlines in detail the root of the group it just gets better and better. I like to think of this group being something like the mix of people who turned out the forever relevant Cluetrain manifesto

The term “Web 2.0” has become a little warn out lately, but it has had an important and dramatic effect on our industry. It has spurred innovation, driven investment and ignited the imagination of the entrepreneurial community.

The Web (2.0 or otherwise), however, is only part of the Media landscape. An important part of course, however Media includes the superset of people, places and things that can co-existing in and around the web to create participation experiences.

Radio, TV, Traditional Media Outlets, News, Entertainment, Movies, Music, Game Consoles etc all have an opportunity to innovate by 'getting social', and each will be impacted by and contribute to the transformative effects of Media 2.0.

There are underlying issues and opportunities however. Issues with fancy names like Aggregation, Attention, Convergence, DRM, Distribution, Engagement, Identity, Participation. These issues need discussion across the perceived Media boundaries and traditional disciplines so that we can all achieve real, integrated results.

To put it plainly, the visionaries, tool builders, emerging social media participants, 'old media' vanguard, investors and marketers all need to speak to each other to help create this opportunity together.

We call this broader ecosystem Media 2.0.

Like the Web, Media 2.0 is about shifting the power from the few to the many. We, the participants, are (or should be) the most important parts of the emerging Social Media. We each have a story to tell and connections just waiting to be made.

The challenge, however, is to help the unsocial media understand how to be social. To help advertisers understand the value of an engaged, trusting participant over a passive audience demographic. To help content creators understand that sharing and remixing is more profitable than DRM and to shine a light on the best innovations and ideas emerging from that very long tail.

Every community needs some help to grow. The long tail has a head, and every conversation needs a topic. So in this spirit, we have gathered a group of people who are passionate about the issues of Media 2.0 to help propel and focus the conversation.

These participants are from a cross-section of disciplines and agendas. Some merely comment, criticize and consult, some develop tools, some live the dream and have started their own Media 2.0 empires and some are fighting from the inside of established media to change the face of ‘business as usual’.

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Geek and Geekhag podcasts

Sarah and Ian

Finally I got around to setting up another blog for Geek and Geekhag podcast.

http://www.cubicgarden.com/blojsom/blog/geekandgeekhag/ or http://www.geekandgeekhag.com/

There is also a RSS 2.0 feed which you can stick in your Podcatcher clients such as Jucie, iPodderX, and yuck iTunes.

At the moment we only have the 2007 episodes posts up, but we'll add the other older ones soon. Me and Sarah will be posting all future ones there and maybe only once in a while pointing to them from our own blogs. Subscribe and enjoy the weekly podcasts.

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Geek and Geekhag Podcast number 3 for 2007

This time we're upstairs in the computer room with our new microphones and a lightly longer podcast for your listening pleasure. We talk about what we did on Friday night, TV generations, RFID misconceptions, Calendaring update and TV.com vs Tape it off the internet.com. We also have a update on the mouse and some music perceptions which puzzles me. Enjoy… and leave us a comment.

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Geek and Geekhag Podcast number 2 for 2007

This time we're armed with decent microphones and an extended podcast for your listening pleasure. The main part includes me trying to explain why I don't think the iPhone is not revolutionary, how Matthew lost a bet and what I'll be doing for kicks next Friday night. While the extended
podcast
(part 2.5) includes me and Sarah shouting about mice and discussing alterative content management systems.

Please do drop us a comment if you think the quality is better and what else we should be doing.

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Geek and Geekhag Podcast number 1 for 2007

As my wife says,

Our podcasts are back for 2007, somewhat streamlined (only about a half hour instead of full hour). I have no idea what number we're on anymore. This time we talk about New Year's resolutions,Twitter, Xbox 360 being hacked, TV, and Christmas presents (new laptops for the both of us!).

Its number 16 by my count and yes shamed by other partner podcasts, we've decided to pick up the pace and shorten it down. You listen to it directly on Blip.tv or if your using my feed with a podcasting client, you should already have it. Enjoy… and leave a comment if you enjoy the new style.

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The new LennyHenry.TV show

Lenny Henry.tv show

Ok this came out of the blue – LennyHenry.TV . Started at 22.35 (GMT) for Mins: 30

Lenny Henry takes us through the best comedy shorts available on the internet, from the most outrageous CCTV to exclusive online TV

I can't seem to find anything about it on the BBC site except for the bit above. And for some crazy reason no one at the BBC has even registered the domain LennyHenry.TV! There was some more information on the Tiger Aspect productions site

So about the show. Well its Lenny Henry commenting and playing some of the funniest and most shared videos across the web. Yep its like the a cross between America's most funniest home videos crossed with Diggnation. Graham Norton use to do a section on his show where he talked about something internet related but it lasted all of 4mins while Lenny Henry's show is 30mins. In the first showed classics like the treadmill
dance
and dancing cop.

Although I'm in two minds about this being on BBC One, It was good to finally share this stuff with my parents. Lenny Henry's funny commentary does add to the show and his general natter with the guest nicely takes it out of the America's funniest home videos category. I look forward to hearing what others thought soon.


I'll certainly upload a part somewhere for review
. I've uploaded it to Blip.tv for now

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Day Break has been axed?

Taye Diggs and Victoria Pratt of Daybreak

Oh great! What is it with American networks and getting rid of shows before they get a chance to get going? I'm not saying Daybreak was the next Firefly but you know what – its damm ignoying. I mean its only meant to be a mini series between the break in Lost season 3 but come on. Its actually not that bad and I was looking forward to seeing what else would come from the series. Now I have to watch it on ABC.com via a proxy
because I can't see it in the UK, but it even that looks unlikely.

According to Lost-Media, “Day Break�, the show that was supposed to fill the void during the Lost hiatus, has been pulled by the network.

The entire story-arch of “Day Break� was planned for a single season, so it’s sad to see that ABC doesn’t have the balls to stick with it until the end. Even though the show only attracted around 4.5 million viewers, canceling a show that was going to end pretty soon is both cowardly and unfair to the 4.5 million who watch it and were looking forward to the conclusion.

ABC has said that fans will be able to follow “Day Break� online at ABC.com, but couldn’t promise that all the remaining episodes would be available on the website.

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The Venice Project

So thanks to Libby Miller, I got my request to join the Venice project fast tracked. I have just loaded it up on my desktop machine and its quite impressive so far. Its by the guys who brought us Skype/Kazaa and is basiclly a streaming IPTV client. Its really made for the full screen TV experience, rather that windowed viewing due to its sofa like interface (think Apple's Frontrow that XBMC or Windows Media
Centre). Anyway, Business week did a bit about it in July and there's more screenshots on Flickr. But expect more details from me with lots of screenshots, once I read the non-disclosure notice again in full.

The Venice project screen

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This week in Media: Content is King

This week in media

This week's podcast from those guys at This week in Media was a great review of the media landscape in 2006. The break points are these…

  1. The move to online video, the rise of YouTube, TV networks put shows on iPods and online, movies beginning to sell via digital download and podcasting grows.
  2. The new media economy. New models emerge for the monitzation of online media, changing distribution models, and the rise of those that will sue rather than change or lose control.
  3. Camera revolution – Red, Silicon Imaging, cheap HD with HDMI, dropping cost and the move to full digital heralding the death of actual film.
  4. HD-DVD and Blue-Ray DOA? Is there a future?
  5. Would you like to play a game? Did Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo lay the groundwork for the future of gaming and interactive media, or did they miss the power up?

Its almost a 2 hour podcast, but its worth every second in my view.

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What my wonderful wife bought me for Christmas

Flickr Canon Powershot S3 IS

Yep for all the overtime she's been doing since the outbreak, she decided to buy me a Canon Powershot S3 IS today. This is also a good segway into the Flickr camera data pool which I've been meaning to blog about for flipping ages.

Here's all the cameras I currently own.

The Coolpix will soon be Sarahs and I'll start only using the HD1 for filming and quick shots. So far I'm totally in love with the Canon Powershot.

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