notes from online video strategy - convergence - workshop

workshop on convergence, stretegising online video

importance of sharing media

sharing video on,line is successful when it crosses into other media,

from web to tv, satellite, screenings etc
important for discussion, idea of creating a network
in italy there is rai, the national tv network, and everyone knows that if they go to channel one, two or three they will find a certain network, with a set of perspectives
a chance to create a network which is national, european or world
easy to find, non hierarchical and decentralised
another model in mind is tghe experience of deep dish tv
[on a satellite and covering the US except for alaska
[maybe deedee can explain how it works? decentralised?
how to collect material etc...
different model in europe.. language issues mean it's necessary to face some other problems
some notes on potential for satellite and other media outlets
here online video can go oither than internet
seven written here, awarding points for getting all seven
1 special point for cinema\
and another - mobile
tv
dvd on demand
netflicks, US business web based ordering interfface
you can order videos by mail, flat fee per month, as manhy videos as you can see, 2 or 3 at a time.
good for distro of independent docs
looking to do something on strictly independent media.. audience is there.. operating on long tail concept, one or two will make it worth it for you???
online ordering of offline dvds
similar service called cultureshop.org in uk
sales not rental
docs that have been on tv once or twice sometimes, small selection
downloads
radio? digital radio?
deepdish done good collaboration with radio in last two years
make audio files from films and david barsamian etc broadcast it
eg on world tribunal
in istanbul
should be thinking more about radio, eg all the bits of footage not used in a video, could be used in radio.
make whole interview available on .wav or similar format to radio people
what do these outlets need?
broadband service that can go to the tv using set top box thing
marcelle working on this, korea tooStruggle in korea between broadcast permissions and ministry of???

In uk too, british telecom excluded from tv market, otherwise they would have got ahead with infrastructure already existing…

Other outlets

Games consoles, not yet open, but playstation wired and connected for playback of video.

Does deepdish take contributions on dv tape? Whatever format we get…. Each show has it’s own co-ordinating producer who co-ordinates with segment producers to put together half hour. Tv culture format, reassuring and attractive to the audience.
In past freespeech had to pay for satellite by the hour, but not they have a 24 hour satellite and very hungry for programmes which they repeat up to 40 times a month, or five times a day.
Main audience is cable, who get it from satellite and have dishes at their channels
One reason in good shape (not financially) is that democracy now is a news programme started by deepdish with radio, after 9.11, see democracynow.org

Deepdish sparrows with ostrich in nest, democracy now vvv popular and growing, add four more stations every week.

John Schwartz founded deepdish got hold of spectrum database years ago, bought bits, released it bit by bit, leases, $2m a year, selling spectrum real estate. 1m a year to freespeechtv

Different formats people need to receive things in

How to collaborate to give people what they need… how to collaborate on this?

Look at a couple of workflows as examples…

Current.tv and European newsreel

Also sustainability, where are weak points?

Guessing a bit on current tv

Start with independent small scale producer with control over their video. Site initiated by al gore, sponsors are nike, credit cards, victoria’s secret etc… youth focus, wide range of issues, editorial collective which decide which video is popular, do you give the vid a green light? If it gets enough, goes to cable channel.

May just go as encoded file, if you get green light, or you might get contacted for better version

European newsreel
Decentralised production collective

Half hour programme of 5 min segments

Rotating editorial collective, sent out for translation, open posting so quality varies, no continuity, and often no context for viewers…. So a clip that makes sense in one country, won’t in another.

Editorial collective get transcript from producers and then pass it to translators, or translation wiki. Then back to editorial collective who would make titles in fcp or whatever and do final versions in vhs and mini fv for freespeech tv. Vhs would go to micro cinemas for retransmission. Maybe could do something similar now online?

Big weakness of the model was lack of editorial on basis of quality… not that there was a lot ot choose from. But as a screener, you wouldn’t want to show the whole thing. Each piece wouldn’t stand alone.

At least with Dvd you can choose segments allowing flexibility to screeners

Hard to have online editorial collective. Works tends to congregate on one person’s shoulders…

Australian newsreel experience is getting dv tapes to start, material could eb encoded to start, with transcripts, so that if it gets approved it can go out quick

Good to have themes for shows. Otherwise they are jumping all over the place, better to have homeless issues together than bunged in with bungy jumping. Aim to contextualise issues, and help with distribution.. can aim to be more timeless….with producers adding longevity to the segment, making it ever green….

For online distro, more news style reports, quick and newsy, then they can be selected, built up, made evergreen for dvd releases at later date.

Translations.indymedia.org. ben suggested they incorporate video translation tool into their workflow. They said yes, it didn’t happen yet
Items on their list time out though, whereas video needs to be there lermanently. Pilot site, omextra on subvideo.net, allow people to add their transcripts and others do the translations.
Tried more lately with collaborating translation, within a week or adding transcript there, had three languages and a screening abroad. Worked, but tool not designed for this. Need to be moved somewhere else…

Questions of sustainability

No one interested in enr now because not very useful to screeners. Editorial insufficient. So screeners should have a say. Similar to current tv model then?

Another model, video letters bloggers, belongs to area of eastern Europe, concept is after war, people upload letters online to search for others or represent selves, the best as selected by viewers go on satellite. Friend of agnese knows the project well… they get funded to do the project but not much strength to develop it to its fuller possibilities.

All these things need a lot of effort and you can’t really expect to create an infrastructure and team over long period to establish something without trying toi understand how you will sustain the work, can’t be always precarious.

Like to know of any experience or idea of ways to sustain .. experience of ngv? Convergence…now people dropping away after a few years… beauty of satellite is that locations can make their own copies… barcelone pubs show v cheap channels, some directed to ethnic minorities… can buy satellite space and then you have the programming.

But now Internet can do the same thing, people can burn off good quality. Don’t have rich benefactors etc in Europe and elsewhere…

Sustainability of groups etc is depending now on people who use the material.. the more it can be automated the better, pout onus to value and sustain on people who use the products.

A lot of this already happening, some not eg translation .. we can raise our game a bit, and get to stage where at least a couple of programmes a year get out to other channels.

Satellites expensive… partly why the programmes are cheap.

For Netherlands and germany satellite is 200,000 euro per hyear. But all the satellites, different in each country.

The satellites not only solution for this kind of thing. In Europe more of a cable tv culture than satellite.

All of these are good outlets. Not a debate on satellite or not, but how to push content out where we can.

Any experience with digital currencies? Can someone else fill this out please??

Was the workshop going to be about convergence of technologies? Anything missing?

Creating common interfaces between cms and rest of production workflow.

Missing link: interface between production and outlets.

Talked a bit about mpeg2 files.

Metadata formats

Way that music industry works is one example of how it can work.

Aggregating all the master wav files and the metadata, then send it to tv broadcaster, online store, mobile phone or whatever, do the transcode and then ship it out top whoever manages the outlet. This is enabled by common metadata standard between them all. P to p encoding network? Intensive process. Cms need to be able to talki to each otherm, can be elsewhere than where the media is stored….. effort needs to be in how to send the file to the person with a dvd on demand facility. Basically we have the tools, just need to get them to talk to each other.

If everyone knows what format their metadata should be in, is more help than dictatorship.

Discussion of enr continues over dinner

Think about how we can move each of our projects towards convergence……