Archive for the ‘technology’ Category

Online Video Growth Spurt Marked By New Programs & Distribution Opportunities

Monday, August 9th, 2010

As discussed in my New Media / New Marketing segment on the Tuesday, August 10th edition of the TheTVNews.tv (see VIDEO embedded below), the convergence of TV and Internet forms of online video are jelling into a significant reality extremely quickly after years of promises.

Evidence of this growth spurt include rapid growth trends such as the year-over-year doubling of streaming movies and TV via NetFlix, a new “digital locker” platform from major entertainment players designed to combat the iTunes dominance, and the increasing viability of “branded entertainment” including an Ikea-sponsored Web-only video series that is garnering 1.5 million views month after month.

I will post or embed my video commentary as soon as it’s available, but meanwhile here are links to what I think is some worthwhile reading. These three links include additional insights and details on the “milestones” mentioned above and more:

  • Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem Unveils UltraViolet™ Brand (press release)
    Major players from Best Buy to Sony to Comcast to Intel and quite a few others are aligning on a new kind of “digital locker” to help you watch whatever you want, whenever you want, on whatever kind of device you want… as long as you’ve paid for it! While this press release is just an announcement, I think this is both a needed kind of technology and an attempt to answer Apple’s dominance in digital media distribution. Expect to hear more, much more from the UltraViolet, UVVU brand.

As always, your thoughts, perspectives and comments are extremely welcome. Thanks.

Posted in TV Industry, Video Web, apple, branding, film, online video, technology, television, video, youtube | No Comments »

Free Internet Marketing Webinar for Businesses, May 27 at 11AM PT

Friday, May 14th, 2010

If you are new to Internet marketing, we want to help you get up to speed, for free.

Jon has given his one-hour workshop, “What Every Business Should Know About Internet Marketing” in locations from Kona, Hawaii to Silicon Valley (as you can see in the video clip on our web page). Now, for the first time, it’s being offered free via the Internet, Thursday, May 27th at 11:00AM PT / 2:00PM ET. Click here to register now >>

This useful and informative webinar includes a complete overview of the three main areas of Internet marketing, including:

  • The “Super Market-Trends” that have radically leveled the marketing playing field
  • The two essential strategies upon which all successful internet marketing campaigns are based
  • The three main types of internet marketing: search engine optimization (SEO), pay-per-click search engine advertising (PPC) and social media marketing (SMM)
  • A comparative analysis of the time requirements for implementation, the kinds and quality of results, and the cost-per-lead that is derived from each main category
  • Valuable tips, tricks and resources that are based on real world experience

Why are we producing this event for free?

  • Jon LOVES to share information and people love learning this material. It’s important!
  • It helps to expose the expertise that makes ComBridges such a valuable marketing partner.
  • This is a “free sample” of things to come. We are working on a new educational website to be called “New Marketing University” that will have many more programs. We hope you’ll like this program enough to become interested in more. To learn more, please register now.

Mark your calendars for Thursday, May 27th at 11:00AM PT / 2:00PM ET. We hope to see you there.

>> Please Click Here to Register Now <<
It takes just 30 seconds, really! And, even if you can’t make it live, by registering you will make sure that you get the link to the free recorded version.

Or view our 1-page PDF with the generic course description below . . .
What Every Business-Onesheet 03.25.10

Posted in Video Web, blogging, e-business, e-marketing, internet marketing, motivational, search engine optimization, search marketing, social media marketing, technology, twitter | 1 Comment »

Google TV Ads, Cisco Feeds MSNBC, & Interactive Marketing Agencies: A Fresh Perspective

Monday, March 29th, 2010

Another week, another Tuesday segment on TheTVNews.tv. This week, I aggregated three new online video news stories that I think merit your attention. My video segment is below, and below that are the Google TV Ads video demo, more comments, and links to all the sources. Please let me know what you think.

1. Great Video Demo of Google TV Ads

Seth Stevenson of SlateV.com did a wonderful job of demoing Google TV Ads for the rest of us. I’m sure you will agree that he proves his point that, yes, anyone with the technical chops to produce a 30-second TV spot and set up a Google AdWords account, also now has the opportunity to be a media buyer and place those TV spots on carefully targeted cable TV networks in the time slots of your choice.

I’m impressed and ready for a client who wants me to do this for them. I’m highly qualified. Are you reading?

Here’s the SlateV Google TV Ads demo for your viewing pleasure:

By the way, for those of you doing the math, not familiar with Google AdWords campaigns, and figuring that, hey, that’s about $1.30 per website visitor… please keep in mind that it’s not uncommon for AdWords customers to pay $4, $5 and up PER click. And the visitors he “acquired” via this campaign were coming to a strange website URL with no identified service or product being offered.

2. Cisco Feeds Its High-End Teleconferencing System to Rachel Maddow and MSNBC

In what is said to be “a news media industry first,” Cisco has partnered with MSNBC to provide  The Rachel Maddow Show’s New York and Washington D.C. studios with its branded TelePresence technology. According to Cisco, “TelePresence offers what traditional broadcast interviewing technology often lacks: a truly two-way, visual connection between the studio host and remote guest with virtually no audio lag time.”

To me, that’s an interesting tech story, not only because of the “no audio time lag,” but also because of further in-roads being made by a traditionally IT industry player providing hardware services to the broadcast TV industry.

Click here to see for yourself.

For more details and illuminations of the interactive benefits of TelePresence, Beet.tv has a video interview with Charles Stucki, VP & GM of the Cisco’s TelePresence unit.

3. Forrester Research Predicts the Future of Marketing Agency Relationships

Anyone in the marketing or advertising business knows that all marketing agencies are being forced to cross “boundaries” that traditionally defined specific niches. Now, Forrester’s latest report, “The Future Of Agency Relationships: Marketers Need To Lead Agency Change In The Adaptive Marketing Era” sets the stage for overlapping, multi-discipline agencies and the ways we all will be doing battle (or not) in the future.

But if you don’t feel like plopping down $499 for the report, I highly recommend Andy Beal’s Marketing Pilgrim coverage of the report, Forrester Predicts the Interactive Agency of Record Will Die. Beal reveals the main types of agencies discussed and some of the top level data including this quote which gives you a flavor of the sophistication being required in today’s marketing agency market:

It is not enough for adaptive agencies to understand market research, ethnographic, or behavioral data. To fully understand customers, and to leverage that knowledge to improve customer experience, requires agencies to understand the interplay between the various types of data, and crucially, demands the ability to turn the data into actionable intelligence.

Stay tuned. The landscape continues to morph at a record-setting pace. Keep on dancing… and keep your seat belt fastened. ;)

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Posted in Google, TV Industry, e-marketing, internet marketing, online applications, online software, online video, technology, video, youtube | 5 Comments »

My Top 5 List of Top Whatever Lists: Happy New Tech New Year 2010

Monday, January 4th, 2010

Tis the season of lists. Too many lists? Maybe or maybe not, depending on whether or not you are looking for some perspective, or maybe some bottom line insights about trends and/or tips on how you or your organization’s tech, social media or just plain ole marketing priorities should be focused for the coming year.

My high hopes are that the following list of lists (and grand perspectives) will help you make 2010 the best yet:

5. Super Geek David Pogue’s Pogie Awards
My favorite NYTimes tech writer’s picks for gadgets, apps & such include the killer Firefox extension READABILITY and a very funny (to me) iPhone app that let’s you safely text while walking, by using the iPhone’s built-in camera.

4. Google’s 2009: A Glimpse of the Web’s Next Decade
At least at the moment, as Google goes, so goes the Web. And, if you haven’t noticed, Google is hardly standing still. In fact, they have been innovating their butts off. So, if you’re not tuned in, you should be; and this post by Mashable is packed with eye-candy charts that help make staying up to date more fun.

3. YouTube Is the Top Social Media Innovation of the Decade
Also, via Mashable, and also not technically a Top Whatever list, I’m including this post because I think the importance of YouTube is about as important as it gets. For one thing, YouTube is frequently omitted from lists of social networking sites. Come on! This thoughtful article explains why I’m going to be posting a whole lot more video in 2010 and why I think you should too.

2. 8 Things Every Geek Needs to Do Before 2010
This post is beyond practical, it could literally save your life (technologically speaking). No kidding. Have you backed up lately? Have you edited your privacy settings and pruned your feeds? This is important stuff (via leading tech blog ReadWriteWeb) that can help make your whole year better.

1. 2000s Decade Recap – Business and Technology (video below)
Originally called to my attention by the TechCrunch post Video: A Decade Of Tech Highs And Business Lows, the 3:22 video below puts the past unprecedented decade in perspective, and given the magnitude of the changes, from the dot-bomb implosion through ground-breaking iPhone innovations and social media explosions, I think it’s worth taking at least 3 minutes or so to reflect. Don’t you?

As the Grateful Dead sang, “What a long strange trip it’s been.”

May the Tech Highs continue, and the Business Lows not so much.

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Posted in Google, iphone, small biz e-biz, social media marketing, technology, video, youtube | 7 Comments »

From My Head to the Web. Tools I Use: MindMeister

Friday, December 4th, 2009

I’m one of those people who has far more going on in his head than I’m able to share. I plan to post videos. I’m formulating “New Marketing University.” And so much more. The name I’ve made up for my productivity efforts to move all of these ideas into online action is “From my head to the Web.”

The most effective tool that I’ve found so far that successfully facilitates this process is the mind-mapping web-based, Web 2.0 oriented, application MindMeister. I’ve started sketching out a variety of information flows from the new service level agreements for ComBridges to the ingredients and intended results for the New Marketing University enterprise to ideas and types of future blog posts.

A simple example is below. When I think about what I call The Grand Canyon Gap between people and technology, it’s clear to me that there are a variety of people at various stages of “crossing” the Gap as well as a variety of approaches to creating communication “bridges” across. Here is the current state of my thoughts on this as captured in MindMeister:

Of course, this is a simple example. There are many more complex examples, many enabled by MindMeister’s Web 2.0 style sharing functionalities, including valuable resources like MindMeister maps that attempt to provide a comprehensive view of the best online collaboration tools of all types and recent attendees of the TEDxAmsterdam conference used MindMeister to mind map the thought-leaders presenters.

I hope this is useful to you. Do you use MindMeister or another mind-mapping tool? What helps you get your ideas from your head to the web?

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Posted in Productivity, Tools I Use, Web 2.0, technology | 2 Comments »

My Virtual CES Report

Thursday, January 10th, 2008

No, I didn’t go to CES (the consumer electronics mega-convention) in Las Vegas, but here are a few tidbits from the web that I’ve found worthy:

Scoble‘s doing Qik videos direct from his cell phone including this interview with the guys from YouTube:

And CNET picked this astoundingly innovative and open source BugLabs platform as its CES Awards winner for “emerging technologies.” I even like their video. Cool.

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Posted in technology, user generated video | No Comments »

Johnny Chung Lee: My New Procrasteering, Low-Cost Electronic Whiteboard-Inventing Hero

Friday, January 4th, 2008


After I discovered the YouTube video on 3-D virtual reality using Nintendo Wii hardware posted below by Johnny (Chung) Lee, I started digging deeper.

First, I discovered the YouTube video posted below about building a low-cost electronic whiteboard using the same Nintendo Wii hardware and custom software that he is giving away. Way cool!

Now, I’ve learned that Johnny has named his blog after a term I’ve never heard before and which I presume he invented, “procrastineering” which he says means “giving into productive distractions.” I can totally relate. I presume he means like me blogging right now instead of working, right? Johnny’s blog is http://procrastineering.blogspot.com/

And then (yes, there’s more), I found out that way back in 2000, he invented a $14 steadicam for videographers replacing that expensive piece of equipment that every semi-serious video camera person needs these days, but many cannot afford. He’ll even put one together for you and sell it for about $54 including shipping!

This guy’s so cool that he’s even put out a call for Mac developers to help him develop a Mac version of the Wiimote Whiteboard.

Johnny, I’m officially your fan. We even have the same “JL” initials. ;) Great stuff.

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Posted in technology, video | No Comments »

The Rapid Demise & Eminent Death of Music DRM

Friday, January 4th, 2008


Digital Rights Management (or DRM) has been a controversial subject against which I have pontificated for years, starting with the whole Napster thing in 2000. Ironically, in that article, I slammed Edgar Bronfman Jr. who is quoted prominently in this new Businessweek article about Sony BMG being “The last major label (to) throw in the towel on digital rights management…” Thanks for the link to this article goes to the TechCrunch postmortem, “Ding, Dong, The Music DRM Witch is Dead.”

I have to admit that the death of DRM is coming even more quickly than I expected, but we can all be glad that she is dying (and, I guess, that Bronfman is waking up).

If you really want to understand this subject, I highly recommend Free Culture: The Nature and Future of Creativity by the wise and articulate Lawrence Lessig.

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Posted in technology | No Comments »

Revolutionary gPC is a $200 Web-facing Computer with no “Microsoft tax”

Friday, November 2nd, 2007

This makes so much sense it’s scary. A $200 computer, by Google, on sale NOW at WalMart that leverages the power of the Internet with browser-based and open source software (thus no “Microsoft tax”).

I might just be geeky enough to go out and buy one. We’ll see. Meanwhile, click here for details of the Everex gPC as covered by John Biggs in the NYTimes.

This kind of “webtop” computer has been a long time coming, but frankly I’m a bit surprised that it’s finally here. That said, in the world of the Web, surprises never cease. Bottom line, I agree with TechCrunch‘s comment, “The Webtop is going to be a classic disruptive technology, starting out cheap and at the margins, but slowly working its way up the food chain.“

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Posted in technology | No Comments »

Digital Photographer Transcends Parkinson’s Disease

Friday, September 28th, 2007

A buddy of mine just got written up in our local paper for his talented transcendence of what others view as a disability. In fact, he’s dealing successfully with nothing less than Parkinson’s disease. Why aren’t your photos in a gallery? Read Clear vision, shaky lens: Fairfax photographer hasn’t let Parkinson’s slow him down and be inspired by the “Movement Disorder, Tremor Enhanced Photography” of Alan Babbitt.

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Posted in technology | No Comments »