Tech Related

Of live video streams and Paleo

I really enjoyed what Nicholas of K had to say in the interview we did last night for Musicorama.tv. He spoke about projects and how we can achieve anything we want as long as our mind is in the right place. I’ll let you know when that interview is online. This year Paleo has been a different experience from previous years because I went as a “radio/TV” person as opposed to a collaborator (work for free, get free food and free non alcoholic drinks as well as invites for friends), in the latter case you sleep so little it’s not unusual to take a week to recover. I enjoyed myself. I enjoyed seeing all the live acts and I streamed quite a few events, from Iam, The Justice, The goose, Massive Attack and more. We also had interviews with BB Brunes, K, The DO, The Dodoz, Marvin, Girls in Hawai and Caribou if I remember all of them. Here are some of the Live streams Listen as the people realise what song it is. listen to the crowd roar :-) Tikan Jah Fakoly was good too. Nice relaxed evening. He was playing before Manu Chao Manu Chao played for over two hours but I had work the next day so I left early.

Lake Parade streaming fun

Whilst a friend was filming with a high speed camera i was streaming the event live from my phone via Qik. I noticed they improved a couple of important things. The first is that video files are now saved and readable without conversion. The second fact is that you now have an RSS feed, makes aggregation easier. I’ve added two or three of those feeds to itunes so the content can be accessed more easily. And there are a few more on Qik which I’ll let you get to yourself.

My thoughts on the Iphone 3g

Today I played with the Iphone 3g and was left indifferent. That’s because aside from having the same design as both the ipod touch and the 1st generation iphones it doesn’t offer anything innovative. What really interests me is the idea of more data. Last month i did quite a bit of data streaming. 100 megabytes inclusive of my current setup. I also used quite a bit of extra data. With the Iphone 3g Plan I’d get 1 gigabyte of data per month, ten times more at relatively little extra. When I can get the Natel Liberty Grande paired with the Nokia N95 then I’ll be happy. Until then I’ll feel that they could do better.

Mobile spending

Important for global marketers, mobile handsets are the dominant way people access the Web in many emerging markets, as it is far cheaper, says John Gauntt, senior analyst at digital ad tracker eMarketer. With a computer, “The cost of entry to get Internet access is about $1,200 for the PC and broadband; a mobile is less than half the cost.”

… Source

As updated handsets spread and ad effectiveness measures are perfected, worldwide advertisers’ spending on mobile will pass $19 billion in 2012, eMarketer predicts, up from about $3 billion this year. Overall Web ad spending, which includes mobile, is estimated at $45 billion this year. (continued…)

Mobile video streaming and the future of video sharing

Two years ago we had the World cup and with that came hundreds of videos shot in cities around the world of people celebrating soccer (or football as a sport). At the time everyone would go out with their video camera, record the footage, wait till they got home, capture it and share via a number of sharing sites. The problem with this is that it’s both slow and tedious. It takes too much time and organisation to do. That’s where a new generation of mobile video streaming devices come in. Some applications like Qik and Bambuser are limited to people with cheap data rates via their mobile operators. As a result their services are not so interesting. What was missing from the market place were mobile video streaming services that would allow the content creator to backup the video to their mobile device before sharing it either over the air via 3g networks or wifi. Three services allow for this Kyte, which Scoble has talked about recenty, Flixwagon which I have talked about recently and then Livecast. Each of these video services allows you to save the video as you’re streaming. Kyte is interesting because it allows for you to share pictures, video, polls and audio from one application. Flixwagon is interesting because it allows you to compile all the metadata you want to have included with the video before you stream. It allows you to categorise it within set niches, then add keywords to make finding the video easier. Livecast is the most recent one I’ve tested (just a few minutes ago) and this one allows you to choose how much bandwidth you want to use, from just 24kb to 160kb. It gives you a stream limit of 2 gigabytes and storage of 100 megabytes… (if I remember right.) It differentiates itself with the stream from file option. You can record a number of videos on your phone and choose to send them at another time. It works well enough Video streaming is an easy way of sharing video with your friends without the need for a computer. As a result we should expect quite a bit more coverage of live events from the audience’s point of view, not just big budget broadcasters. This is a little rambling but it’s fun to see what’s available.

How I played with Flixwagon at the Caribana.

Streaming video from mopile devices is the future and I burned through 90 megabytes of data in just two nights of music festival. As a result of this the third night required a different approach. I used Flixwagon. Flixwagon is in the same family as Qik and Bambuser but with many additional features. You can select the category of content, add a title and keywords to the stream before recording. The advantage of this service in contrast to the two other examples is that this one buffers the data stream in such a way that if you lose the connection you can still continue streaming once you find the data stream. In this particular situation I added the concert access point and went to film a number of concerts like Mademosielle K and Maroon 5. In both these cases I recorded the concert and during the break from one to the other I could let the software automatically push the content to the server.As a result I saved 2CHF per megabyte and uploaded about thirty megabytes within a short amount of time. Arrivals to the Caribana As people arrive ONEFM presenters Waiting for Mademoiselle K Mademoiselle K, first two songs Two more songs

10 megabits per second on I-HSPA

Mobile data transfer is speeding up 10.1 Megabits per second over I-HSPA. Nokia Siemens Networks, a provider of mobile broadband solutions, completed tests with Mobilkom Austria recently testing its new I-HSPA solution. The call, conducted with an unspecified mobile device, reached downlink data speeds of up to 10.1 Mbps during the tests. Source

The Iphone is coming to Switzerland

According to a Le Matin article the Iphone will come to switzerland. It’s the 3g version of course so for those that have been patient this should be a fun time. I see no mention of cheaper dataplans as of yet but it’s an interesting time for those creating mobile video content. It’s also a new version of mobile web browsing.