|

I like Joost and I like the Wii

Byrichard

Tonight was a tech-filled night. I finally had the possibility of downloading and testing out Joost and I enjoyed the experience.

Joost

Joost is a peer to peer video sharing website that is based on the concept of channels but unlike other channels, each video is available on demand. What this means is that if you go to the Redbull channel, for example, you can watch a series of documentaries about various Redbull events whether parapente, aerobatics, or other.

Another advantage is that its full screen with two forms of messaging. The first of these is the ability to use either Gmail or jabber to talk with friends you’ve known for years and the second is with the channel chat. At the time when i tried the channel chat there were only five people so the experience was not that special. As more users join this will improve.

It’s better than youtube because this is quality content on demand. I decided that I’d flick through the music channels before ending on a documentary about divers going down to a deep wreck whilst a freediver would attempt to beat her record. The image was high quality and the video streamed properly almost the entire time. With more users, experience can only get better. Finally, the commercials, 4 per hour were only one commercial long which is not that bad, just providing a short toilet break.

Wii 

I really enjoyed playing with the WII playing a few of the games. From a friend’s bedroom I played tennis, bowling, boxed with him (and this was highly exertional so it’s a good work out) before being a world war II ace trying to protect Dunkirk but not succeeding due to my lack of familiarity with the controls.

Both of these technologies are fun and I want to play far more when I get the opportunity.

Running Joost

Byrichard

Finally I’m home to a pc, linux and mac environment and I’m running joost. It’s not bad. At the moment it’s just filler content but nonetheless it’s interesting to see it work and interact with it.

For a few days I can offer invites to anyone that wants one. Just put a comment and I’ll get back to you.

My thoughts on “If we are all amateurs, there are no experts.”

Byrichard

Andrew Keen’s new book, The Cult of the Amateur is the latest addition to the Newsnight book club. In it, the author expresses his concern for the profligacy of online amateurism, spawned by the digital revolution. This, he feels, has had a destructive impact on our culture, economy, and values.

Web 2.0 is a state of play by which anyone generating content can share it with an audience of hundreds of thousands or even millions depending on its mass appeal. As a result, the quality of media content that certain generations are taking in has gone down.

Whilst the occasional work on youtube may be good there are hundreds of thousands of clips that are absolute crap. They’re long takes with no editing, just letting things happen. One of these such videos is of a pack of buffalo by a stream. A pride of lions captures the young before a crocodile attempts to get its share of the kill. Unfortunately, it fails and the lions finally think their meal is ready. They didn’t plan on the herd coming back. The clip ends with the young buffalo rejoining its herd once more and the predators are still hungry.

What is annoying about these two clips are the duration and the window size. An editor would do his best to find the key moments. In taking the key moments and making a one minute subject the audience would have gained far more. It would also have saved us time. In HD I’m sure it’d be beautiful but as a small window on a browser, it’s disappointing.

That’s the issue with online material. Everyone believes that they can do what they want when they want and then share it with the world. One of the last twitters I received is from Ijustine which read “Just got yelled at for wearing ‘a webcam'” because she’s decided to do the same as Justin from justin.tv. What’s the point of this. I understand the appeal of something like twitter but the live streaming of video seems to be taking it too far. Why are so many people flooding the world wide web with such extraneous content? I don’t want to watch Ijustine sitting at her computer at 3 am as she’s doing as I type this.

Where is the media literacy training that should come with this new generation of web users? Who is to decide what is socially acceptable or not. Is it acceptable to strap a camera to your head and film everything that is going on around you or is that a breach of confidence? Is it worthwhile?

Who’s going to make sense of this new media landscape. Current TV is supposed to be one of the new waves of user-generated content but does it achieve this. How can you boast about creating a user-generated channel when it’s scrambled so that only through payment can you watch the channel. It’s contradictory.

There is a group of podcasters who do a good job of creating web content. The TWIT podcasts are one of these, Mobuzz TV is another to a lesser degree. NPR’s On The media is fascinating. These are examples of how technology can be used to provide high-quality content for a lesser price.

In summary, technology has made it easy for anyone with an idea for a program to distribute it widely over the world wide web. Most of it is absolutely terrible and no one would be interested in the content whilst other elements are brilliant. Whilst everyone is seeing this as a new form of communication there is a lot of material that will never appeal to a mass audience. We must simply wait for a new model to emerge whereby the flood of crap will decrease greatly.

I’m looking forward to the end of this transition period

| |

It’s Vacation Time

Byrichard

it’s vacation time are words that were uttered at the end of a long night in crete back in 2000. They were uttered by an older guy who was with a group of us as we watched the sun rise. Those words always stuck in my mind.

On Wednesday I’m flying back to Switzerland although it’s a one way ticket. During that time I could work on re-editing some old footage and uploading it since people are finally welcoming it with open browser windows.

I don’t think I’ll do that though. I need to buy myself another hard drive first to store all the footage I’d need to capture first.

On a related topic there is a documentary in production that is going to air for Arte, a Franco/German documentary channel. They want some footage from the Paddington station silent disco event I went to a few months ago. It’s great to get something that could look good on my CV and showreel.

https://youtu.be/WTl1ZLgoepo
The footage that Lobster Films would use in their Walkman documentary

| |

It’s All Over – Mission Accomplished

Byrichard

Checking through my pockets this morning I found that £30 are still there in cash. That’s quite surprising when you take into account that last night’s mission was to drink the bar dry. Obviously I did not contribute to this as greatly as was initially anticipated.

It was another night of relative madness. It was a night that involved getting to the bar around four or five in the afternoon and chatting to many people and listening to many others. It was a night where people trickled in until it closed at 3 am. During this time sambuca shots were drunk, people partied and others argued.

The fire was the final part of the night. At this point, I was in bed for the second time that morning sleeping my way into today. They got the police to come to the fire and one person was even taken by car around the building and released. This was simply to scare everyone into behaving themselves. It was probably amusing to see all the conspiratorial drunks spreading rumours and insults at this point.

The wake-up call was quite original today, a fire alarm. The last halls fire alarm I will ever hear and I can honestly say it’s not going to be missed in any way shape or form.

To all those whom I partied with over the past three years, it’s been both a pleasure and an honour. See you around.

|

Like An Airport

Byrichard

Most of the rooms are empty and cars are parked everywhere. That’s because today is the penultimate day of halls and everyone is leaving. Tomorrow at 10am all rooms should have been evacuated for the cleaning services to come and prepare the rooms for the summer groups.

It feels like me like waiting for a plane, everything is packed and there’s not much to do until tonight’s party. The bedroom is cleaned and stuff is packed. It’s pretty quiet, many people leaving, everything is finished now.

I’m looking forward to living in a more diverse part of London which will serve as a base for my job seeking. It’s going to be nice when, tomorrow, I have moved in to my new flat properly.