television

Digital Consultant links for December 28th through December 30th

These are my links for December 28th through December 30th:

It’s the end of TV as we know it – The Register's tech-focused view of broadcasters Project Canvas – which should demo at Easter and sell in summer (unless Sky/Murdoch succeed in fighting it and the BBC's involvement), this could herald the mainstreaming of IPTV (internet on-demand television delivered by web to computer or TV sets) which also leads to the end of broadcast TV (I think this will be a slow rather than immediate decline over several decades).
Is the Tipping Point Toast? – Got sent this link by author Guy Kawasaki who believes 'nobodies are the new somebodies'. This is nearly a year old but a must-read article: it rebuffs Malcolm Gladwell's 'The Tipping Point' theory that marketeers need to target the influential, however, scientific research as shown that crowds are as easily influenced by each other as the supposedly influential, with connection between peers and friends more significant than the 'celeb Twitterers' etc. Important (if not depressing) lessons for social media marketeers.
Social Media for Audience Development & Community Building – Very good article by video journalist Documentally giving examples of approaches and technologies for how a theatre production could use social media, and how it can be used as a means of communicating and collaborating with audiences.

These are my links for December 3rd through December 4th:

Crowdsourcing business documents – Spudaroo is yet another crowd-sourcing website, but this crosses contest with Elance, by asking writers to submit articles, blogs and business plans against a client brief and the client selects a 'winner' to pay a set fee too. As a professional writer I worry about this trend: the marketplace is great for clients, but exploits out of work freelancers by getting them to complete work they are likely to not get paid for and making a skilled profession into an 'X Factor' style competition.
GooTube mulls fee-TV streams – Looks like Google's YouTube are looking to cut a deal to charge folks $2 to stream a TV show fresh off telly just once – yet the iTunes model is a download-to-own model for a similar price. Four years on since I last worked in IPTV, it's the old chestnut again of DRM and how people want to access and keep content. My bet is that the free-to-stream is the only model viewers will stomach (unless for 'premium' content like football matches), but download-to-own, following the DVD model, will have some legs – but maybe only very short legs.

These are my links for November 10th from 08:55 to 08:57:

T-Shirts and Suits – Powerful Customers – The era of customer choice and customer power is on us, and those creative businesses which ignore it do so at their own peril. Neat little article by legendary creative business advisor David Parrish.
Project Canvas throws open online scheme – Project Kangaroo (the all channels iPlayers) died a death but now Project Canvas aims to bring internet TV to television through a set top box. Initially trialed with ISPs and public service broadcasters, it's already under criticism of unfair competition from Sky, who believe its aim to increase access and diversity of content are irreconcilable.