This is something that I’ve been wanting to blog about for a while. I actually started a post about this a few times but never really finished. But here I am again thinking about this so what the hell, might as well get it out.

My friend Schlomo asked on Twitter one day, “Why is the Calacaniscast in video.” That’s a question I’ve been asking for a while. I guess the only really good answer to it is because he can. The same can be said for a lot of Scobles videos as well. A good question that anyone that is thinking about doing video on the web is what information do I have to convey that is most efficiently conveyed in video? Or, more simply, why am I doing video and not audio, or for that matter, text? Here is a hint to the correct answer: it’s not “because I can.”

Video is multi channel communication. You convey visual information, and you convey audio information. The creative juxtaposition of the two can be magical if done correctly. If you watch something like the Calacaniscast, or the Scoble Show you immediately pick up on a couple of glaring problems. One is that there is usually very little going on visually (with the exception of Scobles software demos, which is actually a very good use of video). The other problem they are really long—far too long for video on the net. Here is a key difference between audio and video. Audio is a medium that does not require 100% the listeners attention. A listener can do other things while listening to audio—drive, cook, whatever. Video on the other hand, assumes that what you are doing is compelling enough for people to divert their attention away from everything else in their life to pay attention to that thing. Whether the creator realizes that that is what they’re asking of the audience is another matter entirely. The primary assumption of the audience is that “you want all my attention for the duration of this video.” So if you put up an hour long video of you sitting there behind a desk talking to the camera, it’s pretty disrespectful of your audience, in my opinion. 90% of the audience isn’t going to sit there and look at you or anyone else sit and talk. And I bet that the primary demographic of both the Scoble show and calacaniscast has no time at all to sit for an hour and watch them talk about anything—when just listening can be enough. Audio is the multitaskers format. Video demands all your attention.

So basically what we are talking about here is bandwidth—not just Internet bandwidth (and it’s a well known fact that video consumes internet bandwidth at a much higher rate than audio) but attention bandwidth. Don’t waste your users bandwidth, attention or otherwise.

It seems that Scoble has discovered that video can be editied now. That’s a good trend. I think he’s learning. And Calacanis is at least putting forth a slight effort to use some graphics that sort of make the video in his program more useful—but it’s still not fully using video. But then again, neither of these guys have any real background producing video. They’re text guys who don’t fully understand visual communication yet. No disrespect intended here, just an observation—they’re newbies. I wouldn’t try to challenge them in their respective areas of expertise. I’ll never be the business guy that Calacanis is and Scobel is the PR savant. But it’s clear that they don’t understand how to effectively or efficiently use video yet.

So what I would like to see them do is both audio and video. Audio for long form talks and interviews and video only when it’s necessary—when they NEED to show us something. And then keep the video well edited and short. Because I guarantee you very very few people are watching 45 minutes or more of anyone sitting around talking.

Disclosure: all of our shows, Calacanis, Scoble’s and mine, are carried by Podtech.net.

I’ve had some things to blog about lately but really no motivation to do it. I’ve been feeling a bit behind the 8 ball lately, dunno why. But I think I’m finally been shaking this funk.

One thing I wanted to come back to was the Filmmaker/video blogger issue I mentioned last week. Interestingly this subject came up on the Videobloggers list not long after I mentioned it here. One of the most insightful observations came from Adrian Miles who wrote:

film makers fetishise film (or video) and so are much like authors in
1995 when the web first came to attention (to them). So a film maker
wants to

a) maintain control over the viewer (my work is 22 minutes and you
really should see the whole 22 minutes - what do you mean they might
go somewhere else? what do you mean they might actually be able to
rearrange *my* vision??)

b) like the author regards publication (a book) as the top of their
tree, film professwional sees TV broadcast, cinema or festival
screening as same.

c) like authors, real writing happens on white pages, serially
ordered, between covers. You are special to get there. Real film
makers produce real programs/shorts/features that are serially
ordered between credits. You are special to have your work
made/selected. On the net anyone can do it, therefore the lowest
common denominator rules, and I am not part of that (I’m a film maker
after all).

d) I own your screen. I own all of it. On the net you own your
screen. I couldn’t possibly show my film at 320 x 240, or heck, even
640 x 480.

e) the quality is too bad (this is result of bad compression but was
an issue once upon a time).

f) it might get stolen (of course if you don’t put it online and you
are lucky enough to get into a festival, your work might be screened
once at the wrap party, once at your own premiere, and once at the
festival…)

There are other reasons but I find the easiest way to explain it to
others (which I’ve done a few times in papers and conference
presentations) is that if you think about how authors responded to
the web in 1995 (you mean everyone can read my work? cool? hold on,
links, you mean they can go elsewhere? and you mean my beautiful
perfect structure should be granular with links inside, no way) is
much the same problem confronting trad. professional video and film
people right now.

Paul Schankman of Fox 2 St. Louis did a piece about me and vlogging on the 9 o’clock news tonight. I was worried it would suck, but it was pretty good. Check it out here.

I found this by accident while searching google images. A library of high res image files of Gibson Guitars. Obviously these images are protected by copyright so you couldn’t legally just grab them and start using them where ever you want, but it’s pretty cool to be able to zoom in and see some really fine detail on some of these things.

So funny yet so sad. From the St. Louis Post Dispatch.

Blog this: We need you more than we need your opinion.
By Scott Anderson

03/12/2007

The Wall Street Journal recently reported there are more than 70 million blogs — diary-like Internet sites where individuals post their opinions and readers post their reactions — in the United States today. That’s twice as many as there were just a year ago.

Which means that more than one in five Americans are providing ongoing commentary on topics ranging from politics to Ashley Simpson to high school sports to how to bake a turkey.

C’mon, do we have that much to say? And if so, is this really the best we can do?

Umm who is this guy and who is he reading? Yeah there is a lot of inane stuff on blogs but also a lot of great stuff. And yes there is tons of valuable stuff written on blogs all the time.

In the days before the Internet, those of us who had opinions sometimes did something quaint: We actually met with other people who had opinions.
We did it in all sorts of places: in our homes, our churches, our neighborhoods, our taverns. In some cases, especially when it came to my fellow Catholics and me, we shared opinions in all four places on the same day. We shared those opinions in the open light, and the feedback was instantaneous.

What we did not do was hide in our bedrooms and behind our home-office doors and the anonymity and secrecy of fake web names.

It was called conversation.

In the old days if you had an interest in some obscure subject it was very unlikely that you could find anyone at your local church or pub that you could talk to about it. In the blogesphere conversations are happening all the time across city, state and national boundries on a vast number of subjects, from the inane to the profound. Often news events are blogged before they are reported in the mainstream media—sometimes days in advance. This means that information spreads outside of all the artificial filters that we’ve had in the past. Information is power. Power is what is needed to DO THINGS.

I don’t understand why we celebrate the growth of blogs. It seems to me that they are just another expression of our fascination with our own opinions. We are fast becoming a nation of Sayers, rather than Doers.

Ummm yeah. How does one know what to do? How do we find out about what needs to be done? Where do we find information about if we are doing something right? What if what we need to do requires up to date information? Blogs are about conversations, and conversations are about exchanging information. When more people are sharing information, more people are better informed about how, what, and why things need to be done.

For all the hype about interactivity, blogs are first and foremost the epitome of one-way chatter. You can sit at your computer and spew a stream of consciousness. You can chuckle at your own funny lines, pat yourself on the back for a pithy comment, stand up and shake your fist while driving your point home.

There is no HYPE about interactivity. Blogs are the epitome of an interactive public conversation. There are lots of conversational tools built into blogs. Comments, and trackbacks are integral to blogging culture—and are interactivity. Much more interactive than OP Ed’s in the newspaper for instance. Some of the best bloggers are great conversationalists, who interact regularly with their readers.

I have what I hope is a helpful suggestion for bloggers: Instead of just sitting inside your house and commenting on the world around you, why don’t you, um, get up and leave? There is a whole non-cyber, non-virtual place waiting for you and your opinions. It’s called the world.

Most of the bloggers I know and read are well versed in the world. They blog about their own little corner of it regularly. Their blogs are often catalysts for doing things in the world. I personally have done more, and met more people in the real world because I have a blog. Blogs make my interaction with the world a much more rich experience. Because of blogs I know more about it.

And maybe more than our opinions, the world needs our help. The homeless shelter down the street needs our help. The local school needs our help. The food pantry needs our help. And if you want to get really local and personal, it’s a fair bet that our spouses and kids and neighbors need our help.

Have you read any advocacy blogs? There are lots of conversations about how to do all these things happening all the time. Bloggers ARE very often doers.

If there are 70 million blogs out there, chances are really, really good that I have not read yours. But I have a hunch: We all need your help more than your opinion.

But yet you offer yours. Nice. I would suggest that you go out and learn a little more about the subject at hand before you embarrass yourself in public like this again. Would you like to suggest that people stop reading and go out and do things too? How about wasting their time writing op eds about things they know very little about?

If I had a blog, that’s what I would say.

If you had a blog you might be a little better informed about blogging.

Scott Anderson lives in Des Peres and owns Physician Risk Services, a small health care consulting firm in Clayton.

It seems that a person in this field could find one or two blogs that might be useful to his profession, or have something valuable to share with others within the realm of his expertise. It’s too bad that he has no clue what blogging is really about.

Wow thats quite an honor. Read the interview I did with STL Recruting.

Update: sorry here is the right link.

I rebuilt the sidebar at LO-FI SAINT LOUIS. Looks better but still needs some work. My friend Kopper has volunteered to help me out with some of the management and updates as well. I really want to redesign the whole thing. What a pain in the ass that will be. I would like to move to something along the lines of this. I also like this theme a lot but it would be too difficult to migrate to it. Also some of the important traditional “blog” features are missing, like a blogroll etc. which I think are important to have. I’m really surprised that there aren’t a lot of “vlog” themes for Wordpress yet–if you are a WP developer and are interested in what I would like to see in a Vlog theme let me know.

Ever get that feeling? Is it depression? What is it? It seems like whenever really good things seem to be happening or about to happen I get this weird sensation of dread somewhere deep in my gut. A kind of creeping sadness. The sensation that I might be doing something wrong. Maybe it’s the fear that things aren’t really working out as well as I think they are. Or that it’s all gonna go up in flames … or … nothing.

I often tend to overthink things, and sometimes I read too much into things. Other times I am completely impulsive. I learned a long time ago that expectations dangerous. So maybe I’m just preparing myself for failure.

I need learn to be more impulsive, I think. I do my best work that way.

This is funny! I saw this on the blog A Sampler Of Things.

Some thoughts about SXSW Interactive. Videobloggers were out in force this year. I haven’t seen that many of my vlogging peers in one place at one time since Vloggercon. And the weird thing is that everyone –or at least many people are working on or considering or have signed some sort of monetary or commercial deal for their vlogs. I signed my deal with Podtech a couple of months now. And I’m fairly happy with the arrangement so far. There have been some minor glitches here and there. But really nothing major. But then again I’m a pretty laid back guy who will let a lot of shit slide most of the time–unless I think someone is actively trying to screw me–then I become extremely uptight. Obviously I don’t believe for a second that Podtech is trying to screw anyone. And the more I get to know them the more I really like them. Some of them I really dig a lot.

One big observation I made was that there didn’t seem to be a lot of crossover between the Interactive and the Film parts of the conference. I know that technically they are separate events going on at the same time requiring separate badges and fees, but with video being such a big thing now (and not going away) does it really make sense to keep them separate–or at least not allow any crossover between the events unless you have the right badge? Seems like they could have at least one or two panels that would be open to both. Maybe there were but I didn’t notice.

Anyway I have more thoughts about this but it’ll have to wait. Editing calls.

I am celebrating St. Patricks day by not drinking! Hows that! Actually I have way too much work to do to drink tonight anyway. SXSW was enough partying for a long time. I think I’m still really tired from it all. Sorry about not updating the blog much while I was gone, (like there are enough people who read to care) but being sans laptop while there made that difficult. There was a nice press room that I had access too that had free laptops to use, but seriously I didn’t have a lot of time to sit down and do much besides glance at my emails.

Having a blast here. Went to the Zefrank party and the 8 Bit party last night. Also partied with robots. For some reason this reminds me a lot of Vloggercon … maybe because there are a lot of video bloggers here.

I have a lot of video feeds that I subscribed to in the last 2 years that don’t update anymore. Some still do on occasion but only rarely. I don’t delete them because it’s nice to be surprised by the random video.

I’ve been subscribed to David Howell’s feed for sometime. He seems to post when he has something reall good to share. Which is good, I dig that. I get the impression from his emails to the Videobloggers group, his videos and the occasions I’ve seen him in the flash chats that he’s a pretty intense guy.

He posted something last month that stunned me. Both in it’s beauty (it was beautifully produced) and it’s message. Please go look for yourself …

I have been using Twitter a bit lately. Pretty cool. My favorite friend at the moment is GordonWSmythe (the twitter name for an up and coming vlogging star, you figure it out) Here is an example of one of his Twitter entries: “YouTube banned in Turkey for featuring a video that calls Turks gay. Turkey now officially most sensitive country in world. You go girl.” Too funny.

When I was a kid our TV broke when I was about 11. My Dad refused to replace it until I was almost 17. That means I spent 6 long years of my childhood with out television. At the time I thought it was a curse, but looking back on it I think it was a gift. I found other things to do. I played with this big reel-to-reel tape recorder that my dad gave me, making my own radio shows and comedy sketches (wish I still had some of that stuff). I also read, and drew comics. I was never into sports so much so most of my free time was pursuing creative endeavors. It’s interesting to think how that time sort of prepared me for what I’m doing now. Producing Lo-Fi Saint Louis isn’t a whole lot different than the stuff that I found to amuse myself back then. Most of the work is by myself, in my little room, just working on it—having fun with it.

One of the other things I did to amuse myself was listen to the radio. I got to know radio much better than most kids my age. I listened to music, sure but I also listened to a lot of talk radio. Talk radio wasn’t the same then as it is now. It wasn’t really even political. It was just hosts chatting about what was going on in town and reminiscing about the old days, mostly. It was about this time that I discovered Public Radio. Sunday nights the NPR station that I listened to would run serial radio dramas. Not old ones, but, new modern radio dramas. These were really well produced, deep, aural experiences. Quite frankly it blew my little 12 or 13 year old mind to listen to them. Among the ones I remember was the Star Wars Radio Drama, A Canticle for Leibowitz (based on the novel), and a series of programs produced by a company called ZBS productions. These were all serialized dramas that continued over several weeks. The ZBS series included the 4th Tower of Inverness, The Amazing Adventures of Jack Flanders, and Moon Over Morocco. For some reason these, in particular, captured my imagination and I never really forgot them. Years later I heard stuff produced by the 60’s audio sketch comedy group The Firesign Theater, which reminded me a great deal of these radio shows. I can’t be sure, but the Firesign stuff must have had an influence on the ZBS shows somehow (the firesign stuff started in the 60’s and the ZBS stuff was produced in the mid 70’s). I realize now that what I was listening to was the creative child of 60’s art counter culture mashed up with good old fashioned radio drama. The people producing this stuff in the 60’s and 70’s likely grew up listening to radio dramas in radios golden age of the 40’s and 50’s. I also was familiar with golden age radio shows because my dad collected those on cassette, which I also listened to in lieu of TV.

So anyway, I give you that personal background to tell you this; Moon Over Morocco is now being podcast! If you have any interest in audio drama, then please check it out. You won’t be disappointed.