Node Thy Neighbour

The Neighbornode gives your home wireless network a job as the local welcome wagon. Its a great idea, particularly for high density areas. Here’s the pitch from the nodesters…

These nodes transmit signal for around 300 feet, so everyone within that range has access to the board and can read and post to it. This means that with a Neighbornode you can broadcast a message to roughly everyone whose apartment window is within 300 feet of yours (and has line of sight), and they can broadcast messages back to you. Boards are only accessible from computers that go through the local node.

Right now the nodes are set up to run off a Linksys wireless router. Can blind-node-dating by far behind ? More info at neighbornode.net/index.html

New Music Site from Vancouver.

Project Opus launches
This has got a lot of promise. A new music site slid onto the scene in the last couple of days. Project Opus looks like it’s going to be hot.


project opus web site

It’s early days yet and they’re working out a few small bugs. Why do you suppose the best music sites come out of Vancouver ?

Would you like a book of those ?
I can see all my Christmas spending going to one place. Qoop‘s got a short but sweet hook – Digital to Print, all from your browser.


qoop web site If you’re using Flickr for your photos (who isn’t ?) with a few quick clicks you’ve got a printed book on the way. Do you think they’ll gift wrap ?

My Dose of International News
It’s a bit addictive. Wi-FiTV.com offers up a few hundred sites from a dozen or so countries. Nothing really new there, but the site works well and even though the odd stream doesn’t show, who cares – there’s tons to select from.

wi fi tv logo

I’m still not watching TV if I’m watching on the Internet, right ?

Cell Phone Number Portability – Gotta Have It.

Richard Branson has taken out a full page ad regarding cell phone number portability in Canada. This one’s in the Globe – not sure where else it ran.


virgin ad, click for a larger version
click for a large version

or grab a pdf version here.

At issue is the ability to keep your cell phone number when you switch carriers. For most of us, keeping a number is important. But, as Branson’s ad points out, the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association has recently released a plan that will only see number portability available in Canada in late 2007. Huh? 2007 ?

We’ve had limited number portability for land lines – I moved my Telus landline number to a mobile carrier. But that’s it – do that once and you’re done. And don’t even think about moving a cell number. Not in Canada. The CWTA is also the same group that makes getting a short code (for texting) in Canada some kind of medieval ritual.

In the US, you can get a short code just like registering an URL at http://www.usshortcodes.com/ it’s not cheap – 1,000 USD for a number you pick, 500 USD for a randomly assigned short code. Not so in Canada.

In the full page ad in the Globe, Branson points out that in every other country in which they operate, number portability increases competition. In Canada’s phone business, the ‘c’ word is a dirty word.

Branson’s ad says its not too late to light a fire under these guys. How? Speak up if you want number portability.

Email mynumberismobile@virginmobile.ca .

The mail link will get you started, just add what you want to the message.

And pass this page along to your friends – here’s the permalink to this page: http://blog.bigsnit.com/index.php/2005/09/14/51.

Quick takes on what's hot today.

KK at the podCast hotel.
Kris Krug, one of Vancouver’s web 2.0 advocates has an excellent report on the podCast Hotel in Portland. I’m ticked I couldn’t be there, but look for more of these kinds of events to pop up. If you’ve got one planned, let me know.

Now That’s What I Call a Mobile Community.
Vancouver’s AirG has been quietly making it big in mobile communities. They just hit the 5 million mark – that’s some community. Wait a minute ! That’s some audience.

Nokia Eating Blackberries for Lunch?
Well, it’s worth a try I guess. Nokia wants to put corporate email on every cell phone. Take your pick of reports:
Reuters, InfoWorld, or Yahoo.

Global Turtle Positioning System?
Turtles in the deep sea. Where do they go ? Story Here. Turtle’s location here.

Kicker.
Just a quick note on the heading here. In the news business, a ‘kicker’ is one of those cute, funny stories at the end of the newscast. You know, when the TV anchor, or radio reader, changes his/her voice to all soft and cuddly, with a barely perceptible smile and says…” and finally tonite…” That’s a kicker. Here’s mine:

…And Finally (smile) the food inspection folks at HK Disneyland are scaring the customers. It’s something about those masks they’re wearing. Now I ask you – this is more scary than a person in a giant fluffy cartoon animal outfit ?

Catching up on the CBC Lockout

Those Rotten Managers?
Despite what the locked-out bloggers are saying, CBC management isn’t the evil empire.

They’re doing the right thing in regards to Vancouver R3 contractor Alexis Mazurin. Alexis was at Burning Man last week when he suffered a massive heart attack. Since then, he’s been in a coma in a Reno, Nevada hospital, and his family has been racking up hotel and travel bills while there taking care of him. Today, in an email distribution, R3’s manager Steve Pratt says:

“I wanted to let you all know that Krista Harris [CBC radio director of operations]has talked to both Alexis’ mother and his sister, Nathalie, on the phone. Krista let them know that CBC will be covering all of the family’s travel and accommodation costs.

As far as bringing Alexis back to Vancouver, we have assurances that he will not be moved until the doctors there say he is ready. And all medical expenses will be covered as long as he is there.”

Of course this is the right thing to do, regardless of whether Alexis is permanent staff or not (he’s not).

The Gem Gets Gutted.
The CBC usage police must be squirming. CBCers out on the picket line have been wreaking havoc with the CBC Gem – that’s the official name of the corporation’s logo. It’s also their registered mark, and as such, is protected by copyright. CBC lawyers are usually pretty quick to send cease and desist orders to anyone futzing with it, and under normal circumstances employees aren’t allowed to shave a whisker off the old Gem. Interesting no-one is saying squat about the unholy concoctions being created to adorn picket signs across the country.

Locked out podCasts? Oksurefinebye.
In the old days at CBC, before DNTO was even a glimmer in C. William Smith’s mind, there was a fine Saturday afternoon show called The Radio Show, hosted by Jack Farr. oksurefinebuy was Farr’s way of ending any conversation, no matter whether his guest was at the beginning, middle, or end of his story. A very handy device, for Jack.

In any event, reading the Toronto Star’s summary of the locked-out CBC podCasts brought it all back to me. Says the Star: Oh My Pod. Don’t Give Up Your Day Jobs, then goes on to eviscerate the podCasts posted by out of work CBCers. The review’s bad enough – but it begs the question. If these folks don’t actually have a day job to not give-up, what are they to do ? Oksurefinebye.

Satellite Radio Good to Go.

Despite heavy lobbying from some arts groups, as I had predicted, the federal cabinet will let stand the CRTC’s decision on satellite radio. This is good news for Sirius and XM of the US who now can roll out subscriptions and gear to Canadians. All that publicity around the pros-cons of the licenses put the services back in the mainstream press, which might actually help get them more subscribers out of the box. Get me an mini-dish for my iPod nano and I’m there.

The New Face of the CBC.

5 Things I’ve Been Meaning to Say.

1. At Large Media in Cambridge.
My business partner , Emma Payne, is off to the UK. She’s speaking in Cambridge on Thursday 15 Sept at the Cambridge Entertrise conference. If that isn’t sufficiently nifty, how’s this: she’s staying in a hotel that has a Moat.

2. Sorry, No Truth Today…


ad jobs not today thanks

3. Writers who Blog: New Medium or New Genre.
Meanwhile, also at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, this workshop on October 1st at Harbour Centre. I promised my pals at SFU I’d get the word out.

4. Wrangling the Bird.
More action on the satellite radio front today. A story today in the Globe and Mail about the latest group to jump in. I had a few things of my own to say right here last week.

5. The New Face of CBC.


mr. fournier

This happy guy is Guy Fournier. Guy’s 74 years old and loves to cook. This Guy is now the new chairman of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Maybe this Guy listens to the Radio 3 podCasts while he cooks. Then again, maybe not.

The CBC is embroiled in a labour dispute at the moment, having locked out 5500 of their employees August 15th. Many locked out employees hope this Guy will save the day. Then again, maybe not.

A Half-Baked Ization Theory.

A couple of days ago I was crooning about how much I like the PSP as a platform for, well, everything. The PSP just got released in Europe, and according to this story from BBC, it is the fastest selling game console EVER in the UK.

TV on your phone.

Let me confess. I don’t actually watch much TV. My consumption is usually prompted by a) an inability to sleep or b) some big news story. I actually like the medium, I just rarely find anything on that I want to watch. Despite my lack of excitement, putting media on devices people use and carry with them is just plain smart. Getting video clips on your phone has already rolled out in Canada, but the real play involves a lot more than what we’re getting now. Access to realtime broadcasts and multiple channels is going to put a huge amount of content into play, opening up some interesting niche programming opportunities.


quote from article

The word Mr. Lorbeck is looking for is mashup. This article in e-week is a bit of a promo-fest, but you get the idea of where things are going. Here in Canada, there are some clever companies developing interesting phone/tv mashups, including Exponentia here in Vancouver and Quickplay in Toronto (Mark Hyland, CBC’s former head of Broadband & Digital Services left last spring to join the latter). Even though I’m not likely to use my phone to watch Survivor, I probably would to find out what’s going on when there’s a story breaking. That’s because like most of us, I expect to get the information I want, when I want it, in the form I want it, on the device most handy to me.

This does leads me to wonder just how soon we’ll see the rise of the retro-cell.
“Hey Look what I got. It’s soooo retro. It’s a cell phone, and all it does is, um, PHONE. ”
“Awesome dude. But how does it work, and why would anyone want it ?”

Mashups and Izations…
Success isn’t about pushing TV content to the phones. Success will be some mashup; a sweet-spot that includes new screen technologies, and two important izations. They are: the iPodization of everything, and the googlization of information. Whoever comes up with a phone with a usable interface, that can scour databases for the latest video clips, and then give them to me on a screen I can actually see on the bus (or the street) on the way to work – well, now we’re talking.

Which takes me back to the PSP. Sure it’s a game platform. But check the racks at your local Future Shop. You’ll find more movies for the PSP than you’ll find games. And that’s not just because it’s faster to port a movie to the PSP than it is to port a game (which it is). It’s also because it’s a great screen on a portable device. In that same Future Shop you’ll find a wasteland of portable DVD players going for way cheaper than the PSP; you’ll find them in the bargain bin. That’s because Sony has found the sweet spot, a mashup of DVDization (the movies) and iPodization (portability).

Playstation Portable Browsing

Today’s blog comes with a companion podcast. Get it here

If you love it so much you should marry it !
psp with browser

My love affair with my Play Station Portable made another leap this week. The PSP is an awesome game device, and its screen makes watching movies a treat. The built in wireless to date has been unexciting, since all it did was check for software updates.

That was until this week. All that changed with Sony’s latest software update, which includes control over the desktop theme, support for more types of audio, image and video files, and best of all, a web browser. Oh baby.

Entering URL’s is a bit of a pain, but a few customized link pages will solve that – and it stores favourites just like your desktop browser.

For months now I’ve been raving about the video quality on this device, and being able to load up demo reels for clients is a real asset. Since it will play still images in a slide show mode, I’ve even converted a few of my powerpoint presentations to play on the PSP’s wide screen. Say it with me now, Oh Baby.

This week also marked the release of the PSP in Europe, look for lots of PSP innovation in the months heading into the Christmas rush. Now if Sony would just open up the market on the clamshell disc so we could record movies on them instead of memory sticks – we’d all be screaming Oh Baby.

The news just takes itself too damn seriously.
(with apologies to my friend Anton)

Who needs CBC comedy shows when we’ve got the daily papers. Two stories in today’s Vancouver Sun, apparently completely unrelated. Hmmmm ?

dread work

And taking things a bit too seriously…

The lockout at CBC seems to be frying some brain cells. Quirks and Quarks producer Jim Handman claimed in a letter to the editor that his team created podcasting to CBC. This was in reply to an earlier article quoting a manager who made reference to new technologies, like podcasting, and how they are changing the landscape at CBC, and how it is important for CBC to keep up to these rapid changes. Jim’s rebutal was super cutting, saying how his team of STAFF employees (not contract employees) came up with this [podcasting] innovation. It’s a nice argument, but it’s incorrect.

Back in the mid-nineties, we had gigabytes of audio available for download. This was for our show RealTime, which was live in real time, across Canada and around the world on the Internet. Produced at CBC Vancouver (by a bunch of contract employees, not that it really matters) we had an impressive archive of material available, until CBC got nervous about downloading and told us to remove the files. Joe Lawlor at CBC Toronto was also doing the same. As everyone knows, podcasting is just another form of downloading files; after all it’s an RSS attachment of an mp3 file. So Jim, it’s terrific you guys are doing it, but sorry dude, you didn’t start it, not by a long shot.

Five Things I Like

If this is Tuesday, it must be time for Five Things I Like.

1. My Current Spam Filtering.
The lengths I’m going to in order to avoid dealing with spam remind me of the advice my Dad gave me on avoiding teen pregnancy:

• Put the condom on before you leave on a date.
• Make sure your date is on the pill,
• And never, ever, have sex.

Dad would appreciate my current precautions. Loc’s running spam filtering on the mail server, which is doing a lot to catch the first layer. Office 2003’s version of Outlook filters out a good slice of junk, and I continue to run SpamBayes which catches the stuff the first two didn’t. What I like is that, regardless of how ridiculous it seems, it works.

2. Technology Leapfroging.
New Zealand is going to an all VoIP phone system. Sitting back watching the other guys can pay off – the entire country will be VoIPed by 2012, according to Telecom. What I like is when a little country leapfrogs the rest of us.

3. My VoIP Phone.
I know there are free alternatives, but for business purposes, Vonage Canada has been the right answer for me. What I like is the web interface to every feature, from call forwarding to being able to retrieve mp3’s of my voice mail.

4. Don Tapscott’s Blog.
If you haven’t yet had a chance to see it, make sure you catch Don Tapscott’s blog at www.ageoftransparency.com/blog . Super insightful and an interesting take on corporate culture; you’re going to be naked, you better be buff. What I particularly like his retelling of a recent Toronto radio experience.

and…

5. Maybe It Just Feels Like 3 Weeks.
I promised I wasn’t going to say anything more about the CBC lockout until something happened. Today the two sides decided to get back to the table – which is good of course. This on the heels of an article in the Globe yesterday that cites a study showing Canadians aren’t too concerned about the lockout. What I like is the Globe’s math.


globe screen grab

Six Lessons for Broadcasters


shuffle

With everything that’s been said about podCasting, there are a bits on the trailing edge I’d like to pick up on.

Lesson Number One: There’s No Going Back.

The lessons for traditional radio are enormous. They’re the same lessons marketers everywhere are paying attention to, as are publishers and every middleman involved in the communications industry. They’re paying attention because models we’ve grown accustomed to are changing, and no one knows for sure just where they are taking us. What’s for certain is, once people change, they rarely go back to the old way of doing things.

Lesson Number Two: They’re On the Other End of the iPod.

I’ve been fascinated listening to broadcast executives justify their inability to understand what is going on, by challenging change with “but where’s the business model”. This is one of the great cries of the unconvinced. I heard it during the early days of the Internet in regards to web pages, and again when it came to online audio. Podcasting has no clear business models, yet. Better to ask, “Where’s the audience”. We know the answer; they’re on the other end of an iPod.

Lesson Number Three: You Can No Longer Fool Very Many People for Very Much of the Time.

Broadcasters need to break down what’s happening here. For years they’ve argued that they’re essential, based on a quality of service argument. They hire ‘real’ journalists, they have ‘standards’ etc. On the basis of thier QOS argument, podcasting is a joke – the quality can be terrible and the reliability is spotty. But wait – why are there so many of them out there, and why are people clamoring to get them ?

One reason is they’re providing an array of content. A stunning array that grows daily. Broadcasters meanwhile, continue to rely on the same 200 songs or the same 20 topics for the call in show. When your public has been nurtured on a seemingly unlimited number of options, just a click away, it simply isn’t interested in highly limited choice. There’s a new universe out there, and we just aren’t buying the notion that Jack’s the only person with a handle on it.

Lesson Number Four: Give Me What I Want When I Want It or Get Out of the Way.

A podCast is delivery on demand. By subscribing to a feed, you get one every time there’s something new from the content creator. No waiting for an allotted time, no fuss, no muss. It is stupidly elegant. This is exactly what both the busy professionals and the slacker is looking for. If you can’t give me what I want, when I want it, I’ll go find it somewhere else.

Lesson Number Five: Changing Habits Create Changing Media.

There’s no denying that the biggest factor in the success of podcasting isn’t even the technology; podcasting is just an attachment in an RSS feed. The biggest factor is the iPod. It is also stupidly elegant, and it’s a platform vacuuming up content at every opportunity. The iPod is the new industry standard for audio – soon for video – and I’m certain, soon for books. It’s affordable, it’s easy to use, it works, and it even looks nice.

Like the transistor radio, the iPod is creating a massive change in the way we consume content. The proliferation of podcasts is grist for the evolutionary process, leading us to a new generation of audio consumers and audio services. Media is changing, and changing fast.

Lesson Number Six: We Come In Peace, But There Are a Lot of Us.

The business models that result from all these changes will be as unpredictable as the changes themselves. podCasting is still evolving, it’s barely out of its Geek diapers. People are catching on and turning to these alternate sources for their entertainment and information in numbers no-one predicted. Where there are people, there’s the opportunity to create revenue. It may not fit a broadcaster’s current sales template, but just watch the models pop up over the next few months. It’s damn exciting and rife with opportunities.

Chances are, if you don’t know what that the symbol at the top of the page means, you’re still not convinced. If that’s the case, I’d be more than happy to help.

Satellite Radio ReThink


satellite radio, eh ?

The Globe and Mail is reporting today that the cabinet may ask the CRTC to review its recent satellite radio decision.

There’s been loads of lobbying by arts groups, saying that Canadian artists won’t get enough exposure on the new channels. There’s also a legal argument being posed saying that since satellite radio is controlled by American interests, the current proposals do not meet the CRTC’s own guidelines about who controls the airwaves in Canada. Because this is Canada, there’s also another group who are lobbying against the lobby. The CRTC must have done something right if everybody is pissed.

The results of a possible review are uncertain. The CRTC rarely ends up changing its mind or its rulings, but these reviews give politicians an answer to critics.

Trying to protect the Canadian airwaves in an era of global communications requires some inventive strategies and some new thinking. Creating a ghetto of Canadian satellite channels that no-one listens to isn’t going to help anyone. Sure we should excercise regulatory clout to ensure that Canada benefits from the introduction of satellite radio, but asking for more Canadian channels isn’t going to help. It most likely will make the situation worse.

The root of the problem is that the channel operators will spend as little money as possible on these Canadian channels, the result of which will be negligible listernship. In order to add more channels, the American operators either have to remove existing channels, or lower the bit rate. They’re already squeezing out as much music as they can, so adding more Canadian channels to the mix is going to mean dumping some fine Made-In-The-USA channels. Not a problem in Canada, but a big problem in the US market, where things like the all-Elvis, all-Rolling Stones and Howard Stern channels are the real money makers. Can you imagine them being bumped for the all-Trooper channel ?

Making the operators carry more Canadian channels will just result in more generic, auto-programmed channels requiring as little human intervention as possible. They will be middle of the road and as low cost as possible, and as inoffensive to Americans as possible. Cable TV already has dozens of these music channels made by Galaxie (which wins the award for worse use of clip art) and MaxTrax. They’re run by digital juke boxes, and these automatons crank out loads of Canadian Content every hour of every day, without the help of any humans. Any of these channels could easily be switched to become one of the new mandated CanCon channels, at negligible cost.

Here’s what young Canadian artists have already told the CRTC. Getting airplay on popular U.S. satellite channels does wonders for their careers. What we need are channels that aren’t run on a shoe-string or the result of some rehash of previously aired material. What we need is inventive and responsive programming that works hard to attract an audience.

It’s simple. We’d be far better off with one kick ass Canadian channel on those new satellite services, than ten or fifteen auto-pilots working their way through the MAPL catalogue.

Naked Cape Guy and the Skipper

I’m not sure if anyone else saw him, but there was a guy wearing a black cape and a strategically placed camera bag walking down Granville Street today around 2pm. Cape and camera bag, that’s it. The naked cape guy looked rather jolly, as only a naked guy in a cape in the middle of the afternoon can be, I guess.

Previously, I had passed the skipping guy over by the Hotel Vancouver. He was full-on skipping down the street, his arms whirling faster and faster as he made his way up the block, sweating up a storm. The only problem with this is that he didn’t have an actual skipping rope, or any rope at all. A skipping mime in training maybe?

All this made me question my own grasp on reality. I’m certain both these guys probably took one look at me, and later, writing in their blogs, commented:

“I passed a guy in a dress shirt and freshly ironed pants today. He looked like one of those new media types, you know, the people who make stuff out of nothing. He looked like he was in a hurry, probably on his way to talk to other people about making stuff out of nothing. Who let this guy out on the street ?”


bridge worker

Wired in a ChinaTown Alley

A Chinatown alley, San Francisco.


wired in chinatown

This was my first trip back to San Francisco after leaving Radical. Their office on Berry St. in China Basin had since shut down when I came back in 2001 for the Webby Awards, CBC Radio 3’s first time nominated . I found the irony of this telco box in the high-tech mecca of North America too much to resist. From what I could tell it was still functioning, in spite of (or perhaps because of) a few sketchy looking splices.