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Sunday, July 31, 2011

From A to Zeega: New open-source web platform for collaborative multi-media docs in development | Harvard Gazette

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Excerpt:

Justin Ide/Harvard Staff Photographer

"Harvard affiliates Kara Oehler (from left), Jesse Shapins, and James Burns have won the Knight News Challenge, a fiercely competitive international contest, and will use the funding to develop a prototype software called Zeega, an open-source web platform designed to make collaborative multimedia documentaries cheaper and easier to produce.

Three Harvard affiliates — two fellows and a graduate student — have won the Knight News Challenge, a fiercely competitive international contest that funds digital news experiments that use technology “to inform and engage communities.”
There were 16 prizewinning projects selected from 2,500 submissions. The awards were announced today (June 23).

Contestants from Harvard have won a few times during the five-year life of the Knight contest, but never for as much money — a grant worth $420,000, said Colin Maclay, managing director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society. The competition is “insane,” he added. “Getting into Harvard College has nothing on this.”

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which sponsors the competition, calls its winners “journalism futurists.” They are described as thinkers and designers who employ emerging technologies to make citizen journalism more accessible, compelling, and intellectually rich.

Starting Sept. 1, the three Harvard team members, who were Knight finalists last year, will use their 18-month funding to develop a prototype software called Zeega. The open-source web tools will be designed to foster new genres of investigative journalism and media art, making collaborative multimedia documentaries cheaper and easier to produce.

The Knight project “grows out of a unique combination of documentary arts and experimental media research we’ve been doing within Harvard and beyond,” said Jesse Shapins, one of the three winners. He is a Ph.D. student in Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, where he also lectures in architecture.

James Burns, who graduated in May with a Harvard Ph.D. in economics, is a creative technologist and relational knowledge fellow at the metaLAB (at) Harvard. Shapins and Burns worked together on courses such as Media Archaeology of Place and The Mixed-Reality City, which have used test versions of Zeega, with support from the Presidential Instructional Technology Fellows program..."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

From A to Zeega: New open-source software for interactive docs in development | Harvard Gazette

Media_httpmedianewsha_rqsbf

Excerpt:

Justin Ide/Harvard Staff Photographer

"Harvard affiliates Kara Oehler (from left), Jesse Shapins, and James Burns have won the Knight News Challenge, a fiercely competitive international contest, and will use the funding to develop a prototype software called Zeega, an open-source web platform designed to make collaborative multimedia documentaries cheaper and easier to produce.

Three Harvard affiliates — two fellows and a graduate student — have won the Knight News Challenge, a fiercely competitive international contest that funds digital news experiments that use technology “to inform and engage communities.”
There were 16 prizewinning projects selected from 2,500 submissions. The awards were announced today (June 23).

Contestants from Harvard have won a few times during the five-year life of the Knight contest, but never for as much money — a grant worth $420,000, said Colin Maclay, managing director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society. The competition is “insane,” he added. “Getting into Harvard College has nothing on this.”

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which sponsors the competition, calls its winners “journalism futurists.” They are described as thinkers and designers who employ emerging technologies to make citizen journalism more accessible, compelling, and intellectually rich.

Starting Sept. 1, the three Harvard team members, who were Knight finalists last year, will use their 18-month funding to develop a prototype software called Zeega. The open-source web tools will be designed to foster new genres of investigative journalism and media art, making collaborative multimedia documentaries cheaper and easier to produce.

The Knight project “grows out of a unique combination of documentary arts and experimental media research we’ve been doing within Harvard and beyond,” said Jesse Shapins, one of the three winners. He is a Ph.D. student in Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, where he also lectures in architecture.

James Burns, who graduated in May with a Harvard Ph.D. in economics, is a creative technologist and relational knowledge fellow at the metaLAB (at) Harvard. Shapins and Burns worked together on courses such as Media Archaeology of Place and The Mixed-Reality City, which have used test versions of Zeega, with support from the Presidential Instructional Technology Fellows program..."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Building a Community of Practice around Digital Storytelling (2009 slide deck but still sound)

Oh Oh Oh! ZooBurst is a free DIY Pop-Up Book Software Program! Presents!

Amazing: Sundance and Topspin Bring D2F Direct to Fan Marketing to Indie Film | via Topspin Media

This morning, the Sundance Institute announced an expansion of their incredibly forward-thinking Sundance Artist Services program, and we at Topspin are honored to be included alongside distribution outlets iTunes, Amazon, YouTube, Hulu, New Video, Netflix and Sundance Now as the provider of Direct-To-Fan Marketing and Distribution tools. We’re humbled to have our first major expansion outside of music to be with such a storied and benevolent institution, and we’re quite literally stoked to start helping Sundance filmmakers connect with fans and create new channels for their amazing work.

This quote from Robert Redford really says it all:

“When I founded the Institute in 1981, it was at a time when a few studios ran the industry and an artist’s biggest concern was whether their film would get made,” Redford said. “Technology has lessened that burden, but the big challenge today is how audiences can see these films. The Artist Services program is a direct response to that need. We’re not in the distribution business; we’re in the business of helping independent voices be heard.”

If you’d like to read the official press release, you can DOWNLOAD HERE.

In addition to the expansion of the Artist Services program today, Sundance also launched an online alumni community containing blog posts and essays from some of the brightest and bravest minds in indie film, like Tim League and Ted Hope. The goal is to provide a place where Sundance artists can share data and advice, and interact with distributors, technology partners and each other. Somehow, I managed to sneak my two cents in there, too. Below is a reprint of my “Direct-To-Fan Keynote” that appears inside the Sundance Artist Services site.

My hope is that all filmmakers find it useful. Please share it liberally.
You can it download it as a VIDEO or as a PDF.

Hello. My name is Bob.
I’m here to talk about Direct-to-Fan Marketing (D2F) and Distribution. I work at a software company called Topspin. We’re honored to be a part of Sundance Artist Services.

Topspin makes software used by 
Kevin Smith, David Lynch, Ed Burns, Trent Reznor, Arcade Fire and thousands of other artists to sell downloads, merchandise, tickets and memberships directly to fans. Our company mission is to create an artistic middle class, and we’re doing it by building a self-serve application you can use to market and distribute your work yourself.

You may think I mean self-release. Or DIY Distro. Or “creative” distribution. But those are not the same as Direct-to-Fan. What I’m talking about is a distribution and marketing strategy that should be a part of every filmmaker’s career. I’m talking about making sure you are directly connected to your core audience. I’m talking about selling premium products to super fans. And I’m hoping to persuade you to treat your audience like your most important asset. It is time to invest in your fans.

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Saturday, July 30, 2011

Very cool grad project at UChicago: Oscillation Transmedia Game Trailer | HASTAC

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Very cool grad project at UChicago:

"A portion of my research concerns the emergent artistic form of Alternate Reality Games (ARGs), which are also often called "transmedia," "pervasive," or "immersive" games. One early vision of ARGs is David Fincher's film The Game (1997), which is about an investment banker (Michael Douglas) who begins playing a game that quickly becomes indistinguishable from his daily life. Popular ARGs released after this film have included The Beast (2001), I Love Bees (2004), and Year Zero (2007). Recently, Jane McGonigal has written extensively about this form in her book Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World. She has also designed ARGs such as Evoke (a World Bank Institute project that won the 2010 Games for Change social game of the year award)...."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Cool! UChicago Grad Student Posts Oscillation Transmedia/ARG Game Documentation Video

More documentation here - thanks Patrick Jagoda & Ainsley Sutherland for posting about your work!

http://hastac.org/blogs/patrick-jagoda/2011/07/27/oscillation-transmedia-game...

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Must Read!: The Social Bridges to Creating Open Standards for Privacy & Innovation (The Real Value of #GooglePlus) #LeonhardEuler - A Literacy of the Imagination

New Post from Gunther Sonnenfeld on Google+:

"The Social Bridges to Creating Open Standards for Privacy & Innovation (The Real Value of #GooglePlus) #LeonhardEuler

If there is anything we've learned from the arrival of Google+ it is this: "social media" is a behavior. Not a channel. Not a feature. Not a product. A behavior.

Case in point: Google has created some of the coolest social utilities on the planet, from Google Maps, to Google Earth, to Google Goggles, to Places, to video chat and more recently, Wallet. It also created Buzz and other programs that more or less flopped by today's commercial standards. But the social networking damn broke, so to speak, when Google decided that in order to be social, it needed to understand the value of personal interactions. Once it did, once it got a taste of what it meant to be transparent, vulnerable and authentic (dare we say through those intricate little Circles)... Well, everything changed.

Let's forget, for a moment, about the alarming growth rate of G+, or its pending world domination of all things personal and professional, and think about what this really means to us as individals, groups and business of all types and sizes..."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Ah! The Formula! I'll Bite: Storytelling Drives Social Media Marketing: The Formula

Must Watch in #TOCouncil context: David Hulchanski: Toronto's Three Cities | The Other Housing Market

Grazie Maria Popova! A Beginner's Guide to Infographics and Data-Driven Storytelling - via The Atlantic

Love Maria Popova's thinking & terrific site: brainpickings.com

"Data visualization is a frequent fixation of mine and, just recently, I looked at seven essential books that explore the discipline's capacity for creative storytelling. Today, a highly anticipated new book joins their ranks—Visualize This: The FlowingData Guide to Design, Visualization, and Statistics, penned by Nathan Yau of the fantastic FlowingData blog. (Which also makes this a fine addition to my running list of blog-turned-book success stories.) Yu offers a practical guide to creating data graphics that mean something, that captivate and illuminate and tell stories of what matters—a pinnacle of the discipline's sensemaking potential in a world of ever-increasing information overload.

And in a culture of equally increasing infographics overload, where we are constantly bombarded with mediocre graphics that lack context and provide little actionable insight, Yau makes a special point of separating the signal from the noise and equipping you with the tools to not only create better data graphics but also be a more educated consumer and critic of the discipline...."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Friday, July 29, 2011

Whoot! Love Am Presents! All Is Not Lost - New OK Go & Pilobolus HTML5 video

8 Filmmaking Tips From Guillermo Del Toro & Nicholas Winding Refn | Film School Rejects

These are the bullet points - read the whole for the ideas!

Casting is King
Wide Angle Lenses Give Everything Depth
Use the Location as a Character
Fight the Power
Don’t Be Afraid of Poverty
Try Doing What You Hate
Aspire to Imperfection
Never Be Safe
What Have We Learned?

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Message from the Colbert Super PAC (take note of the details & watch last night's show - rofl)

Dear Colbert Super PAC Members and Electoral Uruk-hai, 

On June 29th, I sent out a call. A call for all heroes to come together under the banner of Colbert SuperPAC, put some money in a hat, and then leave. And you came: over 120,000 of you joined with the goal of Making a Better Tomorrow... Tomorrow. 

But now, Tomorrow is only a Day away. The Time has come to take a Stand. For Something. We haven't figured out what It is yet. That's where You come in. 

Go to http://bit.ly/PACstand and share what matters to you most, whether it's ending poverty, designing a truly zombie-proof fortress or preserving poverty. Everything is on the table-even tables. 

Your concerns will be scientifically blended with the concerns of other Colbert SuperPAC members, then formed into a nutritious concern loaf for me to cram down Washington's gullet. 

It's like a reverse orchestra, where you're all the conductors and I'm the one musician, armed with an FEC-sanctioned violin made of money. Or maybe an oboe – that's up to you. You've made your money-voice heard, now make your mouth-voice heard. Visithttp://bit.ly/PACstand today...now. 

Why are you still here? 

Sinceriously, 

Stephen Colbert 

President and Chieftain of the Dúnedain, Colbert Super PAC 


Paid for by Americans for a Better Tomorrow, Tomorrow
Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
www.colbertsuperpac.com

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Oh Love Love Love IDEO Labs » An Exquisite Corpse Experiment

Watch the first chapter.

In traditional storytelling, we rely on words to conjure images in our minds. But what happens when we’re provided with visuals that represent each of the story’s words, but not its larger context? And what if the story itself is collaborative and nonlinear—and the images that represent it keep changing?

This site, inspired by the exquisite corpse model of storytelling, is our attempt to find out.

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Great Review 'How Bjork's 'Biophilia' album fuses music with iPad apps' by Charlie Burton - excerpt (Wired UK)

Today, the wide, tree-lined street in New York's Brooklyn Heights that Björk calls home is a hubbub of television cast and crew filming the ABC drama Georgetown. Her 280-square-metre penthouse apartment lies atop a muscular 20s redbrick block on the corner, high above the bustle. "You kind of feel like it's a country house," Björk says. She is wearing a cadet-grey dress with shiny mauve patches on the shoulder and waist. When the sunlight from the studio windows hits them, they sparkle. The room is airy, with tables for her kit, which includes a keyboard, speakers, computer and a mix of percussion and electronic music controlpads. Björk has spent much time here over the last 36 months working on Biophilia, trying not to feel daunted by the album's scope.

There was a musicological ambition: she wanted each of the album's ten songs to emphasise one key idea, such as counterpoint, arpeggios or tempo. And there's intellectual purpose: each song's lyrics dwell on a scientific theme that attempts to match its musical concern. In "Crystalline" Björk invokes crystals as a symbol of the track's structural complexity; "Virus" is so called because of its multiplying phrases. "I hope to show kids that if you base musicology more on structures in nature it's actually not that complicated," she says. Although "a bit of a maths nerd" when she was younger, for this album she knew that she would have to learn more about the sciences if she was to unite them convincingly with music.

She worked to self-imposed deadlines, reading books and watching documentaries on everything from astrophysics to cultural theory, focusing on areas where science and sound intersect. One major influence was Oliver Sacks's book Musicophilia, an exploration of the relationship between music and neurology, to which the album's title is a nod. Björk undertook more research for this project than for any of her previous albums. One day she found herself explaining string theory to friends in a bar. "It was actually in a pretty cool way," she says, grinning. "Like I was really good at physics or something."

For all their chewy themes, Björk felt the songs couldn't stand on their own. "People are getting a lot of music for free by pirating it," she says. "But they are going to double [the amount of] shows because they want a 3D, physical experience." Her instinct, at first, was to provide that experience through a music house, "like a museum". Each room would be designated a different song, and contain interactive exhibits related to the track. The stairs would be working piano keys. In June 2009 she spoke to National Geographic about another way she could add to the album: working together on a 40-minute 3D IMAX movie of Biophilia. She approached her longtime collaborator, French filmmaker Michel Gondry, who agreed to direct. Björk hoped this film and the music house would not only generate revenue, but also educate -- finally realising the vision she had described to her teacher, all those years ago. "This project," she says, "is also my music-school project."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Comic-Con: A new generation powered by steam and DIY online - Jeff Gomez on What's Trending - CBS News

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...The Do-It-Yourself mentality at SDCC is not limited to comics, of course. More and more of these costumes are simply spectacular. I've noticed a below-the-radar subgenre has been slowly bubbling to the surface, riding the DIY wave: steampunk. Perhaps the manifestation of 21st century kids yearning for the innocence and mystery of yesteryear by way of Jules Verne and H.G. Welles, steampunk imagines an alternate 18th century world, where we never abandoned steam to power our inventions, but somehow pushed forward into a bejeweled, science-fantasy world. Steampunk costume-players wear ornately tooled gadgets, protective goggles and umbrellas, clockwork broaches, and weathered boots. Bands of them stalk the floor seeking out supernatural menaces, or gathering expeditions to the moon. They sell their handcrafted wares on Etsy, and call for spontaneous meet-ups through Twitter to scavenge antique stores for "parts." Man, it's a great time to be a geek...

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Alright All! What's the Verdict Here: ARG? Bad SciFi? New/Old Cult? Nexus Humanus | Creating Sustainable Happiness One Life at a Time

Nexus Humanus

Pre-Register Here

On August 1, Nexus Humanus unveils an all-new community and exciting site features. Pre-register now and receive a special reward!

The Future Begins With You

Coming Soon

The journey of a lifetime begins on August 30 when we premiere our all-new system of self-discovery based on the lost journals of visionary founder Jay Howard Thompson.

33
Days
1
Hour
36
Minutes
31
Seconds

Privacy Policy | Terms of Use
Any resemblance to actual events or to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
© 2011 LLL1. All rights reserved.

Check out the video - creeped me out.

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Dan Savage's to Rick Santorum: Lay off the Gays this Campaign or Rick will be Redefined

Ha Ha Ha: 'Battleship' Looks Like the Best Board Game Movie Ever - The Atlantic Wire

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The list of movies adapted from a board game begins and ends with 1985's Clue. That movie has its fans, but after watching the first teaser trailer for director Peter Berg's Battleship, which doesn't arrive in theaters until next Memorial Day weekend, we're willing to say the bar for future game-to-film adaptations has been raised. Unlike the Milton Bradley game, the movie has a plot (something about aliens), giant robotic bugs that leap out of the sea and onto the fullback from Friday Night Lights, and Liam Neeson. That's what having a budget reportedly upwards of $200 million can do for a movie...

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

I"m hypnotized! Seriously: Animated Geometry of the North Rose Window of Chartres Cathedral

Sweet Catchy Pop-Up Book Music Video: Don't F**k With Love Video - Films | Openfilm

Love this: Geographic Information Systems & Data Viz Help Scholars See History - NYTimes.com

Now historians have a new tool that can help. Advanced technology similar to Google Earth, MapQuest and the GPS systems used in millions of cars has made it possible to recreate a vanished landscape. This new generation of digital maps has given rise to an academic field known as spatial humanities. Historians, literary theorists, archaeologists and others are using Geographic Information Systems — software that displays and analyzes information related to a physical location — to re-examine real and fictional places like the villages around Salem, Mass., at the time of the witch trials; the Dust Bowl region devastated during the Great Depression; and the Eastcheap taverns where Shakespeare’s Falstaff and Prince Hal caroused.

Like the crew on the starship Enterprise, humanists are exploring a new frontier of the scholarly universe: space.

Mapping spatial information reveals part of human history that otherwise we couldn’t possibly know,” said Anne Kelly Knowles, a geographer at Middlebury College in Vermont. “It enables you to see patterns and information that are literally invisible.” It adds layers of information to a map that can be added or taken off at will in various combinations; the same location can also be viewed back and forth over time at the click of a mouse.

read the full article on the NY Times

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Grazie Cody Shotwell for the Post! MediaShift Idea Lab . Prototypes, Visualizations Take Shape in Knight-Mozilla Learning Lab | PBS

So, as a tribute to the prototyping/brainstorming theme of the first week's lectures, here's a rundown of some prototypes and visualizations that emerged in the first "thinking out loud" blog assignment. Help grow the community by checking out these thought experiments, offering your feedback, or adding onto them with your own twist:

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Youth Get Creative with Digital Storytelling Project | Good News Toronto (older story - bookmarking!)

2011-05-05

Luminato and Manifesto work with students in Regent Park and St. Jamestown to explore contemporary forms of storytelling, and create short film narratives to be screened as part of the Luminato Festival in June

The Luminato Festival happens once a year in Toronto for 10 very special days in June, filling our city’s streets with arts, culture, and creativity. Celebrating its fifth anniversary this upcoming June, Luminato will once again flood the downtown core with a wide range of cutting-edge, interdisciplinary arts experiences. Programming ranges everywhere from free outdoor music concerts, theatre world premiers, magic shows, movies, fashion, food, and much more — with new surprises each year to keep the Festival exciting. Luminato aims to provide something for everyone, but not just during those ten days in June. In fact, a lot goes on at Luminato during the pre-Festival season. The Luminato Education and Community Outreach department, led by Jessica Dargo Caplan, partners with a multitude of community organizations and offers free pre-Festival workshops for children and youth living in Regent Park, St. Jamestown, and Parkdale. These workshops are facilitated by local and international artists and aim to equip participants with unique arts experiences that tie directly to the Festival’s program; this year, Luminato is exploring the idea of adaptation and contemporary storytelling.

Selected youth participants from Pathways to Education and UforChange have been taking part in Luminato’s Youth Digital Storytelling Project. Participants have been working with world-renowned spoken-word artist, Boonaa Mohammed to learn the art and the technical craft of telling stories in new, innovative ways. Dubbed the “voice of a generation,” Boonaa is no stranger to workshop facilitation. He often conducts community writing workshops and seminars, and through his process helps youth discover and tell their own stories. “I’m not a fan of sideline education; I feel like people have to have a hands-on experience,” said Boonaa, who designed the interactive 10-week workshop program with the Luminato team and Manifesto Community Projects, a non-profit grassroots organization working to unite, energize, support, and celebrate Toronto’s vibrant and diverse music and arts community.

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From the Big Screen to the Flat Screen (and vice versa) | Jinni Blog

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nice overview post!

The Smurfs movie is coming out in theaters this week joining a long line of TV series that were turned into movies (Transformers, The A-Team, Sex and the City) and vice versa (Nikita, Friday Night Lights, Are We There Yet?). So we’ve made a wish list of additional TV series we want to be turned into movies and movies we want to be made into TV series. Studio’s and networks, for your attention (and commission…):

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Projector Films - DIY Twitter Movie - Kristi Barnett's advice if you want to do it.

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Great Interview on ProjectorFilms blog with Kristi Barnett:

"How did you find the interactive element of the story? Did people get involved? Or were they passive?

It was great. I chose to make the interactivity simply people’s reactions to her tweets and their replies to her on twitter (and Facebook). I used my phone to reply back because I was normally away from my PC when the story was rolling out. I had females and males interacting and replying to her and loving the story. They were really getting into it and I could definitely see she had a core group of fans. What was interesting was that even when people knew she was a character and this was a story, they would still interact and try to warn her or ask her how she was feeling. I loved that people were “playing” along with it. You can see some of the reactions to the story and her character here. I also got the sense that people did want to have a say in what Karen did and how she reacted, so it would’ve been nice if I’d had more money and time to give them a chance to dictate the story more. I wanted to shoot alternative scenes with the actors and alternative endings. Then guide the audience into choosing what Karen and Darren should do via the tweets. Then based on the majority I would choose a scene. Like one of those “Pick a Path” books. I also thought about running another Twitter account from the perspective of Darren or even the Other Darren at the same time. My God, I don’t want to think how I would’ve made that happen, lol. ...."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Good Distinction: Transmedia vs Multi-screen Distractions - via Michael Matthews - The Mobile Culture - Forbes

Excerpt from Jul. 8 2011 post:

"...According to a Harris Interactive survey, 56 percent of Americans watching TV concurrently surf the Internet and 40 percent visit a social networking site. Thirty-seven percent of viewers are also busy texting on their mobile phones while the TV rumbles on.

Another study, put together by Room 214 and Crimson Hexagon, called Digital Shifts: How New Media is Changing TV, shows 52 percent of communication on Facebook from users watching TV offered facts like “I’m watching,” followed by the name of the program. It also shows 19 percent of studied viewers started conversations about the show. And when they do update their social media channels, the study showed Facebook encourages more conversation while Twitter serves more as a broadcast medium.

In a recent IPG Media Lab and YuMe study, it was stated that smart phones present a real threat to attention and is considered distraction media. The results concluded that smartphones accounted for 60 percent of TV distractions. The reason is mainly that marketers have been slow to embrace the opportunity of phones, among other devices, being used as a tool for supplemental or enhanced consumer engagement. When they do, these devices move from being a distraction to an opportunity...."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

'How to Write A Transmedia Production Bible' (free!) by Gary Hayes via Screen Australia - Digital Resources

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From the site:

"Screen Australia has commissioned Gary P Hayes to write this resource as a best-practice guide to the thinking, planning, documentation and supporting materials required when developing a property across multiple platforms.

The guide is highly recommended reading for producers, in particular those planning a submission to the All Media Program or seeking multi-platform funding for digital extensions as part of an application for production investment in a film or TV project.

The bible that this document will guide you towards is not a production bible
in the traditional sense – a format document for franchising a TV property
into other markets – but rather a catch-all that covers key components of a
complex multi-platform service. Your bible may be extended to a full production reference document as the sections it contains become more detailed.

The Transmedia Production Bible is a document that captures key
story and design IP elements, rules of engagement, functionality and technical issues across multiple platforms, and provides an overview of the business/marketing plan. Each of the five main sections requires specialist members of the project team to be responsible for its development as the service goes from conception to production and the document becomes a fully detailed production bible."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Logic+Emotion: The Social Layer: Six Thoughts On Where Google Plus Is Going

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I've pulled David Armano's Six Thoughts - read the full post for details:

"I've been deeply immersed in Google Plus for the last week or so, not only following what's being said about the service but actually using it, kicking the tires and making observations along the way. For what it's worth, I think Google Plus has an incredible amount of potential for a number of reasons. Here's a few thoughts or more accurately opinions. Everyone has a take, so the only thing can offer here is that I've had these thoughts in my head while using the service but wanted to give it some time before putting it into writing.

1. Google Plus Isn't A Social Network, It's A Social Layer
2. Google Plus Isn't A Facebook Killer And Doesn't Need To Be
3. Journalists, Public Relations Professionals & The Media Will Eventually Flock To G+
4. Businesses With Employee "Ambassador" Models Will Activate & Deploy Them
5. Big And Small Business Gets A Second Chance With Google+
6. Google Will Bring Search & Social Together"

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GLOBAL BEAT FUSION, the #transmedia experience by Spectral Alchemy — Kickstarter

"ABOUT THIS PROJECT

GlobalBeatFusion.com, Facebook.com/Global.Beat.Fusion, SpectralAlchemy.com

The Global Beat Fusion Project explores today's converging world culture through music. Based on Derek Beres’s 2005 book, Global Beat Fusion: The History of the Future of Music, the project travels to Brazil, India, Morocco, Romania, and across the US, talking with some of the most creative and loved musicians from each culture. Asking the artists why they make music, what that music means to them personally and collectively, and how collaborations between musicians from different parts of the world bring humanity closer together.

Thematically, Global Beat Fusion suggests that by listening to a culture’s music you gain direct access to the soul of that culture. We tend to learn about other nations predominantly through major media sources, which tend to focus more on tragedies in those countries through an almost exclusively comparative lens. While politics, social philosophy, and religious ideology must be considered, the heart of a culture resides in its arts. Global Beat Fusion gets to the heart of the matter.

Another important theme looks at the computer as the world’s first global folk instrument. Never before have human beings around the globe created, distributed, and shared music on the same instrument. Considered commonplace today, from a sociological and mythological perspective, the speed and ease of technology offers a fresh and innovative trend, and has extensive consequences for how we communicate and relate to one another as a people.

We plan to produce a feature documentary, but more importantly, build a transmedia portal for international music that continually offers new videos, music and news. Global Beat Fusion’s transmedia experience utilizes traditional motion pictures, print/eBooks, the Internet and the physical world of music events/performances. We’d like to share our process and journey with our audience along the way, and create a strong, active community that thrives in the future...."

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interactive TV documentary film examining sectarian violence in Egypt before the January 25, 2011 uprising: Muwatana

Produced by MediaVision Cairo, Egypt. c.2010
Released on Al Jazeera Arabic News channel c.2011 under the title "Gozour Al Fetna - The Roots of Discord"

Directed & Shot by NRF's Omar S. Khodeir credited in the film under the pseudo Omar Al Masri

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Like! Transmedia horror story, Karen Barley, made on a microbudget, told through tweets, links to YouTube & photos

Rob Pratten interviews creator Kristi Barnett, July 26 2011

"Karen Barley is a horror story told on Twitter with tweets linking out to YouTube videos and photos. It’s the creative brainchild of Kristi Barnett and during its three week run in July earned some impressive stats for a low-budget independent production including almost 700 followers on Twitter and over 5000 words in press coverage plus a spot on BBC TV.

In this article Robert Pratten interviews Kristi about the project’s development and delivery.

RP: You’re a “traditional” movie scriptwriter by trade Kristi so what made you want to write a transmedia story?

KB: I wanted to get one of my stories produced. I’d been writing for 3 years with at that time, not even a short made. I just bit the bullet and decided that using social media would be a cheaper and more immediate way to get an audience for a story. I wasn’t actually consciously looking at transmedia itself but rather the idea of using Twitter as a story tool. I knew no one had tried to tell a story over twitter as a character using other media like videos, photos, weblinks etc. I love twitter and am constantly on it so it seemed natural to me that Twitter could be used in this way. And it is a writer’s medium when you think about it; every tweet is a piece of writing.

RP: How many people were involved in the project from crew to cast?

KB: The total number of people directly involved was 10. The actual crew on the shoot days including cast and myself was 5. So it was micro-budget guerilla film making. I had myself as Writer, Director and Producer; I funded almost all of it. I quickly got in contact with Tim Clague whom I’d met at various screenwriting festivals and after looking at his work in different types of media I asked if he’d be a consultant on the project and story. He gave me some great advice on how to proceed and how to gain an audience and gave me the encouragement to continue and use the story I had. He ended up being an Associate Producer. I then moved quickly into looking for an Assistant Director. Someone that I knew would be creative and technically aware and who also loved the idea of different media. I asked Danny Tate of JellyFish Media to jump on board. He also served as Editor and Sound Designer and was instrumental in making the trailer and behind the scenes video diary (coming soon).

At the same time I was looking for my actors. So I got myself a casting assistant and casting co-coordinator; Matthew Turner and Mark Vella respectively. Then over two days I cast for the two main characters. Gemma Giddings and Benjamin O’Mahony were the actors I chose. They were great and could improvise off script and understand the scenes very quickly and were very intuitive with the camera, as they’d be shooting themselves. They loved the idea of what I was trying to achieve and I think and hope that it was a challenge for them; something very different to what they’d ever done in that they were shooting small video vignettes that only made sense if you read the tweets that went with it. The other actor was David McClelland whom I knew from my writers group. He’s also a technology writer and presenter so he loved the idea straight away. He played Bossman. I also had a Sound assistant, Elise Neola May and a Website Consultant in Anton Russell...."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Monday, July 25, 2011

‪Ok Y'all - The V is 'the Most Powerful Thing On Earth' Are YOU Ready?? Summer's Eve Hail to the V: "The V" Unrated Extended Cut‬‏ - YouTube

‪Grazie @stephencolbert! Summer's Eve 'Hail To The V' Vagina Cleaning Commercial-Is this racist? (White Women Version)‬‏ - YouTube

‪ROFL - Summer's Eve 'Hail To The V' Vagina Cleaning Commercial- Is this racist? (Black Women version)‬‏

‪OMG - NO! Summer's Eve 'Hail To The V' Vagina Cleaning Commercial-Is this racist? (Hispanic Women Version)‬‏ - YouTube

‪Good On Ya! True Blood: Alexander Skarsgard PSA 'It Gets Better' (HBO)‬‏

Awesome mix of old & new: Nichiren Buddhism Explained via QR Codes

Comic-Con: Jeff Gomez on Why you should be excited for remakes and reboots - What's Trending

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by Jeff Gomez

(CBS/What's Trending) "Clicking through the Twitter feeds coming out of day two at San Diego Comic-Con, it's remarkable how many remakes, sequels, prequels, revivals or reboots of properties are being announced. A "Scanners" TV series is in the making, "Fright Night," a modestly successful 80s flick, will be remade and Steven Spielberg is trumpeting "Jurassic Park 4." If you're a cynic -- and there are a few of you lurking right here in the convention center -- this is Hollywood at its worst, a bankruptcy of ideas, the scraping of barrel bottoms. But, my sense of it is that there's room for hope.

"Deep mythologies are at the core of everything we do," said Jon Jashni of Legendary Pictures early in their presentation this afternoon. Legendary brought us the latest trilogy of "Batman" movies, and is gearing up a full-blown blockbuster version of my beloved "Godzilla." He touches on a powerful point: Stories have recurred throughout history and across cultural boundaries because they resonate with the fears, desires and aspirations of the human souls. Telling a story well is a rarity, and so they get repeated and transmitted over and over again, moving from tale to legend to myth. Why should today be any different than what has always been?..."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Flashback to a Great Video Series on: How Storytelling is Changing (by @baekdal) #soicalmedia #transmedia

Transmedia

Potential of Social Media

Great series from the Center for Storytelling with guest speakers including Clay Shirky, Ian Condry, Joshua Green, Dean Jansen, Henry Jenkins, Joe Lambert, and Nick Montfort.

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Da Vinci iPhone | HOW TO BE A RETRONAUT (Love this Blog)

Very Cool Post!: Design Firm Precious on Patterns for Multiscreen Strategies | MobileBehavior

Patterns for Multiscreen Strategies

Original Post May 26, 2011

"Precious is a German design consultancy for strategic design and visual languages. In their early years, they were involved in website and desktop software design. Today, they specialize in smartphone apps, prototypes for TV interfaces, and applications for tablet devices. Here, we've invited them to share what they've learned about interactivity within this emerging ecosystem of screens.

precious: Working with all of those devices was interesting and challenging, not just because of the diverse number of screen sizes and input methods, but because, through user research, we learned about how different the contexts are in which these gadgets are used.
Even more interesting, however, is how those devices relate to each other. What does it mean for the digital products and services we are designing when laptops, smartphones, TVs and other electronic devices are connected? What are the implications for interfaces if people are interacting within an "ecosystem of screens"?..."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Cool! The World’s First QR Code Film Festival (only thru July 21-31)

Your Life Is A Transmedia Experience

Comic-Con: Robert Rodriguez & friends bring "Heavy Metal" to the social media masses - What's Trending - CBS News

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by Jeff Gomez

(CBS/What's Trending) - "It's day three at San Diego Comic-Con, and the floor is buzzing with one of the most unique and unlikely announcements yet -- one that leverages the Internet and social media in ways that anticipate a new phase in the entertainment industry. During his panel to trumpet the formation of his new studio Quick Draw Productions, director Robert Rodriguez ("El Mariachi," "Dusk 'Til Dawn," "Grindhouse") told a rapt audience that he had acquired the rights to "Heavy Metal."
Some of us remember the wildly overblown 1981 R-rated cartoon anthology based on the hide-it-under-the-mattress glossy magazine that featured vicious monsters, flaring ray guns and scantily clad babes. Rodriguez says he's already lined up James Cameron, Zack Snyder, possibly Guillermo del Toro and Gore Verbinski to direct what are sure to be gorgeously animated segments of the new film.
But, what's really trippy is that Rodriguez has invited fans to contribute "characters, worlds, and/or story ideas" to Quick Draw via a dedicated web site, with the chosen concept being added to the film as a final segment! This is no ordinary trip to the set contest, but an embracing of the power of fandom that makes Comic-Con relevant today...."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

Very Moving Piece: Russell Brand on Amy Winehouse: 'We have lost a beautiful, talented woman' | guardian.co.uk

Russell Brand on Amy Winehouse: 'We have lost a beautiful, talented woman'

We need to review the way society treats addicts – not as criminals but as sick people in need of care

  • Comments (88)
  • Russell Brand and Amy Winehouse
    Russell Brand: 'Addiction is a serious disease; it will end with jail, mental institutions or death.' Photograph: Dave Hogan/Getty Images

    Excerpt from a very moving article:

    "...I was myself at that time barely out of rehab and was thirstily seeking less complicated women so I barely reflected on the now glaringly obvious fact that Winehouse and I shared an affliction, the disease of addiction. All addicts, regardless of the substance or their social status share a consistent and obvious symptom; they're not quite present when you talk to them. They communicate to you through a barely discernible but unignorable veil. Whether a homeless smack head troubling you for 50p for a cup of tea or a coked-up, pinstriped exec foaming off about his speedboat, there is a toxic aura that prevents connection. They have about them the air of elsewhere, that they're looking through you to somewhere else they'd rather be. And of course they are. The priority of any addict is to anaesthetise the pain of living to ease the passage of the day with some purchased relief..."

    Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

    Saturday, July 23, 2011

    Amazing: A 3-D Printer Which Uses The Saharan Sun Instead Of A Laser | Co. Design

    When you were a kid, maybe you built a parabolic solar cooker as a science project and thought you were pretty hot stuff. (Zing!) Markus Kayser, who is not a kid but clearly has the lateral-thinking skills of one, did something much more impressive: he built a working 3-D printer that uses the sun's rays to sinter solid objects of out desert sand.

    His demo video is about as pulse-poundingly paced as an Antonioni film, but that's appropriate given how slowly Kayser's "Solar Sinter" device works in real life. "In this experiment, sunlight and sand are used as raw energy and material to produce glass objects using a 3-D printing process that combines natural energy and material with high-tech production technology," he writes. Sintering is a technical term for "melting powder into solid objects," and selective laser sintering is a common 3-D printing technique. Kayser realized that the world's most powerful laser is right above our heads, and to conduct his experiment at maximum sintering strength (and also afford himself with abundant, free printing material), he dragged his rig out into the Sahara Desert near Siwa, Egypt, and got to work.

    Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

    The Most Awesome George Takei Calls Out Anti-Gay Arkansas School Board Member‬‏ - YouTube

    Good Read! Yay PopSandbox! Digital lit: How new ways to read mean new ways to write - The Globe and Mail

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    By Kate Taylor, Saturday July 9 2011

    "The Next Day is a graphic novel about people who have attempted suicide. Once it is posted online in September, you’ll be able to click your way through it according to your own preferences about how it should unfold. CityFish is a Web-based short story, about a Nova Scotia girl visiting relatives in New York. Unfurling horizontally, like a scroll, it looks like a scrapbook, full of photographs and short videos of the places it describes. Inanimate Alice is an episodic, interactive, multimedia novel for children that offers text, videos and puzzles as it recounts the adventures of a heroine who becomes a video-game designer....

    ...“E-books as we know them are electronic replicas of books, it’s paper under glass,” says Kate Pullinger, author of the children’s novel Inanimate Alice – which can be viewed free online. (She also won the 2009 Governor-General’s Award for her conventional novel The Mistress of Nothing.) “If you are going to put a work of fiction on a computer, why would you not use the multimedia components a computer has to offer you – image and sound and interactive games?”

    Montreal electronic writer J.R. Carpenter, creator of CityFish, agrees: “I have been using the Internet as a medium since 1993. …There is fantastic multimedia, non-linear storytelling that has been going on since the beginning of the Web, and e-book publishers are not interested in that.” She says that a work such as CityFish, which explores odd corners of New York through the eyes of a displaced teen, is another way of reflecting the imagination, adding the visual images and sounds that are associated with places in the author’s mind.

    These multimedia experiments often use short texts because readers seem unlikely to tolerate long passages of type in a video or interactive environment. “Maybe the chunk is not the chapter; maybe the chunk is the paragraph, and one paragraph can lead to more, different paragraphs,” says Caitlin Fisher, Canada Research Chair in digital culture at York University, who used that approach in her 2001 multimedia novella These Waves of Girls. “People have been figuring out how to get their message onto a single screen. It makes some writing better and some writing worse.”...

    Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

    Public finds less value in entertainment industry, unhappy about paying: survey - Silicon Valley / San Jose Business Journal

    "...In addition, the survey showed that the spread of consumers' time across multiple devices has increased. Fifty-nine percent of people in the U.K. and 53 percent in the U.S. spent more time on their laptops in the last year, and 49 percent of people in the U.K. and 52 percent in the U.S. spent more time on their mobile phones.

    More than half, or 52 percent, of all respondents would like to use a computer to access further entertainment content, and 30 percent would like to be able to access that content on their mobile phones. Among age categories, 43 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds in the U.S. would want access on a mobile phone, compared with 30 percent of 30- to 44-year-olds and 20 percent of 45- to 54-year-olds. Overall, the youth market, above all other age groups, wants more access to content across multiple platforms.

    "This may be due in part to the increased partnership between high quality entertainment output from other channels moving into the online space, but it may also reflect that users are now watching television while also surfing the web and using social networks on their smartphones," said Jon Hargreaves, managing director of Technology for Edelman Europe. "For the entertainment industry, if the Internet can add real value to offline content, we believe consumers would be willing to pay for it."

    However, most consumers are unhappy with the industry’s move from free to paid entertainment services, with 84 percent of U.K. and 88 percent of U.S. consumers saying they feel negative about the development.

    Payment required for previously free services are being met with feelings of frustration and distrust by users, the survey found. Some cite the lack of improvement in quality of service, while others state they suspect a profit motive driven by greed. Trust in the entertainment industry has fallen by 9 percent in the U.K. and 11 percent in the U.S...."

    Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales

    Which medium is right for the message? #Transmedia Teasing for Comic-Con

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    By Alan Sepinwall WEDNESDAY, JUL 20, 2011 1:05 PM

    "Comic-Con starts tomorrow, and before I head out to San Diego, I had a few idle (and unsurprisingly nerdy) thoughts on a subject that feels particularly germane, given the blending of comics, movies, TV, etc. at what was once primarily a convention about comic books:

    What happens when characters from one medium cross over into another?

    One of my favorite comic book series of the last decade is Greg Rucka's espionage series "Queen & Country," centered on the life of Tara Chace, a tall, cool blond "minder" for the British government, who's one of the best killers in the world.(*) Each arc is drawn by a different artist, automatically giving it a different one even as characters like Tara, boss Paul Crocker and others continue to appear and, in some cases, evolve. It works wonderfully as a thriller, as a character piece and also as a bit of geo-political commentary. Rucka's so plugged into this world that he had a Taliban story in the works months before 9/11 (it had the eerie timing to come out right after), and a later story opened with a terror attack on the London Underground that was eerily similar to the actual attack that happened nearly a year later in the real world.

    (*) And to pre-empt the two inevitable questions: Yes, I am aware that Rucka based the series in part on the '70s British TV series "The Sandbaggers," and no, I have never actually seen an episode of "The Sandbaggers."

    I bring this up because it's a great series that more people should be reading, but also because in addition to the "Queen & Country" comic book, Rucka has also written three different prose novels in the series: "A Gentlemen's Game" (that's the one with the London terror attack), "Private Wars" and "The Last Run." Rucka got his start as a crime novelist (his Atticus Kodiak series is still ongoing, though it's evolved pretty dramatically over the years) and so he's an old hand at the format. And the "Queen & Country" novels are interesting for two reasons:

    1)To see how differently the same writer, working with the same characters and universe, can tell a story so differently depending on the medium;

    and

    2)Because Rucka didn't treat the books as inessential, or non-canon, or however the various "Star Trek" and "Star Wars" tie-in books are usually treated. These books are not only part of the ongoing story of Tara Chace, but major events in her life and the ongoing life of the series take place within those pages...."

    Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales