Momentshowing

How to search for Creative Commons media

Lately I've been running up against the issue of finding good Creative Commons licensed media to use in my own projects: music, photos, video. While the concept of CC media is great, the practice is still evolving. Creative Commons is simply a license you can out on your own published work that makes clear how other people can use it without asking your permission. This is the way we build a reasonable sharing culture. Mike and Jon are the heroes over at CC.

We just launched a new search tool at SpinXpress that lets us search for CC-licensed media to use in our own work. Check it out.

So let's say you want to find some video of a nuclear explosion that you can cut up to use in your video. You want the choice of using it commercially. Just choose the fields...and you get back permalinks and descriptions of each piece of available media. You can also see Previews right in the page.

You can even get a specific URL to a search for sharing. Here's an example. I know Rudy and Casey have been using it to find CC-licensed photos in Flickr to use in their work.

Music is still a challenge to find by keywords, but it's a challenge we got to take on if we want to get off the "illegal use of copyright" train.

Anti: the best

Schlomo brought up a memory.

Communication. That’s what he was doing. If you go through his archives, you will see him around his house (smoking weed), on the job (smoking weed), and driving around town (smoking weed). Collectively though, you also learn about his estranged relationship with his father (divorced; unaccepting of Anti’s lifestyle) and the sorts of friends Anti has. Really great stuff. Really Human Stuff.

If you weren't around for Anti's daily videos, check out his adandoned blog with broken links.
You got to remember that there was no Youtube back in 2005.
We were just figuring out how to be ourselves online. 
Here's a rare video that still exists:

As I said back in May of that year...

"His videos are often times 10 minutes long.
You are just sitting with him.
He knows you're there and talks to you.
It has absolutely no "value".
There is no "point".
And his work is.... "priceless".

VIDEO: Okay, now the bridge

Download The Video

In this video, Ryanne and I announce the new videoblog:
Swajana.com

All videos are done by Ajay, Nive, Prasad, and Hitesh. Check out the videos they made of themselves.
It's a collaboration between us (+Markus+Verdi) and this Indian team whom we met on our recent trip to India. Our friend, Freeman, who lives there, is the real mastermind behind the project.

The whole idea was to help these guys regularly post videos about their lives.
We've helped with the annoying things that a good videoblog needs:

• tweaking the blog so it looks good
• setting up a production schedule
• showing how to get clear compression.

We use a wiki, email list, and SpinXpress for the collaboration.

This is all part of our effort to help get stories told by people outside the Western world.
We were inspired after Verdi and I helped Steve Wyshywaniuk and Brian Conley get Aliveinbaghdad smoking earlier this fall. We helped them raise some money, built their new blog(Vlogsplosion!), edit, and helped set up a production cycle.
AIB went on to win a bunch of Vloggies in November.

I realized that the whole key was the personal connection that Brian had made with a couple guys in Baghdad when he visited Iraq last year. For lots of reasons, the Iraqis just didnt have it in them to make their own videoblog. So he had the brilliant idea to make a videoblog for them. The Iraqis just focus on recording video...the Americans take care of the rest.

So I encourage others to do the same thing. If you know someone who lives in a country that we hear little of, just help them. We are documenting some of our work here. Many times, people just need to know that someone cares and will watch.

Ultimately, people in developing countries won't need us to do anything for them.
But for now, the audience for these videos will not be the Iraqis or the Indians, but us (westerners).
If we want to see life out of these countries, my experience shows that we got to help build the bridge.

So subscribe to the Swajana feed. A new video about life in India every Monday.
If you'd like to see a specific story, add it here.

How to Bit Torrent can make video scale online

It's now officially Josh Kinberg month here on Momentshowing.
JD Lasica interviewed Josh recently about his ideas on web video.
watch here

There seems to be different camps forming around online video.
Some people like the Flash video that you can easily watch on the page.
But you must also skip around page to page to watch it.
The other school of thought is pushing the meme of delivering video in RSS feeds...allowing tools to help manage this media locally and sync it to devices.
But some people hate having download the video to watch it.

In a year, as more people are educated, we will hit a sweet spot where people realize that each is good for different purposes. Flash video is good for adding stuff to MySpace-like profiles or web pages so people can pop in and watch. Video in RSS is good when you really want to distribute far and wide. Whe you can watch web video on TV, you'l need to download the large files locally. Think an open-TIVO system.

It's my sneaking belief that as more and more people start watching video online...even the biggest servers will have problems keeping up. Soon, even the silliest goof will have a thousand viewers because hundreds of millions of people are online. The most popular content will have TV network audiences of millions.

How do we handle this?
Big media companies will have little problem throwing money at the problem.
But how do make sure the individual person, the independent creator, can stay in the game?
Distribute the load.
Bit torrent is a proven method for trading files between many computers.
People must become accustomed to downloading media when they aren't using their computers...and "seeding" it for other people. Communities will form around video they like and support...since not all creators can afford the absurd bandwidth bills of hosting media themselves for huge audiences that they deserve.

But aren't torrents complicated?
If you use aggregators to subscribe to torrent feeds, it's all invisible.
Just subscribe, download, play.
Since we now have "always on" broadband connections...it's all good.

But torrent technology has a huge PR problem...the stigma of piracy.
It's all perception though.
Nothing in the technology says you have to trade copyrighted material. Hollywood has just created the situation where "stealing" is the option if you want to watch something.
(Think "war on drugs". Don't provide logical alternatives and criminalize the user.)

Digital Bicycle is a site that lets Community TV producers trade entire programs through torrents.
You make a show, upload a torrent, and then anyone can download it and air it on their local Public Access station. It's all in the use case.

Anyway...lots of educating needs to happen. Different scenarios must play themselves out this year. Tools need to be created and evolved. Realities will push us to change. Fun stuff.
Video online is happening fast.

Josh Leo is cool

The big craze currently are the content companies rushing to put their TV shows on the web.
iTunes, Yahoo Music Engine, MTV, CBS....they all are creating ways for you to pay to download the shows you can already watch on TV.
This is an obvious sell.
You like it on TV, then you'll like it on the web.
This doesn't change much of anything except a company's revenue AND their ability to survive these fast-moving times. It's a smart move.
If I want to watch the 152nd episode of Seinfeld right now, I should be able to...and I'll pay a buck or two for this convenience. Though if they don't offer the service, people just find what they want elsewhere. (DON'T MAKE PEOPLE PIRATES!!! TAKE THEIR MONEY DUMMIES!!!)

Enter videoblogging. Almost 2 years old and growing.
Josh Leo was recently on Michigan public radio to discuss his work.
HERE is a link to the 4 minute story.
Josh is so clear in his intent and vision for putting his videos on the web.
"This is my life and I want to share it with you".
(this is my life)

The reporter does a good job putting videoblogging in perspective. She captures the passion Josh has for creating his own media...and the passion people have for watching it.
More of us are craving feeling, some unmediated communication, and the power that comes when you know that what you see is not illusion or manipulated.
It's funny when we get so cynical that we make fun of personal videoblogging as being "naive".

I like TV because it lets me turn off my brain. It takes me away.
When I was 12, my folks gave me their old 12" black and white TV for my room.
I was in heaven. I was a TV baby.
I got into Videoblogging because I was going nuts with the rift between what I saw on TV and what I experienced and knew to be true in the real world. I can only be numb for so long. Since traditional media wasn't offering a bigger buffet table, we started cooking our own meals.

Videoblogging as practiced by Josh Leo is the revolution.
His videos will never rival the audience of CSI...though there is nothing technically that would stop him from having an audience that big. But when there are a million Josh Leo's around the globe with their small audiences....then you have something.

It's not about the eyeballs they attact or CPM's...it's about the ideas that will flow across the globe through direct video publishing and distribution.
It's the effect and influence. Pull your head out.

Just as text blogs have changed the way newspapers/cable news report on issues by becoming fact-checkers and offering competing conversations...videoblogs will follow a similar path.
But whereas text is dependent that you can read the language, video can cross many more of the invisible cultural and geographic boundaries because you can SEE what is happening.
And unlike TV, a huge global archive of video is already being created that will keep our great-great-grand kids closer to understanding what we were like.

Anyway, there will be videoblogs that aim to rival TV entertainment and make money doing it.
There are text blogs that make a lot of money.
Anyone can now make an extremely popular "show" and distribute it globally. The sustainable business model is still being sought. Good news.

But you can also just pick up a camera and say something...and see if anyone feels the same way.
The army of ants has arrived.

Why do we need videoblog directories?

At FireAnt, we're about to release our new videoblog directory.
It's hooks right into the app, making it easy to find feeds and subscribe.
It's an open directory as well. It works well.

On the Videoblogging list, we've been discussing why text blogs don't have directories.
The answer: they have great search engines that search blog posts...like technorati. Peter from mefeedia had some good reasons why videoblogs NEED directories:

First, with video, you need a lot more info to decide where to put
your attention than with text, because video demands more attention
(you can't just quickly scan it like a text post, for example). So for
video, you need more filters, metadata, information that helps you
decide what to put your limited attention towards. It's an attention
war. Hence, directories can be useful.

Second: we as vloggers, for some reason, aren't really linking a lot
to each other's videos. I'm not sure why that is. But it does mean
that we have less interlinking than textbloggers to help people
discover new stuff. Hence, a directory makes sense, again.

Third: search for video is an unsolved problem, and will continue to
be, especially for our type of long tail video. Hence, .. you get the
picture :)

I think its true that people dont link to videoblogs like text blogs.
here's why: when i link to a text blog, I include it into my words...making it my own.
But with video, we have not come up with a good way to quote video...and link to a specific part of a video.

Blogger, Typepad, and the other big boys don't even acknowledge videoblogs yet on their site. So we have a long way to go before we get the tools to easily remix each others videos...unless we build the tools ourselves.

Node101 NYC is now open

Ryan and I are officially opening Node101 this saturday in Manhattan.
Anyone can come down on saturdays or sunday from 2-5 pm.
You can learn how to videoblog, troubleshooting your videolbog, help us teach, or just hang out.
Bring your laptop and camera...or we'll have a couple extra for you to use.
WiFi all around.
Please see our Node101 blog for more details.

Node101 is a concept that developed out of our realization that meeting face to face is important.
The vision is to have different nodes throughout the world.
Over the next several months, we'll be creating a "teacher's kit" and other resources so anyone could start a node. Though our nodes are run by volunteers out of cheap spaces, we believe each node should have a reliable, published schedule of classes. Sustainability is the key.

Node101 will teach how to videoblog...but also provide a place where people can talk about the world and why they want to start making media in the first place. Especially here in the US, there are so few places public meeting spaces.

There are already nodes in San Antonio and Ojai.
Yehaw.

A Vision for you

Here's a video by The Random Show showing the coolness of the VlogMap.
You can fly around the earth and visit all these different videobloggers.
As of August 2005, there is still a strong sense of community.
Just look at the chaotic network we are creating.
People around the world, offering an unmediated window into their lives.

Here are the intsructions on how to do it.

This is why I love videoblogging.

With all the talk of money and making millions and Internet TV and getting famous through videoblogging, Michael Verdi eloquently explains why I got into videoblogging in the first place.
Though money is necessary and wonderful, Michael explains what's richer.

Get FireANT

In my spare time, I am helping create a free media aggregator called FireANT.

Our team is made up of Daniel Salber, Erik Radmall, Josh Kinberg and myself.
We work on weekends and late into the night making it happen.
These guys are powerhouses who truly believe in what we're all doing.
We recently made this awesome screencast (edited by Ryan Hodson) to help explain how the PC version works.

FireANT is the first software application that comes complete RSS subscription, Video Search, built-in BitTorrent, and the ability to sync media onto the iPod and Sony PSP.

The PC version is a beautiful monster.
The idea is to make an open platform that plays anything you can put into an RSS feed.
Read text posts.
Watch videos and flash movies.
Listen to audio.

You can grab feeds from our ever-growing Directory of feeds.
You can use the Yahoo Video Search to make feeds out of any search term you enter.

You can browse through feeds and download what you want.
You can also choose to download everything from all your feeds...and watch the videos like a TV channel in wide screen mode.

We want you to tell the creators what you think of their work...so click the Comment button to leave them a note.
We will soon have "email this" and "blog this" so you can let people know what youre finding.

We will also have Tagging enabled so you can tags videos.
All tags will be made into feeds automatically.
Taggers will become the filters of the videoblogging and podcasting world.
Sense will be amde of all the media we are now creating.

We need your feedback...so download it and give it a whirl.
We want you to go crazy with it. (It's exteremly addictive)
We hope to help people connect to each other and actual participate in their own lives by seeing media made by non-traditonal sources and realizing we can make our own video/audio that the whole world can see and hear.
Video distribution is now democratized.
It's now up to us to make it happen.
Learn to Videoblog here: Freevlog.org.