Bill Cammack

I have literally *NOT* had a chance to update my production blog on “The Lab” since my last entry, which was about ten days ago. There just haven’t been enough hours in each day in the last two weeks.

I rushed production on “American Pimp” because I had to get it done before going to BlogHer Business ’07 with Rox from BeachWalks.TV. I shot video @ BlogHerBiz that I STILL haven’t finished uploading. That was on a Thursday and Friday. That Sunday, I went to Central Park with Mike, Eric & Sandra… more video from that… Then I spent the rest of the week preparing flickr pictures, editing and uploading videos and working on my next episode of “The Lab” that I had wanted to finish by that Friday.

So I had decided that in honor of my new BlogHer friends, I’d do this weeks show based on “The Witches of Eastwick”….. Only to watch the whole movie then realize there wasn’t enough material for me to comment on in an entertaining fashion. So I had to switch gears and select another movie, which was “Clerks”, which ended up having way more material than I needed.

So I watched the movie and selected the clips I THOUGHT I was going to use. I then started writing my dialogue based on getting from clip to clip. What I SHOULD have done was time the clips from the beginning when I selected them. I like to aim around 3-4 minutes for an episode, so including intro and credits, that should place me around 1:30 worth of clips, leaving the rest of the time for dialogue. AFTER I got the clips together, and AFTER I wrote my initial run at the dialogue, I found out that I had probably 5 minutes worth of clips, so I needed to get rid of most of them and find a new ‘out’.

I needed a new ‘out’ because the old one was a joke based on the fact that Dante’s ex-girlfriend was getting married. In trimming the clips, I cut out all the references to Caitlin getting married. In fact, I cut out all references to Caitlin altogether. There was literally no time in the timeline to set up the ‘out’, so the ‘out’ had to go along with everything else. This meant my final dialogue was useless, because it set up the ‘out’, and it meant my intro dialogue was useless, because it set up things that I wasn’t going to talk about.

continued…

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PBS’ “Frontline” is doing a series called “News War: What’s Happening to the News”. Part 3 aired last night @ 9pm, but you can watch it online.

Segment 19 in part 3 is of particular interest to those of us involved in videoblogging, which is, on the simplest level, putting videos on a blog. These videos could be personal. They could be something created or acted out. They could be just about anything…. Except they could also be a documentation of something that happened. For some reason, there’s a debate surrounding the importance of this. It seems completely obvious to me that if you document something and post it for people to see….. right now…… ALL around the world…….. that makes your work just as valid, if not MORE SO than someone who has a job called “journalist” and took some courses explaining HOW they’re supposed to report things and WHAT they’re supposed to report. :/

The first part of Segment 19 features an interview with Andrew Baron, creator of Rocketboom, as well as clips featuring Joanne Colan, current Rocketboom anchor and Amanda Congdon, former Rocketboom anchor, subsequently of Amanda Across America, and now ABC News. There’s also a clip of Amanda interviewing Josh Wolf, who’s currently in jail because of “citizen journalism”.

In another segment of the show, they mention that Amanda ‘made the jump’ to ABC News. I think that’s an interesting piece to the puzzle of “us vs them”, with independents on one side and MSM on the other. I suppose that those who are interested in attempting to invalidate “citizen journalism” could argue that ABC simply hired “on-air talent”. They chose HER and not necessarily “her journalism”. Read the rest of this entry »

NATAS + MySpace = 2007 Broadband Emmy Awards

National Television Academy press release

LOS ANGELES – January 8, 2007 – MySpace, the world’s leading lifestyle portal, and the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, presenters of the coveted Emmy® Awards, today announced they have joined forces to honor premium broadband content on the Internet. MySpace will serve as the exclusive online partner of the Broadband Emmy Award submissions, empowering video producers and filmmakers to submit self-generated content for consideration through the official MySpace Emmy profile at http://myspace.com/MyEmmy.

The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences debuted its first Emmy Award for content distributed via broadband and portable delivery last year and honored creators in four categories. This year, The Academy will triple the number, honoring creators in 12 categories in four content areas: Entertainment, Sports, News & Information, and Public & Community Service. In addition, high school students are eligible for the National Television Student Awards for Excellence for broadband-delivered content in all seven student categories. Read entire NTA press release…

Now THIS is going to be interesting. :D

[Full Disclosure: I am a NATAS Emmy Judge as well as an International Emmy Judge]

There are several ongoing debates within the community of people and groups who make videos and post their created content on the Internet. One of them is “what is and what is _not_ a video blog”. There’s another debate about videos posted in “closed” environments vs those posted in ways that make them accessible to whomever happens to be searching the net for video content. A MAJOR debate is what aggregators should and should not be doing with RSS feeds from either content creators or hosting sites.

Yet another daily debate is “what is QUALITY content?” or perhaps “what makes a show popular” or “what makes a show _good_”. The problem, IMO, with making distinctions about what constitutes a popular show is that depending on where you look and how you look at it, shows that get similar amounts of hits can be spun to look like either one is more “successful”. There is no agreed-upon site that can actually track site date consistently and accurately.

This makes sense, because there’s no bottleneck… Meda that goes to the internet goes straight out. It doesn’t have to go through EPs, producers, editors, quality control, legal, studios, stations, channels, local distribution points, cable boxes, televisions. There’s nowhere you can go and say “this show delivered 80,000 units through here and that show delivered 50,000 units, so the first show has more viewership for this period.

On top of that, there are several ways to get data from a site. If someone goes to my web site, they might view a page and then not view the video. They might open the page but not read anything on it at all. They might bypass the main page because they linked to a permalink for one post. They might not hit my site’s pages at all if they subscribe to my videos in RSS. They might not hit the RSS more than once if they are downloading the videos and watching them offline. So… if one site uses page hits to judge popularity and another site uses video downloads, they’re going to see things completely differently, even looking at the exact same site. If you have to have a particular widget installed to count in the rankings, you can forget it entirely as far as accuracy. Anyone who hits the site without being “part of the program” doesn’t count in the stats.

Anyway, I doubt the 2007 Broadband Emmy Awards will have anything to do with page hits and downloads. The Emmys in general are about quality content and quality production values. That’s what makes this contest interesting. MSM (Main Stream Media) is now getting involved in putting clips on the internet in mass quantities. All of a sudden, there are videos on MySpace with laugh-tracks. :/ All of a sudden, a “new” show appears with 30 episodes uploaded on the same day! :/ Reading the eligibility requirements for the MySpace contest, “Repurposed material originally produced for traditional media is not eligible”. That’s good, because cutting three minutes out of a professionally produced, shot and edited piece shouldn’t put you in position to compete with someone that made their video specifically for the internet. That doesn’t mean the internet piece isn’t well done or professionally produced, but it’s apples vs. oranges.

The first category open for submissions is “Entertainment”. It’s open right now, and “News & Documentary” opens on Feb. 26th. They both close on March 26, and finalists will be notified in April.

As usual, make sure you read the fine print in contests or even when you choose a hosting service to upload your videos to. Check out these terms of service in The Rules of the MySpace My Emmy contest:

By entering the Contest, you grant Sponsors a perpetual, fully-paid, irrevocable, non-exclusive license to reproduce, prepare derivative works of, distribute, display, sub-license, exhibit, transmit, broadcast, televise, digitize, otherwise use, and permit others to use and perform throughout the universe the Material (including without limitation, the underlying intellectual property therein to the extent necessary to exploit Material) in any manner, form, or format now or hereinafter created, including, but not limited to, on the Internet, and for any purpose, including, but not limited to, advertising or promotion of Sponsors and their services, all without further consent from or payment to you. The completion, expiration and/or termination of the Contest shall not affect Sponsors’ rights regarding Materials or Sponsors’ other rights hereunder. Sponsors shall have, forever and throughout the universe, the right to use such Material in any manner as determined by Sponsors in their sole discretion, including without limitation, the right to make changes, alterations, cuts, edits, interpolations, deletions and eliminations into and from such Material and the right to package such Material with those rendered by other Entrants in connection with the exploitation of such Material, all without further consent from or payment to you.

That’s fantastic! Look how progressive those terms are! Throughout the universe! :D Wow! They must know something we don’t know about pending space travel. Anyway… here’s the link to the Broadband Rules from MyEmmy.TV. If you’re willing to pay the $400 entry fee, you can skip all the TOS shenanigans and soul-selling.

The MyEmmy.TV page also includes the Judging Procedures & Criteria:

JUDGING PROCEDURES AND CRITERIA:

Content, Creativity and Execution are the primary standards for judging. Each criterion is given equal weight.

Judges will focus on the clarity of presentation of information, as well as the visual impact of the entry. Judges can also give weight to the entrant’s utilization of “broadband” capabilities, (e.g., interactivity, and viewers’ choice of images). Although any entry originally produced for “broadband” transmission is eligible to compete, the more the web’s capabilities are demonstrated in the production, the better the chances may be for winning.

Advocacy and presentation of strong points of view are eligible for award consideration. “Self-published” work by individuals as well as production entities is also eligible for consideration.
All “Broadband” entries/URLs will be viewed at home and judged in one round to determine the nominees and winner. Judging panels will consist of content experts rather than technicians. There will be separate panels for each category, although there may be an overlap with some judges serving on more than one panel. Judges vote via secret ballot using a scale of 10 for the highest and 1 for the lowest rating in each area (Content, Creativity, and Execution), for a total of 30 possible points.

OK… So I see what’s going on now. :) Myspace is holding a contest in which the winners will be sponsored to the official Emmy competition. There are going to be two levels of judging. You can skip one level altogether by paying the entry fee and going straight to http://www.myemmy.tv/ . If my understanding after skimming the official entry rules is correct, as long as you made your content specifically for the internet, any level of professional involvement, time or money spent on the project is fine.

I’ll be interested to see what MySpace promotes to entrance in the actual Broadband Emmy Awards. Let’s see if any of the “mom & pop” user-generated content gets the nod over studio-produced work. I’ll refrain from mentioning any shows that I think could compete favorably… VERY favorably in the competition, just in case my region is involved in the judging and asks me to participate.

Either way, I think both the MySpace contest and the official Broadband Emmy Awards are fantastic ways for content creators to gain exposure and/or accolades. It’s definitely worth considering entering… whether it’s a video that was already done (since March 2nd, 2006) or one that you’re planning up until April 2007.

Bill Cammack • New York City • Freelance Video Editor • alum.mit.edu/www/billcammack