BBC News - YouTube in two-day live video-streaming test

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YouTube has started to experiment with its own-brand live video-streaming technology.

Over two days the site is planning a trial in which four partners will get the chance to air live programmes.

YouTube has done one-off live events in the past, but the trial marks a test of underlying technology that will be used when the service is launched.

The live programming system is likely to be only open to media partners rather than individual web users.

YouTube partners Howcast, Rocketboom, Next New Networks, and Young Hollywood will take part in the test that runs from 13-14 September.

Rocketboom said it would be showing an hour-long variety show that resembles the programmes seen on TV.

Dan Cryan, head of broadband at Screen Digest, said changing tastes meant YouTube was unlikely to become a broadcaster like existing TV channels.

"For much of traditional TV programming there's a move to consume it on-demand and consumers are increasingly beginning to expect that," he told BBC News.

"There are certain things that work better live, sports being the obvious example, but other forms of event TV work too," he added. YouTube was much more likely to set up a system that could handle such live TV events and deliver an audience to them.

Live streamed video seen on YouTube before now has included President Obama's first State of the Union address, Indian Premier League cricket matches and a U2 concert. Its political channel CitizenTube has also occasionally used live streaming.

However, all these have been isolated incidents and the technology being tested over the two day trial will help its partners stream a continuous service. It is reported to have said that it will not be archiving any live programmes.

The trial is billed as an "alpha" or early test of the technology YouTube is developing to underpin the live programming.

Before now, YouTube relied on other content delivery networks such as Akamai to get live video to viewers.

YouTube has given no official date for when development on its live-streaming technology will be finished or when the service will be offered to all its partners.

By moving into live streaming, YouTube will bump up against a whole series of new rivals including Ustream, Justin.tv and Livestream.

Smart thinking here: Scott Pilgrim a Harbinger: Augmented Reality as Expressionism | Second Tense

Excerpt - read on the whole on:

http://www.secondtense.com/2010/09/scott-pilgrim-harbinger-augmented.html

"A Harbinger of Things To Come

I have many friends and colleagues working with augmented reality and social media and agree that it will continue to grow. But I think we will all be surprised at the scope at just how pervasive it will become. Because Augmented Reality is an extension of expressionism, it's more than just a new technological wonder. In fact, it's not a technological discovery, it's something implicitly embedded in human thinking, that technology has slowly been able to evolve to express in more complex and accessible ways.

Augmented Reality has been here with us forever, actually. Look at the definition of Augmented Reality - it is contextual information laid out on top of the "real" physical world. By this definition, we can look back to the dawn of civilization. Language is the most basic, ancient form of AR, where our words both express and sculpt the word. One might even agree that language makes possible all acts of civilization itself. And through history, all sorts of means of communication have been layered on top of our physical world to add reality.

So now we live in an age where we can manipulate reality by putting the physical world on a screen and adding images, text, sound, and video on top of it. In another 5 years, we'll have Heads Up Display glasses that will do the same thing; first they'll start as important tools for jobs, but like computers in the 90s, they'll spread from our jobs to our common life. Then in 10 years, we'll have contact lenses that do the same thing - in fact, they're already being tested in the earliest stages. Imagine the applications people will write for these! Data for almost anything, customization for how we view the world - I should do a blog post just listing the possibilities, but a few off the top of my head:

- Automatic facial recognition and linking to peoples' social network profiles.

- Scavenger Hunt games based on what you see - like "spot the VW beetle"

- Enhanced target acquisition for soldiers

- Jobs that have complex sets of parts will have them all labeled / highlighted, such as in surgery, auto mechanics, or watch repair.

- Construction supervisors seeing how pieces of building are supposed to be constructed and being able to compare to the actual work.

- Visual E-mail

Speaking of which - why haven't I read or seen any science fiction with this? If anyone knows of any, please post in the comments.

Universal Lands Stephen King’s ‘The Dark Tower’ And Plans Unprecedented Feature/Network TV Adaptation – Deadline.com

EXCLUSIVE: Universal Pictures and NBC Universal Television Entertainment have closed a deal to turn Stephen King’s mammoth novel series The Dark Tower into a feature film trilogy and a network TV series, both of which will be creatively steered by the Oscar-winning team behind A Beautiful Mind and The Da Vinci Code.

Ron Howard has committed to direct the initial feature film, as well as the first season of the TV series that will follow in close proximity. Akiva Goldsman will write the film, and the first season of the TV series. Howard’s Imagine Entertainment partner Brian Grazer will produce, with Goldsman and the author.

When Deadline revealed in April that Howard, Goldman and Grazer planned to team with King, Universal was battling Warner Bros—home of Goldsman’s Weed Road--for the property. The multi-platform deal was so comprehensive, it took months to close. It will be announced later today by Universal Pictures chairman Adam Fogelson, co-chairman Donna Langley, NBC Universal Television Entertainment chairman Jeff Gaspin, and NBC & Universal Media Studios Primetime Entertainment president Angela Bromstad, all of whom pulled it together.

I spoke with Goldsman and Howard, who have polled enough of their peers to be convinced what they are doing here has never been attempted: using a major studio’s film and TV platforms simultaneously to tell a story. It is reminiscent of when Peter Jackson directed three installments of The Lord of The Rings, back to back, so that they could be released in three consecutive years.

“What Peter did was a feat, cinematic history,” Howard told me. “The approach we’re taking also stands on its own, but it’s driven by the material. I love both, and like what’s going on in TV. With this story, if you dedicated to one medium or another, there’s the horrible risk of cheating material. The scope and scale call for a big screen budget. But if you committed only to films, you’d deny the audience the intimacy and nuance of some of these characters and a lot of cool twists and turns that make for jaw-dropping, compelling television. We’ve put some real time and deep thought into this, and a lot of conversations and analysis from a business standpoint, to get people to believe in this and take this leap with us. I hope audiences respond to it in a way that compels us to keep going after the first year or two of work. It’s fresh territory for me, as a filmmaker.”

Considered King’s answer to JRR Tolkien’s Middle Earth trilogy, The Dark Tower revolves around Roland Deschain, the last living member of a knightly order of gunslingers, and humanity’s last hope to save a civilization that will crumble unless he finds the Dark Tower. Howard and Goldsman describe the world as “an alternate Americana, one part post-apocalyptic, one part Sergio Leone.”

Goldsman first mentioned The Dark Tower to Howard and Grazer while they worked on A Beautiful Mind nearly a decade ago.

“Akiva said, ‘Stephen will not let go of it, but it’s like nothing else you’ve ever read,’” Howard recalled. “It was frustrating because it’s one of those works where you read it, and then at odd times, the imagery and sensations just pop up in your mind. This is going to be an amazing life experience for us, trying to do justice to the story and the universe.”

King granted an option—for $19, a number relevant to the plotline--to JJ Abrams and his Lost partners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse. They never cracked the sprawling plotline and all the characters. Goldsman pounced when the rights were available, but saw the same problems until Howard suggested using film and TV platforms. Though Howard famously grew up on a TV screen on The Andy Griffith Show, he hasn’t directed TV since the early 80s, but is eager to return. It seems hard to fathom he'd direct a full season's worth of episodes, but that is the early plan, and who says they have to do 22 to create that bridge to the next film?  

The plan is to start with the feature film, and then create a bridge to the second feature with a season of TV episodes. That means the feature cast—and the big star who’ll play Deschain—also has to appear in the TV series before returning to the second film. After that sequel is done, the TV series picks up again, this time focusing on Deschain as a young gunslinger. Those storylines will be informed by a prequel comic book series that King was heavily involved in plotting. The third film would pick up the mature Deshain as he completes his journey. They will benefit from being able to use the same sets cast and crew for the movie and TV, which could help contain costs on what will be a financially ambitious undertaking.

"We will certainly be looking to maximize both creative and fiscal opportunities by creating one enterprise that encompasses TV and movies," Goldsman said. "Some of the shooting will likely encompass both platforms, and that has never been done before. It's thrilling, we feel like kids in a candy story."

Goldsman is writing, and Howard said he and Grazer have cleared the decks to do this quickly. “I’m finishing The Dilemma, and then I don’t have anything scheduled and I plan to work hard on this with Akiva and Brian,” Howard told me. “We will refine our take on the feature and TV shows. We have a clear view of what we want to do, and we’re lucky to have a company with the nerve to back us up on this venture.”

Howard, Grazer and Goldsman will exec produce the TV series for Universal Media Studios. Kerry Foster will exec produce the first film for Weed Road, along with Imagine's Todd Hallowell and Erica Huggins.

Dexter Creates Elaborate ARG to Keep Viewer Interest Between Seasons

dexterShowtime Digital Media has created a way to keep fans of its hit serial killer drama Dexter entertained in the off-season: By introducing another serial killer - one that might not be as benevolent - in an elaborate alternate reality game (ARG).

The point is to uncover the identity of the so-called "Infinity Killer," a serial murderer with a name reminiscent of John Lithgow's Emmy-winning turn as Season Four's Trinity Killer.

The game was unveiled during a street marketing effort at San Diego Comic-Con in July, where attendees were drawn to a faux crime scene, according to Marcelo Guerra, Showtime's VP of digital marketing. Guerra said the crime scene "served as what they call the 'rabbit hole.'" In it, someone had recently been killed.

Showtime used SCVNGR, a game platform with a location-based element, to draw attention at Comic-Con. "As a digital marketer, I'm interested in finding new ways [to provide] compelling experiences as audiences become savvier and savvier," Guerra said.

Once drawn in, fans could interact with the ARG on two main sites with fictional characters and content - Sleep Superbly and Serial Huntress. With the help of Boston-based agency Modernista!, Showtime extended the experience to a variety of other online platforms. For instance, the game has included ads on Craigslist, a classified ad in the Philadelphia Daily News, and a lost jacket in New York. At one point, a watch with a clue on it was listed on eBay and participants had to bid for access the clue. (Showtime did not charge the winner, but the watch was mailed to the winning player.) YouTube and Twitter were also employed.

A marketing campaign of this scope requires a great deal of content, which Guerra says resulted from collaboration among Showtime's marketing department, the show's writers, and Modernista.

"A couple of the writers have really been into this new kind of storytelling and they've been really helpful and supportive along the way," he said.

Dexter fans have so far discovered a connection between the Infinity Killer, the faux crime scene at Comic-Con, and the two fictional websites. Showtime promises an exciting conclusion in the next few weeks, or about a week before Season Five premieres on September 26.

"It takes a lot of time and effort [to create]," Guerra says. "But it's a rewarding experience. And I think as a result, we're going to give fans the kind of experience that will keep them talking about the series and deepen their connection with the brand."

Showtime declined to disclose the number of players who have engaged with the ARG. Guerra describes it as a success, in part thanks to support from alternate reality websites like unfiction.com and ARGNet.com, which verified it as genuine and pulled in alternate reality fans who had not necessarily watched Dexter before.

This is not the first elaborate Dexter marketing campaign from Showtime. Previously, the network dyed fountains red in various cities prior to a season premiere.

Showtime is a wholly owned subsidiary of CBS Corporation.

Piece adds new elements to definition - don't agree with all myself: California Chronicle | TRANSMEDIA: Starring role

Transmedia is about more than just running content across multiple platforms; it involves engaging an audience in a story wherever they happen to be coming to it from

With half a million game downloads attracting 4,000 dedicated players in 165 countries and widespread media attention, Conspiracy For Good far exceeded the targets of its sponsor Nokia. Devised to introduce Nokia's service platform Ovi, it's an audience participatory entertainment unfolding online across interactive theatre, live event and mobile app.

"With the explosion of social media, the way brands interact with an audience has increased in vitality," says Tero Ojanpera, Nokia's executive VP of services and mobile solutions. "Conspiracy For Good is a unique attempt to enhance a story with technology. While the direction in terms of engaging people through interactivity is clear, exploration of this format is very new."

Much of the media hoopla surrounded the project's use of 'transmedia', a technique hailed in some quarters as a game-changer for the way people interact with stories and brands. Yet it's more evolutionary than the hype suggests, having been around for a decade in various guises.

Indeed, the writer of Conspiracy For Good, Heroes creator Tim Kring, says transmedia is a "fancy word for a simple concept: telling stories across multiple platforms". Ojanpera admits transmedia wasn't in Nokia's vocabulary when it conceived the project over two years ago.

Recognising transmedia

The term was first floated in the early-1990s to represent the idea that narrative can flow from one media platform to the next. It was resurrected in 2006 by MIT professor Henry Jenkins, whose work Convergence Culture lent the movement a conceptual template appropriated by everyone working in the field since.

One of those was Jeff Gomez, co-founder of New York's Starlight Runner Entertainment, who lobbied the Producers Guild of America (PGA) to sanction an official production credit. "In Hollywood, everything is in the credit," he says. "I became frustrated that what I was doing was being confused with game design or cross platform. Transmedia isn't about porting the same content across multiple media, but doing so in such a way that each platform contributes a new and unique aspect to the story." He got his wish in April this year when Transmedia Producer was ratified by the PGA as 'the person responsible for shepherding narrative content across at least three different media platforms'.

The term has since become a marketing buzzword, although its definition remains elusive. "Some people think of transmedia storytelling as a giant jigsaw, where the pieces exist on different platforms," says Simon Meek, producer at Tern TV, which produced transmedia-style project The Beauty of Maps. "As the user consumes these isolated chunks, they combine to create a bigger story."

Transmedia shares many characteristics with projects previously known as cross-platform. Channel 4 Education commissioned careers advice project The Insiders in 2008, which featured content entry points across multiple destinations, combining social media, bespoke sites, iTunes and on-air trails and even outdoors. James Kirkham, MD of Holler, which produced the project with TwentyTwenty Television, says, "We called it a cross-media platform then, but now a similarly exploded narrative would be classed transmedia."

While cross-platform indicates a product is spread across platforms, it doesn't convey the necessity to tell a narrative in the way that transmedia is understood to. Matt Locke, Channel 4's acting head of cross-platform, says, "Story worlds have been extended onto different platforms way back to Star Wars, when it was mostly seen as marketing and merchandise. Now the web allows the audience to immediately give their thoughts to the writers and producers so that they're a participant in the story's creation. Transmedia isn't about platforms but a decision by the creative team that bakes engagement into the project's structure at inception."

Gomez agrees. "Transmedia invites a mass audience to express themselves directly to the storyteller, who's obliged to respond. That dialogue is unique in mass media."

Lost is a prime example of a linear TV programme created with a complementary online narrative that feeds characters and subplots back into the show. Similar examples include Heroes, Misfits, Skins and upcoming web drama Hollyoaks Freshers, described by Channel 4 cross-platform commissioner of entertainment, drama and comedy Jody Smith as "a classic transmedia commission".

"We're putting characters onto Facebook so you can keep up to date between episodes via video blogs and status reports," she says. "Transmedia gives the story depth and keeps it alive long after the basic TV content has aired."

Exponents suggest audiences can access transmedia stories via any of the platforms on which it's carried, yet TV remains the primary medium. Perhaps this is because in Jenkins' theory few consumers will be able to dedicate the time required to get the whole picture.

"We don't want to turn any project into a wild goose chase and force people to consume everything," says Smith. "We don't want major plot points online or in live events where only a few thousand will see them."

Brand involvement

It's no coincidence that transmedia's best examples are from TV (Heroes), cinema (Head Trauma) and gaming (Electronic Arts' Dead Space), where the brand is itself the story. But that doesn't preclude brands getting involved as part of the story - series one of Misfits featured Nokia sponsorship, with producer Clerkenwell Films creating a mobile app that linked the drama to a Nokia- sponsored event - or devising its own narrative.

"Whereas branded entertainment or product placement drive awareness by tacking the brand onto something else, transmedia builds brand mythology," stresses Gomez. The attraction of transmedia to brands is that it encourages participation and the extension of the brand's narrative by its target audience. At the same time, this poses a risk since the narrative is then hard to control.

Gomez even points to the Iranian unrest last June as an example of transmedia erupting online then going global via social networks and transcending any one individual or group control. "This exhibited a vitally important aspect of transmedia in that there was no central person or brand behind this spontaneous outburst," he says. "This is transmedia taken to its logical conclusion."

Jenkins describes this as 'collective intelligence', where a community carries much more than any individual within it. So a vital aspect for brands building transmedia campaigns is to incorporate social benefit as a motivation to participate. Nokia achieved this in Conspiracy For Good, working with charities to equip five libraries in Africa.

"We advise that the brand message needs to have an aspirational core," says Gomez. "Content will have a certain invulnerability to negative feedback if its themes are seen to mean well or contribute something."

According to Kirkham, brands have an opportunity to shift from simple intrusive display advertising towards genuinely compelling experiences. "The smarter brands will be able to immerse themselves in a transmedia project and in turn attract and immerse the audience in their brand ethos, above all making people feel something."

Cross-over medium

The multiplicity of devices and near-instantaneous broadband connections have helped evolve cross-platform projects into transmedia ones. But smartphone growth has arguably been the biggest catalyst for its take-off.

"Mobile often provides the glue for many campaign elements," says Tom Thorne, MD of multi-channel agency Candyspace Media. "The crux to getting transmedia right is in the interface between technology and narrative."

It's no coincidence that Nokia has made the biggest impact in this space. "It's a natural fit for technology partners and mobile apps provide a means of getting your product involved in the story," says Ann Wixley, creative director of media agency MEC. "A basic trait of transmedia is to blur reality and fiction, and since you take a mobile with you everywhere, it can be used to weave all manner of real locations, objects or events into the narrative."

Is transmedia truly transformative of the way brands and content producers engage with audiences, or is it just dressing familiar concepts in new clothes? Opinion varies.

Wixley believes it to be "jargon", and even Kring admits it's a "catch-all phrase" for trying to create narrative across multiple platforms, "something born from the necessity of trying to reach people online".

Channel 4's Locke also downplays its influence. "Eventually we'll see persistent story worlds created as a matter of course, rather than producing a TV show which is aired once and forgotten about. What will define its potential is whether it can generate new revenue streams for broadcasters to invest in content."

Having fought for Hollywood recognition of the intellectual property he's creating, Gomez has the most forthright view. "Transmedia development, production and implementation is a paradigm shift," he asserts. "There's a generation of people who are the most self-expressed. They're already moving rapidly and seamlessly from one platform to the next; it's almost instinctual. The problem is that their content isn't doing that right now."

What is transmedia?

* A fusion of real life and fiction

* Tells bespoke parts of the same story on multiple platforms and through live events

* Access to the story can be from any platform at any time

* Needs to have an element of social benefit

* Closes the feedback loop between storyteller/brand and audience

* A community creates and extends the story beyond the control of a single creator

Copyright: Centaur Communications Ltd. and licensors

(c) 2010 New Media Age. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.

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App Watch: September 11 Memorial Museum Looks at 9/11 Through Pictures, Stories -

By Jennifer Valentino-DeVries

When we at Digits saw the Explore 9/11 app in the iPhone App Store, we were initially taken aback. There’s a tendency to associate apps with fun, such that apps and 9/11 seem as though they should be diametrically opposed.

Local Projects

Although it’s anything but fun, Explore 9/11 is a fascinating look at how technology is changing the way historians find and share information. The app is offered by the National September 11 Memorial and Museum — and even before the museum is complete, it provides a look at history through the eyes of people touched by the event.

“We understand it takes thousands of people to make history, and we are building a museum that acknowledges that,” said Jake Barton, founder of the media design firm Local Projects, which made the iPhone app and is a lead exhibition designer for the museum. “This is one thing that digital technology does exceptionally well, and it’s literally something you could not have approached 20 years ago, 50 years ago.”

The app, which is free, was released Aug. 26 and has been downloaded 100,000 times, Barton said.

Explore 9/11 includes a walking tour that takes people to seven locations around the World Trade Center site; each stop is accompanied by images, text and audio of interviews with eyewitnesses. There is also an interactive timeline of important 9/11 events.

But perhaps most interesting is the section that allows users to search for photos submitted to the museum’s Make History website. Users can see images that have been tagged with certain keywords or associated with various locations, from Downtown Manhattan to sites around the world that held memorials. The photos include those from tourists who visited the Trade Center years before the collapse, as well as those from anniversaries years after the Sept. 11 attacks.

On the newest version of the iPhone, users can even see photos in an “augmented reality” mode, in which images are overlaid on the camera view.

Barton said the museum encourages people to upload images and stories to the website of anything that has to do with the World Trade Center or Sept. 11 and its aftermath. “We’re looking for any and all materials,” he said. The images go into a database that is then accessible on the website and via the app.

Not everyone will be comfortable viewing the images on the site or in the app, but Barton said it’s important for the museum to solicit all it can in its efforts to record history. The site alerts users when they might be viewing content that has not yet been reviewed by the museum, and it encourages people to flag inappropriate stories and images. “It’s sensitive,” he said, “but we also want to have a message that the museum is an open space.”

Previously on App Watch.

Pretty Damn Cool: Tour Wrist turns iPhones & iPads into Portals - grazie @Mike Monello !

Description:

"With Tour Wrist®, iPhones and iPads become portals. So when you point your device up, you'll truly appreciate a property's grand staircase. Turning around gives you the full stadium seating experience. And looking down will reveal just how much leg space a vehicle has to offer. Plus, even if you don't have an iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, or iPad, you can still view "tours" through our intuitive, touch-based controls. Check out travel destinations one minute, hotels and restaurants the next, or even look inside new homes. With powerful search, sort, and sharing tools, Tour Wrist® gives you the power to travel, remotely."