The emerging language of bespoke news and programming

Huddled over a small screen, a bagel in one hand, a young boy is furiously tapping away at his mobile, whilst across the opposite seat a business man tututs.

[ 1, 2, 3, 4] He's been staring at his screen for the length of the 40 minute train journey, intermittently indexing the screen which appears to activate a new sound stream.

Truthfully, the two could have continued ad infinitum.

This is the era of bespoke news.

Packets of news, with no beginning, middle or end, just information whose content and direction you're in charge of.

Bespoke news?

An anathema in itself, as the very idea of news at the moment, designed top downwards is seen as bespoke.

But this is different, thick with content and stylised like an Ozwald Boateng suit. It's 2014.

You can also read this article on viewmagazine.tv


***SUITS YOU***

[ 1, 2, 3, 4] Ozwald Boateng is the dashing daring young buck who dared take on an establishment in Britain.

Savoy Row, as refined as royalty and the essence of Britishness, Ozwald would launch a concept to challenge the status quo: bespoke haute couture.

In his plush offices just off Savoy road, he is recounting his life story to Al Jazeera's Riz Khan for a special One on One.

Riz Khan boldy entertained an idea for me to shoot in between the programme takes providing at times some rivetting and loosely structured converation between the two, where in some cases Ozwald is inadvertently interviewing Riz

It's the first time I'm hearing Ozwald's journey despite knowing him for near twenty years, but it symbolic for what he has achieved, in concert with a new mood for change in design.

Ozwald's brash colours and clean line cuts rejuvenated and industry few believed was broke.

Today, news, another bastion is having a pasting from all sides; an onslaught from DIYers and more poignantly a stylistic collective of journalists inhabiting a new news econiche, multimedia.


***BESPOKE***

[ 1, 2, 3, 4] Multimedia is News' bespoke couture~ a language crystallising around the edges of designers and news enthusiasts: old and young raiding the news space for attention.

Honed amongst the labs in MIT, it's come a long way mutating in form and function.

The trend at present is to attempt to cull news info by throwing at it the following variables: text, audio, video, and pics.

Multimedia - the one stop solution, delivering many media.

But through a series of interviews with industry figures, from the national Telegraph to design student it's apparent that it has as much universal form now as an amoeba.

It means different things to many, but an intriguing quality of this emerging format is that is stands to become a language in itself.

Consider this: the central tenant of the news package is the unit of multiple voices within one conversation between the network and its constituents, you.

It asks the question what, where, when how, and why - news' k. app.

It seeks self containment, closure: he said, she said supported by clips.

And it's delivered by an expert.

In the land of multimedia, the package is open ended, a conversation between many.

It posits temporal as well as spatial questions: geographical relations that connect each other.

It eschews containment, introducing nodal points facilitating multiple entry.

The inverted triangle which so governs news disentegrates into a series of smaller triangles each interconnected.

You start the conversation and we'll move it on.

In an era of nuclear media, ones and zeros enveloping into columns of information, it's a wonder why we haven't harnessed a fraction of what we do.


We Kill more than we eat - wasteful

[ 1, 2, 3, 4] Take this: a reporter spends 2/3rd of their time fashioning the elements of a report, discarding sometimes 3/5th of their story.

The journey, interconnectedness of pulling together the story, over space and time are considered almost irrelevant.

The report equally fixes us with a narrative with no room for flexible entries elsewhere along its linear well defined timeline.

What's discarded out of hand any question beyond that of its author of relevance.

Multimedia is twinned with interactivity.

And interactivity says Mark Steven Meadows from a well recieved book on interactivity Pause an Effect is a response to a response.

It is cause-effect- cause: time and journey matter, none of which news in its present form delivers on online.

But it's early days. Leonard Shlein in the Alphabet versus the Goddess makes a convincing argument about right side brain funtions e.g. imagery dominating left brain attributes such as literacy.

We've seen the results with television's inception, but it, TV, has largely remained unchanged since servicing an information starved populace.

The Nets coming of age, multimedia which I'll return to in a follow up has the potential to deliver news and info not as a 360 degree axis, but zero.

It will fold on itself- zero sum

In next article I'll expand on some of these notions, but before then you'll have noticed I have named certain sections of this post as [1.2,3,4].

If I changes the numeric order of this "stanzas" does the text still makes sense.

See proceeding post.

Grrrrrrr Network reporters

What is it about network reporters who get a dose of lyrical diarrhoea when it comes to reporting tragic shooting?

Grrrr!

This recent case, in the US, raises the spectre again of a cruel fixation of news by the insecure versus news' clamour to report.

He the gunman wants to be famous, but he won't be around to experience this warped sense of fame.

That wicked legacy is foisted on the viewers.

Could the media engineer a media boycott, which would send a message to any other disturbed soul contemplating this evil crime?

You'd hope so.

"Ladies and gentlemen we were going to report on this because it's news, but we've changed out focus to look at those who are suffering, rather than the perpetrator of this string of violence looking for publicity."

It'll never happen

What the media boss needs for Christmas

image courtesy of Wayne - his own illustration - whom I should be interviewing soon

A new car, a bonus thrice his/her salary, or Ms Angelina Jooooliieee?

No.

If you're thinking of getting your media boss an everlasting gift, nip down to the nearest high school/secondary school and observe students at work during IT hours.

There lurking at the back, in between being taught mouse movement and how to use google is the ONE.

S/he, though they tend to be hes is the kid who dare not speak his name.

He mashes up RSS with feed burning protocols, realigns the video codecs to pum out near HD quality on the mobiles, and speaks for a generation in taste and style; except his own is found wanting.

S/he's tie is shaped like the blues brothers and there's the touch of the Harry P ( Potter) about their personna.

Wierd but inclusive, or at least they try to be.

Dotcom Prince
At the height of dotcom mania in Soho, I knew one such figure.

Geez just what couldn't he do switching from perl to Msdos and then claiming photoshops algorithim if applied this way could do this.

Do what?

This?

OMG.

If you want to impress the boss for Xmas, go waive a contract in from Harry P offering free reign of your newsroom, a desk of their own, a journalists card, and all you have to do chosen one, is tell us what we're not doing right now and what's going on out there!

Get yourself a geeky net wizard is what I'm saying.

And that much I'll say and more at the World Association Newspaper Congress next year.

Just remember a teenager is for life, not just for xmas

Televisual web

If we extrapolate on the the enveloping sense of right side brain dominance over the left.

In particular imagery and music over literature, as so unnervingly put by Leonard Shlain ~ Art and Physics/Sex, Time and Power then it's very likely that we're heading towards a televisual web.

A growing body of events allude to that elsewhere: net speeds get quicker supporting bigger downloads, and supporting richer media experiences.

It's been a joy for me just seeing how I can encode for a 28k modem at 240X120 to 720X330 as seen here with the file coming in at around 7mb.

We've only touched the void.

There are some clever people writing algorithms which will be the equivalent of TV's mass visual explosion and then what!

inspired by maths

A site in progress for an amazing friend who is a composer.

Inspired by my maths background in Integration- differentiation ~ a work in progress

Heroes

Heroes finale BBC (UK) .. now that's what I'm talking about.

but where do they go from here?

Woops? GENERATIONS... spoke to soon

Chuck Norris and the PCs

Mid afternoon in a quiet surburb, then all hell breaks loose.

He's flushed down a toilet, thrown from a second balcony flat, then kicked into touch like Johhny Wilkinson ( Rugby) with that sweet foot of his.

No not Chuck"hard as nails" Norris.

The PC that goes by the name: The Panasonic toughbook.

And still it works. IT WORKS!

If you know any of the Norris' jokes I won't bore you suffice to say this thing roundhouse kicks Norris before he considers having the harddrive for waffles with his grits.


Chuck Norris doesn't use PCs. His fists keep smashing the screen
The PCs were designed for combat life, but like many military apps are finding their way into civie street; workplaces where there's a high risk of dropping things, like hospitals.

"Woops! Sorry Mr Nash, did you bang your head.
Poor you, but my computers ok."

Frankly there should be national competitions testing its thresh hold as well as questions being asked of other manufacturers.

Yesterday I bumped into a colleague and jolly well, damn near damaged my hard drive.

What I need... What I need is.. I need me a toughbook.

Now that's what I want for Christmas.

Get them quick before Chuck does

Diplomatic conundrum

Gillian Gibbons - the British teacher - who named a teddy bear Mohamed and was sent to jail for fifteen days, is freed and pardoned.

Now lets look behind the scenes.

I'm not privy to the diplomatic conversations but am extraoplating my experience based on stories I have done in this area in the past and from hearing diplomats shed light on behind the scenes antics from attending Chatham House where I have been a member for the last 14 years.

Ms Gibbons is coming home.. well if she had her way she wouldn't want to.

That was the whole point, presumably of her going to Sudan in the first place, to lead a new life.

The team that went out to secure her release; now what would you give to have been privy to their strategy?

If the president Omar al-Bashir had not met with the two officials, British Muslim peers, Lord Ahmed of Rotherham and Baroness Wars, then you can expect their would have been be a bit of a fall out with the British government.

Diplomatic Ways
Diplomacy works in mysterious days and well, er, wrist-slap is a dish nicely served cold: a Sudanese official party to the UK inadvertently held up at Heathrow or something else.

Woops, an embarrassing moment set to take place down the line.

But the president's move now gives him cash in the bank.

The Africans have an expression scratch my palm and I'll scratch yours, after which they'll add: "Now lets drink tea", a brief moment to celebrate.

Keep and eye on for a diplomatic entourage to the UK in a year to 18 months time, with favourable results.

On the other hand, you may not hear anything; that's the whole point of diplomacy and to paraphrase ex CIA James Woolsey talking about the clandestine services with me ie the CIA which also translates well to diplomacy, what they don't want you to know, you wont.

Ms Gibbons spent 8 days in a prison which in her own words wasn't that bad - the ministry brought her a bed!

A prime catch, however the Sudanese authorities were not going to have her slopping out with other hardened criminals.

Humiliate the British government but for goodnesss sake don't rub it in.

So having been pardoned, Ms Gibbon's experience has ironically in a rather "unhelpful" fashion been cut short.

Unhelpful because if she's to sell her story, it's only 8 days.

The real cause celebre story would have her emerging from prison having served the full 15 days.

Selling her Story
And the point is can she sell her story?

It's likely somone wil be contacting Max Clifford - PR/newspaper guru for advice.

One question is is the pardon tantamount to a clean-criminal-slate?

If it is it gives her an ethical and technical victory: she's not a criminal.

If it hasn't been expunged that benign holiday trip to the US might be complicated filling in the immigration card.

And the newspapers would rather not run up against their industry guidelines about paying criminals for their story.

Yes the crime was elsewhere.

So she'll be back tomorrow; you could start to write the story now.

The media will go into a frenzy, GMTV, BBC, the tabloids and qualoids; she will for 15 minutes become a celeb.

And then it'll be over, with part of her self back and a reflection of the life she so beautifully was leading before this very unfortunate state of affairs kicked in.

But everyone's a winner: The president: the two British peers; the media ( juicy story); and, even, even Ms Gibbons, well!

p.s Watch out for a photocall (sic) with high powered govt officials which should bat the dodgy donations issue into touch for a while

SEO of the journalist

It's likely the very mention of SEO draws bewildering stares, bordering on lunacy, from a room of journalists - the non-techy types.

So spending the evening rummaging through my monthly susbscription ( I have rarely looked at it) of SEO news at times seemed futile and truth, grrrr mind numbling tedious.

Gosh ! You could spend a lifetime "safe cracking" the wherewithalls of SEO and towards what end: world domination.

It's debatable in the end, but there's some truth in the matter that key-word indexing and obeying the rules of SEO may even usurp quality of articles.

Fancy that, a new breed of journalists who write well, even perhap mediocrely, but reach high rankings because of their understanding of how bots and robots work.


Content in not king, well. . .
Content is, yes you're ahead of me, but that means nothing, or does it, if you no one can find you?

Most newspapers by dint of having an audience and a litany of fine writers get bangs for their bucks, but their hegemony stands to be challenged in an evolving web which increasingly packages varying algorithims around how we say what we say and how we link those.

I ran an experiment two weeks ago posting a set of articles for a site in an area previously neglected and within the week noted it had climbed to the front page of a three million page index.

That's not bravado, but illustrates how writing for the web, ( go look at Jakob) is fundamentally different to writing elsewhere.

Interestingly I also learned that Jakob eschews blogs in favour of articls for online sites.

It's worth drilling his article to understand his point.

And the over arching point in all this: everyone wants to be linked to, BUT not all links give you street cred.

In fact some links even devalue you: I'm picking up my book on advanvced mathematics to distil this in easy language.

Blog Value
But blogs though have huge benefits which need little explaining.

It's a point well exercised in the first six sessions for some of our cohorts working online.

For what it's worth a strong draw on a video ( which has its own rules) coupled with linking articles might just do the trick.

Trouble is you'll grow grey hairs stuck to your PC.

Time to get a life!

A year in Journalism

Snapshot of front page of viewmagazine.tv
You've got to like listening to stories.

Why do we do it?

Perhaps you can tell me?

For me, it's about individual experiences, how those translate to others, make an impact on lives; in some cases the lives of the very authors themselves as they reflect on their own journeys.

It's most likely instictive; from the early years of gesturing to word formation, finding the basics ie food and shelter to complex permutations of words e.g Chormsky.

In many cases - a darn right curiosity of others whose origins and customs, we've perhaps read or barely touched on but would like to know more.

Celebrity tests the banality of this overzealousness.


Exit Interviews
So to the case of these series of shorts I have been making in recent years which have become my vivid photo-video portraits.

One question posited to the interviewee that hangs in the air for them to ponder.

Once Masters students in journalism, crossing the thresh hold to professionals, set on informing us of issues that richochet our lives.

Why should we be fasincated even more so.

Because of the physics of our time; the strains and strifes of the world ( steady on David) against journalism 12 rounds and going with a Tyson in his hay day.

It's fair to say this is the most tumultuous time for storytelling and the most exhilirating.

And that's why I like millions are so fascinated people's stories.

Everyone has something to say; this is my chance to document those whose paths we both have crossed.

Steady cam - handy cam combo

Tom Barrera dropped me a line with details of an interesting device he's created here.

His words:" A way to do photo and video journalism at the same time. I doubled my income with it.
Its called a Quad Pod Combo Al lin One".

Thanks Tom.

And I like the maketese line "I doubled my income with it"

This isn't an endorsement, as I have never tried it, but equally I'm not being dismissive.

If it can help make the work of photojo and video easier then that must be useful.

Have a look and see what you make of it.

Camera devices
There are a couple of devices on the market for videojos: film maker Mike Figgiss' 'wheel like steady cam - the Fig Rig" has been used by a fair few friends of mine in shoots.

Then there's the steady cam junior - a smaller version of the steady cam, that perhaps doesn't get used enough.

A simple enough steadycam can also be obtained from a small tripod by weighting the bottom and extending the neck where you'll place your grip.

In Norway, if I can find the film, a senior exec has the camera attached to a pulley device.

Last week at Reuters one of their execs spoke about a min- body crane that helped you do Pieces to Camera or Standups so you could get an appreciable depth of field.

Keep those devices coming

Exit interviews

For the past couple of years taking a Masters class in journalism, I have conducted exit interviews as they ready themselves to fly from the nest - ok analogy I suppose.

Sometimes I have asked odd questions.

Who would you invite for dinner and why?

What one thing would you like to change in the world?

Sometimes you might even get asked these at interviews as I have in the past.

So coming up a dive into the recent archives and class of 07 -the fantastic new generation of journalists, doing everything and anything we, you might have wanted or still want to do.

In the excerpts coming up on viewmagazine, they're talking about the year: short burst clips summing up what they've done, their fears ( should they have any) and the road ahead.

Amongst the group is the 24 year old zeigeist journalist now at the BBC as their Gaza Correspondent, Tamer.

And others who are commanding respect and attention in their endeavours.

Makes for fascinating listening

Nokia Vs Sony A1

One of the issues to surface over the Reuters- Nokia gathering was the quality of pics.

You heard a little bit of the debate when Tim raised it in yesterday's Video post.

Today I was on Nokia's site feeling around and posted the point raised in the video.

Obviously, I'm sure of this, it'll improve.

And there are many perhaps, evidenced when you go to Nokia's user group, who will say its superb.

No worries, that's really not my contention.

Do I take my A1 or er Nokia, maybe a debate a lot of us will have very soon, with by then the A1 doing something extraordinary to thwart of a filming device when you can edit-load at the press of a button.

Which on that note Multimedia Editor John Dempsey from IC Liverpool alerted me to this.

Liverpool one of the first tranche of newspapers in the UK to go video journalism, have at times been able to sell footage to the BBC.

He tells me about this shoot - a march in support of Rafa Benitez Liverpool's coach captured on the Noki and posted on IC Liverpool's site.

There's some white noise but what do you think about the pics as opposed to not having them at all

Blog Role TV - Future TV

For the legions of online newspaper et al sites with adroit presenters, Chicago Tribune (CT)makes the first land grab.. ok one of the first.

The idea - presenting at Apple a couple of years ago was simple, reinforced by a bloke called Dave who had a programme called Blog Roll where punters blogged in and the presenter spoke to his audience.

Occasionally, you might get one of them on the phone or skype and exchange a few words.

Ideas though are one thing - I'm speaking about me now and my smarty wazz pants thought - but doing it, well, that's what separates the doers from the talkers and Chicago Tribune has showed its digital doer status more than we can remember.

My favourite from its multimedia camp is a MM doc looking at oil.

But to the present and et voila, this pops out nicely.

Talk radio with Pictures
Talk radio but with more inteactive bells

Isnt that called Television?

'Course TV does its own version e.g. Good Morning America et al, but it's a fair bet the costs at Chicago are minscule.

The hard work comes from the software and team fluidy knitting it all together.

This is an idea which will take off, with bloomburgesque info attachments doughnuted around the screen and what it will do is out the most enormous pressure on TV once again.

Yes some of them won't be worth the screen we're looking at, but Chicago Tribune's for instance will redefine dip in TV, respond at will, as we know it.

CT's Mark Hinojosa comments about this some really special features to this set up:
1. Look at their Youtube Channel
2. "There's an on demand, which is built from the live version so lets you pick which question you want to hear the answer to. The snap polling is the newest feature. If you watch it live you can vote and see instant results in the chat window".


Nice!

Hail the Immersive Video Journalist

His name is Cliff Etzel -an award winning photojournalist in which he describes himself as visual content creator since 15 years of age.

"1 of 99 out of 847 applicants accepted to the Eddie Adams Workshop in 1992", his site bluprojekt.com tells us, adding:

"While there, I was 1 of 15 special merit award winners for my work. In addition to working as a Video Journalist, I am a certfied PADI Rescue Diver and an I.A.F.D. Certified Freedive Instructor. I also publish the only website on the Internet devoted exclusively to shooting video underwater - UWDV.COM"

Read more here

As a water baby and free diver, Cliff and I whom regularly swap notes and emails, is onto something.

I'm PADI but nowhere near Cliff's qualifications, but have pulled off some wreck dive expeditions, one of which was sold to the BBC.

So the combination of videojournalism and advance diving skills puts Cliff in a catergory of his own.

If you're planning an expedition, sea-environmental project, want to take a crew to Antartica or are from Dive Magazine (Is John Banten still around?) then Cliff could be your man.

Hail the immersive videojournalist (I-VJ)

Interested in Mobile Phone film making

FILMOBILE is organising a unique networking event in collaboration with the Mobilefest (São Paulo) in the Centre for Excellence at the University of Westminster on the 6th December. The program includes presentations by filmmakers and organisations working with mobile devices. A live web broadcast with the Mobilefest in Brazil is scheduled to take place during the networking event. The talk is followed by an open discussion and a wine reception.

The event is free to attend but registration via the New media eXchange website (http://nm-x.com) is required in advance:
http://nm-x.com/event/2007/12/mobilefest-london-presented-filmobile

Please register early as guest list capacity is limited.

Speakers in London:

Eva Weber (BBC and documentary director - The Intimacy of Strangers)

Lisa Roberts (Pocket Shorts, Video Umbrella, Single Shot)

Daniel Florencio (Filmmaker and Current TV pods producer)

Camille Barker (Artist and SMARTLab researcher)

Max Schleser (Mobile filmmaker and researcher)

Speakers in São Paulo:

Alberto Tognazzi - MovilFilm Fest,
Zico Góes - Programme director MTV,
Maurício Hirata – Ministry of Culture, Brazil,
Wagner Martins – Economist ("Cocadaboa"),
Mauro Rubens – VJ and video artist,
Duncan Kennedy –Mobifest Canada.
(Detailed program will be posted sooner to the date on www.filmobile.net)

Date: 6th December 2007, 2 pm - 7pm

Venue: CEPLW (Centre for Excellence), University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, London NW1 5LS

Marylebone campus is directly opposite Baker Street underground station (Bakerloo, Circle, Hammersmith & City, Jubilee and Metropolitan lines). Buses run past on Marylebone Road and Baker Street with only a few stops to Euston, King's Cross and Paddington mainline stations. Car parking is available to those with special needs.

FILMOBILE is a project which aims to create a dialogue between the industry, filmmakers and artists working with mobile devices through a variety of on and off line events.

FILMOBILE is supported by the University of Westminster, the Higher Education Innovation Fund, CREAM, CEPLW, the London Gallery West and London Westside.

Contact:
info@filmobile.net
www.filmobile.net
Mobile: 0791 9032166
RSVP: Event registration via http://nm-x.com

Reuters unveil mobile reporting kit -

Here Matt Cowan from Reuters is answering a question about their Mobile reporting camera's battery life. We're at the Online News Association gathering in London at Reuters HQ.

Thanks to Reuters - Sophie and the crew, and the ONA's kate and Paul for a really splendid evening

Apologies for the sound, I didn't have my radio mike with me.

Geez - no blog day

I missed a blog day.. I misse a blog day.. I missed a blog day.

Does that mean the blog police are after me.

Yes it's not funny.

But I have a habit of telling my Masters lot that they need to blog every day, no exception.

So I have sinned.

Bog a day keeps the thought police away...

coming up later, a video cut from Reuters and some...

and the unintegrated newsroom - why office party sex will be severly impaired across the techno-advanced newsrooms

Dire politics in the UK

If you're old enough to remember this is all too familiar, the perception of alleged sleeze within government.

Donations to a party which seem to be, well, not done in the correct manner.

John Major's government crashed and burned for this.

An unhinged wheel that left the central political carriage unusable.

That whiff has now surfaced.

And what made it worse for Major was the perceived contempt for the electorate.

The PM has called an inquiry, but he will know that in politics perception is everything, and it'll take a cabinet war room PR excercise to undo this states of affairs.

oh dear

Chinese Rap

OK I know not what they sayeth - shame on me - but the gestures say it all.

My colleague who heads up the University of Westminster's music course will go wow for this, Kienda Hoji

He's also a professor at Peking University and has been running an American Idol contest for Chinese singers and insists on speaking mandarin to the contestants, many of whom don't know how to respond.

We're both doing a couple of courses at Peking next year.

If you want to hear some soul dance tracks by Chinese artists - this is for you. Good stuff

Culture huh! Xie xie