Video Player in a Magazine!

I have been trying to find someone with a copy of Entertainment Weekly from mid September. Trust me, this has nothing to do with this merits of the magazine itself -- but there's a little glimpse of some exciting new video technology within. For this issue only, CBS has supplied a thin insert that plays a video with audio right on the page. It's an advertisement, of course, but wow. Crazy. Only magazine subscribers got the insert, so I've had no luck at news stands. Has anyone seen it in person?

Uncut.

A while back, our friend Matt told us about an online project called Star Wars: Uncut. It asks the people of the internet to recreate 15 second scenes from Star Wars, with whatever creative direction they see fit. The ultimate goal is to string together all the scenes to recreate the whole movie. I finally got the chance to check it out, and it's awesome! Some people re-enacted it with their own actors, or friends, or legos, or cats, or animation, etc. Some people literally translated the scenes shot by shot, and others took funny creative liberties. Definitely worth checking out, and participating.

Way to go, Finland.

Finland just passed a law making access to broadband a legal right for Finnish citizens. (In France, access to the internet is a human right, but this is the first country to make it a legal right). Starting in July 2010, residents of Finland will be guaranteed at least 1mbs internet access, with plans to increase this to 100mbs by 2015. In a world where access to the web is increasingly essential for applying for employment, paying bills, and accessing world news -- this is a wonderful thing.

Web Video Predicted to Drive 60% of Internet Traffic in 2013

Cisco released a white paper analysis that shows that video communications traffic is accelerating at an alarming rate, particularly web video. Read the full analysis here.

Wireless Electricity

I can't wait...

Manhattan Bridge after a summer storm

This is the view from our office window. 

Qik

Check out Qik.. It's a video sharing site, that allows users to upload video LIVE from a mobile phone from anywhere in the world. Theoretically, it uploads and streams the video as you are recording it. I tried it out last night, and there was a couple second delay, but still pretty cool. It's basically a one click record+upload, so there's a whole lot of wobbily videos of nothing on the site. I see the potential here for more live vlogging and amateur coverage of news events-- but I'm surprised that I couldn't find more coverage of the protests in Iran. I guess it's only available for select phones at this point.

In the news... The Pirate Bay is building a video site called The Video Bay. It's extremely beta right now, but we're watching to see what they make of it...

New Media Killed the TV Star

Not according to Cable service providers...

First, this article on the Business Insider makes some pretty obvious predictions about where the Television industry is headed.

"...[E]ventually the cable-satellite-airwave monopoly over TV content in local markets will be circumvented by simple, global Internet distribution. You won't have 5 channels, or 50 channels, or 500 channels. You'll have millions of channels. You'll be able to watch anything you want, live or taped. You'll be able to watch it wherever you want--TV, computer, mobile device. You won't have to sorry about "slinging" video content around or programming your DVR. You'll just plug a pipe (Internet) into a box (device) and watch. This is where the future is going."

For many, this future is practically here. A combination of Hulu and Streaming Netflix has already rendered my TV useless. But, I've been really wary about Time Warner's pay-per-use shenanigans. Using the internet for streaming video content could sadly turn out to be far more expensive than Cable TV.

Yesterday it was announced that, believe it or not, Time Warner (along with Comcast) plan to distribute TV shows online.

"The concept, known as "TV Everywhere" or "On-Demand Online" is viewed as a way the pay-TV industry can allow customers to watch TV online through personal computers and mobile devices without enticing them to drop their cable TV subscription."

I'm hoping this is an alternative to their ridiculous metered-use experiment, because it seems absurd to charge customers for a Cable TV subscription, and then charge them AGAIN to transfer the data through their computer.

I feel like the Cable industry is stunting the progress of technology. Streaming web video has been a really powerful propellent in spreading information. It has increased the ease at which consumers can find and share entertainment, and video programs with educational and artistic value. It's changed the way companies market, and it's opened up endless opportunities for new business. And to me, the potential of extending this power to mobile devices is exciting.

- Flash 10 is coming to mobile devices in its beta form in October. This is great news! No more getting that pesky question mark cube (you know what I'm talking about), and video content will be even more portably accessible.

- But in the meantime, there is a website called Tappity designed to help you search and navigate mobile-friendly websites from your phone's browser. Instead of using an ordinary search engine, Tappity yields only results that can be viewed properly on your phone.

- Also, unrelated: It has been rumored (for a while now) that Apple is scheming a tablet computer. It's not really something I'd use for video editing, but it's still kinda cool.