NevOn

Record audio at Odeo

Odeo, the podcasting service and directory launched last July, now offers a recording capability where you can record a commentary about a podcast:

[...] There is now a "Reply" button under the audio player on Odeo pages. This way, when you record and share an Odeo with people, they will be able to record a response. (You'll get email notifications of this activity so you can keep up with the conversation.)

I definitely want to see how Shel and I can implement this feature for For Immediate Release. Our podcast is listed with Odeo so you can also subscribe to it there. We've already added an instant-play feature to the podcast blog (just click to listen to a show); if we can also provide a way for listeners to easily make an audio comment there and then, while the impulse to do so is hot, that would be terrific.

Now if iTunes had a feature like this...

Odeo has also introduced a rather neat audio messaging service where you can record a message and send it to someone. And you don't need to have an account with Odeo to use this service.

Do give it a try!

Comments are integral parts of the conversation

While I'm still having a bit of difficulty figuring out whether the 30Boxes calendaring service is worth spending any time with or not, I'm having no such difficulty in seeing the value of a service like coComment.

The concept of this is brilliantly simple - provide a means through which any comment you make on any blog (anyone's blog, including your own) are aggregated in a single place so that you can clearly see all those comments from different places and thus get the broad picture of all the online conversations you are taking part in, anywhere. Read more about how it works here.

Not only that, you can then add a bit of code to your own site which displays your latest comments, wherever you make them. I'm trying that out which you can see in the right-hand column.

It gets even better as you can also share your aggregated place on the coComment website so anyone else can also see what you say and where you say it. A sort of shared personal place for all your conversations. A great way to stimulate more conversation with and by others. Take a look - here's my place.

And more! You - and anyone else - can also subscribe to an RSS feed of your comment place so you can get all the comments you've made to a particular post. That RSS feed will also deliver anyone else's comments to a particular post you've commented on.

Now that's a conversation. It makes redundant anyone's notion of where you comment is an important thing. It's not. Who cares where the conversations take place when you can track them, wherever they happen?

coComment is in beta (of course) and you need an invitation to participate. If my experience is any indicator, just go to the home page, fill in the details there and you may get an email invite from coComments directly. That's what I did a few days ago.

This is a terrific service. It works on the major blogging platforms. Still in development, as I said, and the developers have lots of ideas for it. One I'm hoping to see soon - a fully-automated way to capture your comments into coComment. I've got the coComment capture bookmarklet in Firefox, but I keep forgetting to click it when I leave a comment anywhere...

30Boxes first look

I've been following the growing blogosphere buzz during the past week about 30 Boxes, a new online calendar application that some are saying is the killer calendar application.

So I signed up for the beta yesterday. Noodled around with it for thirty minutes or so, added some appointments to my new calendar, set my preferences for adding in some web content, etc.

Reading all the excitement in recent days, perhaps my expectation was set far too high as I'm a bit underwhelmed by it so far. For me, I don't see this replacing Eventful, an online calendar service where, like 30Boxes, you can share information with others that I've been playing with for the past few months, and certainly not Outlook (although you can sync your 30Boxes calendar with Outlook).

Am I missing the point of it?

Thirty minutes isn't enough time to form any fixed judgments, though. Plus I haven't got any buddies on the system yet to share anything with. So I'll learn more about 30Boxes and then form some clearer opinions.

Meanwhile read what others think about it.

[Technorati: 30Boxes]

Sound comfort for sailors

It's comforting to know that HMS Daring, the first of the Royal Navy's latest Type 45 destroyers launched on Wednesday, is fitted with the most advanced state-of-the-art weapons and defence systems. For instance:

[...] The main armament for the new destroyers will be the world-beating Principal Anti Air Missile System (PAAMS) - a collaboration between the UK, France and Italy. This capability represents a major step forward for the Royal Navy, putting the UK at the cutting edge of area Anti Air Warfare and ensuring that the Type 45 can defend her consorts and allies for decades to come.

The new generation of missiles could be sea-skimming, high-diving, supersonic, stealthy or highly manoeuvrable. Attacks could come from any direction and in salvoes. With its advanced combat system, the Type 45 will greatly enhance the ability of the Royal Navy to defend its warships and other vessels it is accompanying from anti-ship missiles and from attacks by aircraft and land-based threats.

More comforting for the crew, perhaps, is their living environment:

[...] HMS Daring's 230-strong crew should be happy too. She and her sisters will be the first "gender-neutral" warships to enter Royal Navy service, and the Hotel Facilities, as the living quarters are known, are the most opulent ever fitted in a British warship. Mess decks are replaced by individual cabins, each with their own I-pod charging points, CD player, internet access, five channel recreational audio and larger berths.

(Bold text is my emphasis.)

No jokes about this in this post! It's not too far-fetched to look at the iPodding of the crew's quarters, with its internet access as well, as a podcasting opportunity for the Navy as an employer to communicate with the crew as employees in a new and interesting way...

(Via Engadget)

Microsoft's Windows Live power play

Participating in the first UK preview of Windows Live in London last Thursday evening was a worthwhile experience. This event was the first public (ie, to a private group) UK presentation of and discussion about the collection of new internet-based services from Microsoft that are currently in beta testing.

I've not yet directly experienced any of the constituent parts of Windows Live (I'm on the beta sign-up waiting lists) other than pop in now and again to the website portal and play a bit with the Ajax-based customization features where you can add and subtract content that will appear in your personalized page.

Here's a screenshot so you can get an idea:

As I mentioned in conversation at the event, I've not been that impressed with it. Ok, it is a beta, but it's not been anything that has really held my attention or interest other than to note that it's in development and will likely be a big consumer offering once it moves into the more polished and getting-to-final development stages. Still pay attention to what's happening with it, in other words.

What I learned last Thursday is that this view is pretty narrow and barely scratches the surface of what Windows Live is actually all about.

So what is Windows Live? Briefly, it comprises these layered services:

• Live.com - the portal/home page shown in the screenshot above (developer blog)
• Windows Live Mail - the successor to Hotmail (developer blog)
• Windows Live Mobile Search - a personalized search tool for certain smartphones that lets you save those searches on your phone
• Windows Live Messenger - the successor to MSN Messenger (developer blog)

You can read the Microsoft press release from last November for the formal description of Windows Live, and there's a pretty good review by Paul Thurrott that goes into some detail about it all and links to an interesting analysis of the evolution of MSN into Windows Live.

So last Thursday's event in London was worthwhile in providing everyone there (some 30 people plus MSN and the PR agency) with a better focus on the overall offering and where it's at in its development cycle.

That's not the half of it, though.

Discovering Windows Live

Light blogging until the weekend as I'll be in London tonight for the first UK preview of Microsoft's Windows Live.

Windows Live is a set of personal internet services and software designed to bring together in one place all of the relationships, information and interests people care about most, with more safety and security features across their PC, devices and the web. While it has clear benefits from an individual consumer's point of view, I'm especially interested in learning more about those benefits from the business point of view.

More later. Meanwhile, if you want to learn a little about Windows Live, here are some places where you can:

• Windows Live website
• Windows Live Ideas - try out some of the cool things
• What the media is saying about Windows Live
• What bloggers are talking about
• Paul Thurrott's review of Windows Live

[Technorati: windows live]

Book, blook and podcasts

Here's a neat idea - post the chapters of your book to your blog (sound familiar?) and record each chapter as a podcast.

The book in question is hackoff.com: An Historic Murder Mystery set in the Internet Bubble and Rubble, a novel by Tom Evslin, who started posting chapters last September under a Creative Commons license.

Evslin started the podcasts last week and I've listened to a couple of episodes so far, from the first chapter. The sound quality's not terrific (a bit echo-y) but they're a great listen. I listened on my PC although I think I'd get a better experience listening on my iPod.

Incidentally, Evslin's book blog is known as a blook which, according to the Wikipedia entry, was popularized by his very book, er, blook.

Some book publishers are embracing new media like podcasting. My current favourite - The Penguin Podcast, a podcast every couple of weeks with book extracts, author interviews and features from Penguin Books UK. Innovation in book marketing.

How to be an internet millionaire

Daily Telegraph: A student who hoped to graduate without debt by setting up a website offering internet advertising space has made £519,000 in only four months. Alex Tew, 21, a first-year business management student at Nottingham University, said he hoped to achieve his aim of making a million dollars - £578,000 - early in the New Year. "I thought I might make a few grand but I've made a fortune," he said. "It's been a crazy adventure."

This is the story of the MillionDollarHomePage, an internet site Tew set up where you can buy advertising space at $1 per pixel.

As of today, Tew has sold 990,000 pixels. Now he's auctioning the final 1,000 pixels on eBay. Bids close on 11 January.

Does he really need a business management degree?

Window shopping

"Displax developed by Edigma combines rear projection holographic screens with finger tracking to bring interactive storefront displays to retailers and various commercial applications. Displax® - Interactive Window allows human interaction in a shop window, with multimedia applications, emission and record of sounds, detection of human presence in front of the display, etc."

Not exactly hot news as this product came to market in 2004 from the Portuguese company Edigma. But cool technology that you can just see soon making its way into the High Street.

The photo's hot, though.

(Via Marketingfacts.nl)

Video publishing and other cool things

Interesting developments with video, blogs and mobile phones.

Videos of the panel sessions at Les Blogs 2.0 in Paris earlier this month are now available from Vpod.tv, a new video publishing venture from entrepreneur Rodrigo Sepúlveda. You can stream the video (amazing quality) or download the files (big, +/- 200 megs each).

(Now's your chance to relive, or see for the first time, the famous Mena and dotBen spat in high-quality video - wind forward to about 17:25 in this video.)

Vpod, or "video publishing on demand," looks a very interesting concept. I'm finding it hard to find any detailed info about it, though. The bare-bones website via a Frappr group gives you an opportunity to sign up to test the offering, which I've now done.

One of the panelists in the podcasting/videocasting session I moderated at Les Blogs 2.0 was Gabe McIntyre, the man behind Xolo.tv and the video bloggers forum. Amsterdam-based Gabe produces a regular video show and interviews some interesting people. Will this develop into a European Rocketboom?

There's YouTube, a kind of Flickr-for-video concept, where anyone can upload video for anyone else to view. With this free service, you can blog the videos you take with your digital camera or mobile phone. This is a serious venture with financial backing from venture capital firm Sequoia Capital.

Finally, news via entrepreneur and Maxthon partner Netanel Jacobsson of a hot new video service for mobile phones from Samsung Mobile that will be launched on 24 December.

The service, called AnyFilms.net, has two primary offerings - short movies by up-and-coming directors to download for viewing on certain models of Samsung mobile phones, and interactive movies where you determine the storyline. Although it's not yet been launched, the website is already live.

I agree with Net - this could be very big indeed:

[...] The success of iPod Video combined Video Podcasting is obviously spinning off to our mobile phones. And that’s easy to understand, video is hot, videos produced by users themselves is even hotter - and when all this will be possible on handsets with high-quality digital video cameras - enabling users to create their own films on the fly - upload and share them - this market is just going to explode. For what is more compelling? A Blog, a Podcast or a Videocast ?

Net has the full scoop here.

BBC innovation to annotate audio content

The BBC is involved in some major innovation for audio-visual content management that looks far beyond the needs of only a mainstream broadcaster.

Tom Coates writes a detailed post describing the BBC's Annotatable Audio Project, an experimental internal-BBC-only project designed to allow you to collectively describe, segment and annotate audio in a Wikipedia-style fashion. He says: "I consider it one of the most exciting projects I've ever worked on, and BBC Radio & Music Interactive one of the only places in the world where I would have been able to have done so."

It's not hard to see where this research is coming from. There is so much audio (and video) content out there now that finding what you specifically want, never mind being able to describe and tag that content, is rapidly becoming one of the major difficulties for anyone who listens to audio, whether that's mainstream media broadcast recordings or podcasts. As for adding and sharing your own annotations to your favourite content, that's not yet a practical reality:

[...] How on earth are people expected to navigate all of this content? How are they supposed to find the specific bit of audio or video that they're looking for? And how are they supposed to discover new programmes or podcasts? And it gets more complicated than that - what if what you're not looking for is a complete coherent half-hour programme, but a selection of pertinent clips - features on breaking news stories, elements in magazine programmes, particular performances from music shows?

In the end, the first stage in making any of these processes possible is based on the availability of information about the audio or video asset in question - metadata - at as granular a level as possible. And not only about that asset, but also about its relationship to other assets and services and other information streams that give individuals the ability to explore and investigate and assess the media they've uncovered.

What I find extremely interesting about this BBC project is that, while it's mostly focused on annotatable audio for BBC programming, it looks beyond that and into user-created annotation and metadata that would let you add your own tags and descriptions to content that you and others can use, and you would also be able to edit and add tags and descriptions to content other people have created.

Indeed, just like the Wikipedia concept.

Read Tom's post for clear and understandable explanations of the project and the real potential for what the project would enable. Includes some great screenshots. And take a look at two screencasts he's done that show the embryonic ideas in action, in how you would edit content information and playing content.

Innovation to pay close attention to.

(Via Geek News Central.)

From Tom's post, it's very clear indeed that he has been a major asset to the BBC with a project like this. The BBC has now lost that asset - Tom has left for a new role at Yahoo.

Les Blogs 2.0 will change the way you think

If you're planning to join the more than 120 people already signed up to participate in Les Blogs 2.0 in Paris on 5-6 December, get clear in your mind right now that this will be no ordinary conference:

A New World is here

Don't you feel the rules and our world are changing ? Don't you feel changed by what many people call the Web 2.0 ? We believe as most of you that the way we work, the way we learn and teach, the way we interact with one another and more generally our expectations and relationships to other people, the institutions, the business world and politics are changing dramatically.

It is not only about blogging, it's about changing the way we think.

Yesterday, the near-final event programme was published. Here you can see the breadth and depth of thinking you can expect to see and hear - and be part of. You'll meet some of the blogosphere's foremost movers-and-shakers in the world, people who have ideas, influence and the ability to make things happen.

I'll also be there and, on day 2, moderating a panel discussion on podcasting, photo- and videoblogging.

Two days of amazing interactions and all for just €200 plus VAT. How can you afford not to be there? Sign up here!

The secret of Apple's success

Apple may be just a minor player in the computer and consumer electronics industries in terms of revenue ($14 billion in fiscal 2005) and market share (less than 5% worldwide) but, Fortune magazine says, it is now undeniably setting the pace for both of those industries in terms of hardware, software, and industrial design.

Fortune's short feature piece discusses Apple's product range after the launch of the video iPod, iTunes v6 and new iMac G5, commenting on the user-focused way in which Apple approaches its products, its markets and its customers.

Apple's secret? This quote from Apple CEO Steve Jobs says it very clearly:

[...] "Apple is a company that takes complex technology and makes it easier and simpler to use," he says, and seems satisfied with his answer. But moments later he smiles, and refines his definition: "Our goal is to stand at the intersection of technology and the humanities."

A couple of interesting stats in Fortune's article:

• The iPod now owns 75% of the mobile-music-player market
• The iTunes online music store now accounts for 84% of all legal sales of downloaded digital music

Fortune | Jobs Speaks: What’s Next for Apple

Kick starting new copyright laws

A subject I've posted about before is that of the inadequacies of copyright laws in this age of instant copy-and-paste and relying on decades (if not centuries) old geographical-based laws to help you protect your intellectual property rights.

So it was with keen interest I read Copyright for the digital age on the BBC News site yesterday which talks about the Adelphi Charter:

The Adelphi Charter was prepared by an International Commission of experts from the arts, creative industries, human rights, law, economics, science, R&D, technology, the public sector and education. The Charter Office is based at the Royal Society of Arts in London which is concerned with innovation in the arts, sciences and industry.

This is what the Adelphi Charter proposes:

1. Laws regulating intellectual property must serve as means of achieving creative, social and economic ends and not as ends in themselves.
2. These laws and regulations must serve, and never overturn, the basic human rights to health, education, employment and cultural life.
3. The public interest requires a balance between the public domain and private rights. It also requires a balance between the free competition that is essential for economic vitality and the monopoly rights granted by intellectual property laws.
4. Intellectual property protection must not be extended to abstract ideas, facts or data.
5. Patents must not be extended over mathematical models, scientific theories, computer code, methods for teaching, business processes, methods of medical diagnosis, therapy or surgery.
6. Copyright and patents must be limited in time and their terms must not extend beyond what is proportionate and necessary.
7. Government must facilitate a wide range of policies to stimulate access and innovation, including non-proprietary models such as open source software licensing and open access to scientific literature.
8. Intellectual property laws must take account of developing countries' social and economic circumstances.
9. In making decisions about intellectual property law, governments should adhere to these rules:

• There must be an automatic presumption against creating new areas of intellectual property protection, extending existing privileges or extending the duration of rights.
• The burden of proof in such cases must lie on the advocates of change.
• Change must be allowed only if a rigorous analysis clearly demonstrates that it will promote people's basic rights and economic well-being.
• Throughout, there should be wide public consultation and a comprehensive, objective and transparent assessment of public benefits and detriments.

We have Creative Commons but that seems to have no teeth at all.

Could Adelphi be the real kick start for change needed today?

Open source film making

If you can post the content of a book to a blog as you develop the book, why not a film? That's precisely what Scottish film director David MacKenzie is doing with the script for Hallam Foe, a film based on the novel by Peter Jinks.

Hugh MacLeod writes:

[...] So here's what we decided. Like I said, filming begins in January. Between now and then David has to do one more major re-write. The script in its current form is on a Word Document here. Feel free to download it and tell us what you think. David doesn't have a blog himself, but he'll be happy to answer questions in the comments.

From my perspective, it's no-brainer. The idea is to get the script "out there" to the world at large as early on as possible, so if there's anything wrong with it, at least it can be fixed. The earlier you get your audience involved with the marketing process, the easier and cheaper it is. Most film marketing is, to quote David, "Too little, too late".

The interesting thing for me is we're not just trying to use blogs to pimp a movie. We're trying to use blogs to actually help the making of a movie. Not only that, this isn't a low-budget indie art-school project. This is a commercial, mainstream movie from an established director doing the Cluetrain thing.

One interesting additional possibility here is that the film could have multiple plots and/or endings. "Bloggers' Cut" as well as the director's cut, so to speak.

The film could even be released over the net as well as via the film studio's usual channels. No Hollywood studios involved - Film Four and Scottish Screen, according to IMBD. Nimble companies, should be easy to consider and decide.

Now that would be really Cluetrain.

Apple launches video iPod

On the road until the weekend, posting will resume then.

Meanwhile, one item for you, briefly discussed in FIR #76 (recorded yesterday, a day earlier than usual).

The speculation was correct - yesterday Apple launched a video iPod. My recommendation - forget the iPod nano; this is the one to get. Just look at the specs. And think about video podcasts.

Oh, Apple also announced a new iMac G5. And iTunes version 6.

Just over two months until Christmas...

Why Europe fails to leverage innovation

A guy has a great idea for a product or service that companies would very likely buy, certainly enough that the idea has money-making potential. He's trying to get some financial backers. So he's sitting in his local Starbucks on the wifi sending  some emails and his business plan. Someone asks if the next seat is free, to which our ideas man says yes. The two get chatting. Turns out the second guy has the money and the means to help the first guy. Next thing you know, the two are getting together and the ideas man is on the way to realizing his dream.

A view through rose-coloured specs or a reality? Well, an acquaintance of mine said something like this happened to him a year ago. He hasn't made his fortune yet but with the resources he's now got access to, he's refined his original idea and is getting closer to his tipping point.

Naturally, this happened not in Europe but in the United States.

Indeed, I couldn't imagine something like this happening anywhere in Europe. Not the UK (read Where are all the UK start-ups? by Tom Coates to see why not). Not in The Netherlands (heh! no Starbucks here!). Nowhere in this continent.

Not that there is any shortage of great ideas in Europe. There are plenty. What's lacking is a framework or environment in which to develop ideas into some kind of commercial or business reality. I'd add 'attitude' as well.

Which is why an excellent article in the European Business Forum caught my attention today.

In Is Europe losing its innovative edge? by David Tebbutt, this thought-provoking feature suggests that Europe hasn't lost the ability to innovate, but its edge is being threatened by other countries' greater skills at bridging the commercialization gap. David argues that, without commercialization, innovation is meaningless.

The article then includes the top ten issues that Europe needs to address if innovation is to stand a chance of flourishing here:

1. Fear of failure
2. Fear of success
3. Risk aversion
4. The mirage of the single market
5. The VCs’ lack of experience
6. Shortage of funds
7. Expertise is scattered
8. Lack of openness
9. Official ignorance
10. Out of touch

Read David's complete article for detailed commentary with each of these top ten issues and see if you agree or not. And note that the commentary and analysis of the European picture are the conclusions of venture capitalists, technology innovators, entrepreneurs, CEOs and early adopters who attended the Innovate!Europe conference in Zaragoza, Spain, in June.

If Europe is to keep up with the global Joneses, never mind actually excel, things have to change. How likely is that? Don't hold your breath.

USA, you've little to worry about from Europe in this regard. (Pay attention, though, to places like India.)