2008 a journey with friends

The Documentally podcast in it’s iTunes form started in 2006, i started video blogging and using twitter in 2007 but it was 2008 that felt like social media really took off for me.

Maybe because I felt like I was no longer just a photographer. My ability to take photos and document things was now just one shade on a growing multimedia palette of skills that had community in mind.

I guess things really took off with my trip into Jordan for the United Nations. This was a big job for me, the ground covered, audio interviews, photos and final editing into a podcast assembled with the assistance of people like Phil Sands and Bill Cammack. It was in Jordan I introduced an Iraqi Refugee to Seesmic. This blew his mind that he could reach out into the homes of the western world and report first hand what he was going through whilst escaping with only his life from the mess that was/is Iraq.

I felt this would be an incredibly important use for video conversation platforms. Today they seem to concentrate on conversations with celebrity and have not yet been adopted by areas of the worlds community in real need of talking about their plight. Hopefully myself and Mike Sizemore will be able to push the use of video conversational platforms in the political sphere. We have already had great success using Qik during talks with political party leaders with Thompson Reuters, thanks to people like @ilicco.

Shortly after Jordan was a meetup in Paris, then SXSW in Austin, Texas. This was made possible by more sponsorship. Jeff Pulver bought the tickets and myself and Phil Campbell’s socializing was more than covered by Seesmic. It was here that many online friendships were cemented and connections made. People who’s lives I still follow daily and think of as good friends. Some of these friendships were fortified more with my trip to New York for Podcamp NYC 2.0. Also made possible with sponsorship from Seesmic.

There are too many people to name with whom friendships were made and are still maintained. If you look at my Twitter friends and scroll back to the first 30 or so pages.. these are the people from this time. These are the people I would do most anything for. The web weaving warriors who have made sense of this digital wasteland.

After SXSW I was bridging out from mobile media making and into Consulting. Geert Van Kesteren commissioned me to fly out to Amsterdam and help him with his media mountain. Towers of hard drives containing incredible photo stories waiting to be reformatted into online portfolios, podcasts, films anything that gave them new life.

Las Vegas was another big event of the year made possible with the help of Steve Purkiss, @Kosso’s Phreadz and The Open University. In fact Phreadz and The OU have gone on to play a massive part in many more of this years adventures. Berlin Web 2.0 was made infinitely more interesting and Geeknbury really came together with the online participation from those that could not make it.

Work for me this year has been a pleasure. Which is just as well, if i’m not doing something for an assignment, I am doing more of the same for the love of it. It was great working with Carl (@FellowCreative) and the University of Creative Arts online projects. Speaking at places like the UCA and the MDDA really punctuate the year nicely and allow me to learn through talking more about what it is we do.

I finished this year by running video blogging courses. A full day of looking at kit, learning how to use it, filming editing uploading and dissemination.

If you had asked me at the beginning of 2008 what i would be doing throughout the year, I would have had no idea how fast and how far this social media wave would travel. Surf’s up and it’s 10 foot and tubing.

If you ask me now I’ll say I just want to stay on the surfboard, anything else is a bonus.

I look forward to doing more with these people in 2009. More projects with the likes of Dave @BuddhaMagnet. More experimental stuff with the OU, more teaching with the MDDA.. More with, Nick Butler, @sleepydog, Phil Campbell, Mike Sizemore.. Just more.

Of course I have the little matter of a baby arriving between March and April so my focus may alter somewhat in the first quarter of this year. If I thought 2008 was epic, 2009 it is bound to be more so.

This blog post accompanies a podcast I have rushed out in the last couple of hours of 2008. Not really a concise summery. Just a ramble whilst walking the dog on a cold December night. Trying to get my head around the year and at the same time trying not to freeze to death in the dark Northamptonshire countryside.

You can subscribe to my ever so neglected podcast in the iTunes store.

If you feel you can add to this please comment. It’s great to get feedback, thoughts and ideas.

Don’t forget you can support this blog here and a review on my podcast in Itunes may do more good than bad.

I won’t ask any more from you other than to stay in touch. Communication got us here.. Staying connected will carry us through. A journey with friends.

12Seconds on the iPhone

Video has finally arrived for the un-cracked iphone! Well.. video in the shape of a video slideshow, which as far as I am concerned is a bloody miracle judging by the way Apple seems to be restricting development of video based apps. Or is it AT&T and O2 not wanting people to stream with their ‘unlimited’ data?

I have to say I am so happy that it is 12seconds.tv that has started to build this bridge across the video void.. It’s a long time coming and for a start up with little to no cash, this is like building home made space suits and heading off to the moon.

They are top guys too..

The next thing I need to do is invite them over here to the UK so they realise although we are a little island we have big gobs and could have started spreading the word way before the US woke up.. This would have eased the world into 12Seconds and been a great way of flushing out the inevitable bugs before everybody rushed in..

The US could then have woken up with a massive 12Second alarm call..  Here in England it is now the end of the day and I have had the app sitting dormant and broken on my iPhone until only a short while ago.. All day out and about i have been checking it like it was a pacemaker and my life depended on it.. I won’t go into how frustrating that is. I initially thought the app had been launched broken.

I think my frustration stems only from my anticipation and the fact I knew it was a really important release as far as iPhone apps go.

Of course.. if i had taken a proper look at the text on the app store it would have told me I would have the app before it was going to work, but you know me.. Ever so slightly impatient when it comes to the release of new tech.

Still.. it has now sprung to life and I can actually talk about it. I dropped a tweet out yesterday mentioning it by accident but managed to delete it before I caused too much trouble. (Sorry Guys)..

So what are you waiting for?! The application cost a dollar (59p) it’s a bargain.

It is so straight forward. If you don’t have a 12Seconds account get one and then get the app.. Hell, why not get the app first! You can sign up through the app on the phone.

Once you have it.. Log in.. take three photos, add 12 seconds of audio and click to share it on the 12seconds site. It really is that easy you could do it drunk.. you no doubt will..

So if you are reading this as a noob and don’t know about 12Seconds.. get on it. Be it through the app or through the site..  I’ll see you there.

If you do download the app.. please review it and help the guys get the respect they deserve.

I have made some good friends through 12Seconds and I’m looking forward to making more. As soon as you are ready to go.. come let me know.. It may come as little surprise that I am on there as Documentally.

On the way.. down. on 12seconds.tv

Less is more: The 12 second blog killer

I am finding it easier and easier to just click record and speak my thoughts into some form or video blogging application.

It all began with Seesmic and now in addition (especially when wanting to cross post and use multimedia) I also use Phreadz. For live streaming (in my opinion), there is still only Qik.

The more I used these places the more I noticed a dip in my frequency to blog and podcast. It’s just too easy. If I have a question, thought, idea or master plan I would like to bounce off someone, I just press a button, speak my mind and before I have time to log out, I have an inbox full of answers replies and comments.

Coupled with the bind it can sometimes be to actually write a blog post and I am amazed these pages ever change.

Don’t get me wrong.. I love this Wordpress template. It has enabled me to cram all kinds of content onto the front page of my blog. It’s well laid out and easy to use.

Many of the settings lie dormant beneath the surface as I don’t feel the need to use all the whistles and bells at my disposal.

I love the integration of the images to highlight the articles on the front page but if I originally thought I would take my time to grow into this blog template, I am now finding that I’m taking too much time to do each blog. As a result I write less as I can’t just ‘bang out’ an idea and make it live. Not like I can when posting a video.

Just as I have massively reduced the production time on my podcasts by keeping it simple, maybe I can do the same here? Instead of having to upload two new and unique graphics every time I do a new blog, I think if I already have a selection of stock avatar-type images to link to on my server I am more likely to want to drop little ditties, thoughts and ideas onto a web page.

Sometimes I feel you have to worry less about how it looks in order to get the content out there. I guess I realized this a while ago. Maybe I just didn’t want to let go of my initial way of doing things.

Our Man Inside on 12seconds.tv
Now with the emergence if 12 seconds all hell has broken loose in my video blogging world. I’m not sure what it is that I find compelling.. Perhaps it’s fitting stuff within the time constraints.. Maybe it’s the distillation of peoples humour and the visual snippets of their lives? It’s all so easy to digest in small bitesize chunks without feeling that you should be doing something else.

No one rambles. There is no feeling of time-suck, your life ebbing away as you wait for someone to make their point. I guess this sounds selfish but when you surround yourself with creative minds, absorbing their media all day, everyday, be it blogs, podcasts or videos, you sometimes just want a mini media snack, not a full blown mind meal. If you do not limit the time you put aside to take all of this media in.. before you know it, the day has gone and you are wishing you turned off hours ago.

I don’t get that with 12 seconds, at least not at the moment.. Who knows where it will go. I guess I kind of like it being a different beast to the other places I frequent. If I want threaded conversation (..and i do.. often) I have those places. If I want a 12 second stand alone snippit.. it’s perfect.

Maybe we will soon see replies and threading, perhaps it will become more of a video-Plurk rather than a video-Twitter.

Part of me hopes not. Comments are enough for me right now and I think I would like to see 12seconds evolve along it’s own pedigree, not cross breed into another social media mongrel.

Only time will tell.

Phreadz and the New Media Expo

I was having a quiet night in on the net, flitting from one platform to another, posting a video here and a tweet there.

The chatter in the networks was all about the upcoming New Media Expo in Las Vegas. Having missed out on the Boston Podcamp while on a photo assignment I felt a pang of longing and posted this video..

Apparently I was not clutching at straws.. an hour later I was looking at an email from an anonymous donor pledging me the ticket money to the Vegas NME, providing I did what I said I was going to do, that is, utilise Phreadz in the perfect environment and demonstrate it’s potential.

Apparently there are some serious lurkers out there that really want Phreadz to be pushed more on the international tech circuit..

For me it’s a no-brainer. I have been a Phreadz Phanboy since February 08 It is the only thing on the web that does what it does.

Since I lost my Video blogging cherry to Seesmic I have dabbled in all kinds of online video platforms. Each have their own niches. If i want a large unknown mystery audience I post to seesmic. You never know what you may get back. If i am feeling spontaneous and creative i may blurt out a few 12 second video ditties on 12Seconds.tv

The thing that attracts me to Phreadz right now is its seemingly unlimited ability to show off any content I throw at it. If I want to post video, audio, photos, text links or even a slideshow presentation it will happily suck it all up in just about any format I can chuck at it. It can either be uploaded into the main time line or into one of the many custom channels that have been made.

Recently my very own Geeknbury festival had its own channel. I was really chuffed with this and the channel allowed this small geek festival to exist outside of the field it was born in and be enjoyed internationally. It even had its own musical continuation in the shape of a gig by Steve Lawson and Lobelia played and streamed from their very own living room right into the Geeknbury channel.

I don’t even need to sit here on my minimal countryside bandwidth waiting for files to upload as I can cross post with URLs from countless other video platforms including two of my favorites, Qik and Blip.

Where I feel most at home though is within the virtually instantaneous video conversations occurring across all channels, from either mobile or off my laptop.

Although still in a closed beta (soon to open wider, I hear), Phreadz founder Kosso, has not only concentrated on content but he has ensured community still plays a major part in Phreadz. Occasionally new channels appear out of the blue and, as users, we all quickly embrace another place we can express ourselves. After all, it is still the user who makes the content in Phreadz and because of this the conversations are always rich. Channels have allowed any exasperated rant or heartfelt tale to live side by side without content clashing, or meaning and context getting lost in the ever increasing flow of new and interesting dialogue.

One place on Phreadz I’ll be sure to spend some time next week will be the New Media Expo Channel, created as an experiment to cover The New Media Expo hosted in Las Vegas by brothers Tim and Emile Bouquin.

So although I will be in the channel, thanks to my mysterious ‘Angel’,  I will also actually be in Las Vegas, creating content, networking and showing anyone that loves new media an innovative tool that has not only indirectly given me this opportunity but that also inspires, homes and houses so much of my online existence.

The New Media Expo Channel is at http://newmediaexpo.phreadz.com and is open for all to see.

If you want to know more about Phreadz and want to join in with the beta testers, why not drop the site an email HERE

If you are an investor, contact the site as it is ripe and ready to take the net by storm, Kosso just needs smart folk with money.

And if you really want to help out right now.. make a donation to the chip-in on the front page here.. It’s worth it.

I am off to pack and charge geek stuff.. If you are going to the NME in Vegas let’s connect on Twitter

UPDATE: Anyone in Vegas sending New Media Expo content to nme@phreadz.com automatically gets an account!!