Saturday / Sunday Slide: Smurf Shoe

Discovery. It is always illuminating and satisfying to discover something new, particularly new music, which is something I am almost constantly seeking. Thanks to Twitterer @bizaaron for tweeting about Freescha, an indie-electro duo based in San Fernando Valley, California.

Listen to this little ditty called Smurf Shoe. It is difficult to tell if this is an official music video or a fan-created video. Admittingly, the video is strange - in a good way, though.

One thing is certain: If you ain't shakin' your rump by the end of the video, check your pulse.

Saturday / Sunday Slide: BBtv Interviews the (other) Digital Archivist

Boing Boing, the technology and tech culture blog, recently interviewed a human rights digital archivist on its sister video website Boing Boing TV (BBtv, for short).

Popular tech writer Xeni Jardin interviewed WITNESS.ORG's Grace Lile, the human rights' organization's digital archivist in charge of organizing and preserving institutional and user-submitted human rights videos and images.

I mention this piece because I was surprised and pleased to see such an influential blog as Boing Boing mention the importance and necessity of a digital archivist in our digital information age. 

Moreover, I was equally surprised and pleased to hear Ms. Lile talk about raising awareness about human rights issues and its history; engaging the public; and soliciting the public to participate online by submitting stories and videos to Hub, an experimental website designed to be a "global platform for human rights media and action."

UPDATE: Grace Lile added a comment and provided the URL to WITNESS' Media Archive Blog.

Thanks, Grace. Check it out.

National Film Board of Canada Digitzing Its Collection

The National Film Board of Canada (NFB), Canada's public film producer and distributor, recently launched beta.NFB.ca, a website created to showcase the Film Board's wealth of films, documentaries, animated shorts, trailers, news clips, and other productions found in its 70 year old vaults.

According to the beta.NFB.ca website, whose "mission is to make these films accessible to all Canadians," there are so far 300 full-length films and clips digitized and ready to view on the website. Furthermore, beta.NFB.ca intends on adding more films every week. The website explains that this "project was facilitated by Canadian Culture Online, which has been helping us [NFB] to digitize our film collection since 2001."

Although the website is currently in proverbial Web 2.0 beta, the website nonetheless has some very promising and impressive Web 2.0 features. Besides offering high-quality streaming video, in addition to a robust hardware and software set-up (details here), the website has these notable user-centric features:

• Browse documentaries and animated films or search them by keyword search;


• Film selection is accompanied by a related films column (similar to YouTube) and a descriptive note by a Film Board curator, if available;


• Favorite films can be given a thumbs up (recommended) and shared with the social Web via such popular tools as delicious, Digg, StumbleUpon, or FaceBook, or be embedded in one's website or blog, or shared by email;


• Viewing history panel is available resembling a roll of film (some work could be done on this);


• Three RSS feeds;


• News blog updating site additons and changes.

The beta.NFB.ca website looks and feels very good. The black background color invokes a movie theater, highlighting the films. The website's main navigation is clean and simple with four primary categories. As the user drills down, more navigation choices emerge but thankfully remain simple on all levels. A reasonably rugged search engine is available, though I found browsing for films more successful and rewarding. Speaking of browsing, the labels attributed to the four categories are intuitive, though I would recommend replacing "Explore All Films" with "Browse All Films."

Overall, this is a very slick web production, one that Canadians should be proud of - and the rest of the world can thoroughly enjoy.

You think you know Canada, eh? Well spend a few minutes (or hours) here and you'll learn something new. Guaranteed.

The Birth of the Web Ego-Maniacs

I am noticing a troubling trend among the user-created content set. Don’t get me wrong, I am a strong supporter of user-created content, particularly when it is well-produced, entertaining, educational, and engaging and exhibits the fundamentals of Web 2.0 (social).

There are numerous websites (and more on the horizon, I bet) that enable users, like you and me, to publish our thoughts and ideas. There are blogs, naturally, wikis, photo-sharing sites, and, as broadband surges forward, the proliferation of podcasts and videoblogs.

Equipped with a laptop, web camera (or a camera-enabled cell phone), and a high-speed Internet connection, one can record shows or even broadcast live across the Web. There’s Youtube, of course, and there is Y!Live, Ustream.tv, Viddler, Vimeo, Qik, Kyte.tv, Flixwagon.com, and many more. All worth checking out, if you like.

But I am seeing a trend that I do not like among these websites:

First, I am seeing the same user faces across all these websites. It’s as though a dozen or so of these pro-bloggers or pro-vloggers are taking up much of the space and sadly with some less than stellar material. I don’t want to name names, although I assume some would not mind the additional attention.

Secondly, the material that is being produced, while "live" and "dynamic" (yeah, crossing the street, yeah), is for the most part pointless and trivial. Enough with the crap! You’re clogging up the arteries of the Internet with these narcissistic, self-indulgent videos.

Mind you, I am not condemning these top bloggers and vloggers, these shameless pluggers, because they are largely friendly folks with good intentions and some have found a recipe for success, being able to make a living off this new media lifestyle. These top vloggers have their good moments, true, but they should save their ramblings, pontifications, and walks through their basements and their freak-outs for their personal hard drives, not the Web.

Podcasts and New Media: Are they in your future?

Podcasting and other forms of new digital media are evolving and, I believe, entering the mainstream, as broadband connections and mobile computing proliferate.

Is your organization producing and publishing podcasts (or other forms of digital new media) to the Web?

With digital new media, I find, there is a unique intimacy between content creator and content consumer, unseen and unheard of before in my experience, in which the content consumer is not passive but rather active, communicating and networking with others in the community of listeners and/or viewers and in some cases influencing the direction of programming.

For example, Star Quest Production Network (SQPN), a Catholic new media organization founded by Father Roderick Vonhögen, a Roman Catholic priest based in Amersfoort, The Netherlands, produces and publishes family-friendly audio and video content to the web.

About a year ago, I blogged about SQPN, explaining how it was producing some very good, high-quality content that one could download to an iPod or other mp3 player.

Fast forward to today, and I am pleased to report that SQPN continues to produce more programming worthy of watching - and emulating in your own personal or professional context.

Its latest show is called "Grace Before Meals," a lively, funny, entertaining and educational cooking program hosted by Father Leo Patalinghug, a Catholic priest with a penchant for cooking practical and healthy meals (with a dose of the divine and a sprinkle of humor). Running time: Approx. 9 minutes.



What a fine piece of online media! With the proper tools and training, can you envision your organization creating podcasts and other digital new media?

Since You Asked...

A few people emailed me about my recent use of videos on The DIGITAL Archive. Well, actually, no one emailed me, but I think it is appropriate to talk a little more about the videos, or more specifically the video streaming services available online that I used.

Everyone knows about Youtube. I have a YouTube account and from time to time I upload a video or two.

However, I recently came across a new service called Viddler, which is like YouTube but without the clutter of copyright material. So far. Yes, for now, Viddler remains in a pure state: community-created content only.

But what really stands out for me in Viddler is the feature to comment on videos at specific frames along the video's timeline. One can post a text comment or video comment. A discreet overlay appears with either a text comment or video comment. Pretty neat. Plus, there is even an opportunity to monetize one's videos. Besides text and video comments, ads can appear as well. Like or hate it, ads on online content are hear to stay.

If interested, give Viddler a try.