Rocketboom: The Brave New Vlog that is Reshaping the Future of Media
The age of video blogging and “citizen journalism” is being led by Rocketboom. What is Rocketboom you ask? Rocketboom is a New York City-based vlog (video blog) that serves up Internet culture and other quirky topics in about the time it takes to boil an egg (about 3 to 5 minutes). This brainchild of former musician Andrew Baron was launched in October 2004, as an outgrowth of text-based Internet blogging. Episodes are anchored and co-written by comely, sharp-witted, aspiring actress, Amanda Congdon and are delivered Monday through Friday by 9am EST.Rocketboom fundamental business model was to build a substantial audience without worrying about generating revenue. This seems to have paid off. Rocketboom is now one of the premiere vlogs on the Internet with upwards of 130,000 daily viewers. Recent distribution via TiVo and Akimbo, which enables Web videos to be watched on TV, has further increased its reach. The content and composition of Rocketboom segments typically consists of any number of elements: stream-of-consciousness news vignettes, strange Internet media finds, tours of interesting businesses, haggling (but not purchasing) with street vendors over the price of pirated DVDs, or wandering the streets and asking a question like “Why is George Bush so awesome?.” Rocketboom strength is that it is raw, creative journalism that is not afraid to have an opinion, unlike stale mainstream news media. Congdon shoulders about half of the scriptwriting duties. She also finds the many of stories and takes on the tedious task of sifting through and researching audience submitted stories. To complete the Rocketboom formula, add Congdon’s aesthetic appeal, instant likeability, and quirky persona and you have a winner. Rocketboom is addicting. When asked about the future plans of Rocketboom, Congdon responded in an email:
“We're going to expand our correspondent list to include someone in almost every major city. We're also in the process of developing new shows and creating what we hope becomes a network of vlogs. All of the shows will have the Rocketboom "feel" but won't all be news anchor style.
For Rocketboom.com, which will always remain free of charge, we're working on a different kind of advertising model, one where the ads are at the end of the video and are worthwhile and interesting in their own right. That way people anticipate the ads, instead of dread them. We've been working on this prototype.
Here's an example: Rocketboom New Ad Prototype
The content is thus related to the ad, making the ad more powerful and the viewers happy. We find the viewers often comment more on the ad than the actual episode! So, yeah, we'll be making our own ads for companies. We'll also be auctioning off ad space (video only) on eBay. Only catch: We can do whatever we like with the brand of the company, who wins (porn companies will not be allowed to bid).”
The amazing thing about Rocketboom is that only costs about $25 to
create and produce an episode according to Baron’s blog, Dembot. Baron writes:“…if you can find or loan a camera, a computer and an Internet connection, you can very easily create work that will support itself at any size. The news story behind Rocketboom right now and the story for any other dreamers out there is the daunting magnitude in which our humongous monetary value has outpaced our tiny costs.”
What does Rocketboom mean? Congdon says that there is no funny story behind the name and that producer/director, Baron chose it back in 2004 because he just thought it had a nice ring to it, and liked the space theme. Rocketboom is much more than wildly popular vlog. It embodies the reality that current technology gives “citizen journalists” the means to launch their commentary across the media at nominal cost with the potential to achieve extraordinary results. Rocketboom is reshaping the future of media.
FYI…For all of you Rocketboom/Amanda Congdon fans, keep your eyes peeled for Congdon in CBS’s “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” on February 2, 2006. She will be appearing as herself in an episode, in which the killer watches Rocketboom only to discover she knows the truth about his case.
Check them out online: Rocketboom.com
Matt "A Face Made for Podcasts" Largo
posted by Matt Largo @ 9:16 AM
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The latest rumor to hit the press is that search engine juggernaut Google is engineering a strategic move into the lucrative MP3 music downloading arena. Analysts at Bear Stearns are wagering that Google may be in the process of developing a service to rival Apple iTunes. An analyst wrote the following in a recent client note:
next…Google Radio Network? It all seems to fit together in some strange way, doesn’t it? But wait! Don’t answer yet! There is another piece to the "Google Collective Unconscious". Google apparently has a voracious appetite for ‘dark fiber’. Sounds like the premise to a sci-fi horror flick, but it’s not as scary as it sounds, for now anyway. ‘Dark fiber’ is telecommunications speak for fiber-optic cable that has already been laid, but is not yet in use or “lit up” with the required optical communications hardware. Thousands of miles of dark fiber are available in the United States because of the telecom industry crash a few years ago, but there have been few takers because of the high costs of making it operational. Google is planning on being a major taker. The following information was gathered from a job posting on Google’s website, which read:
The technology to effectively provide streaming video content over the Internet has come a long way since late 1990’s. That is when the barriers of having enough horsepower and bandwidth in home PCs to support acceptable streaming video were broken. Providing worthwhile and compelling content that consumers will routinely incorporate into their media diet is the next hurdle for streaming video. Wi-FiTV is a streaming video portal that has taken the challenge by offering over 200 channels (I counted 209) of TV and some Web-only content from over 50 different countries. It also streams 50 audio-only channels of news and various musical genres from around the world. The moniker, “Wi-FiTV” was chosen a few years ago in anticipation of streaming video content over widely available Wi-Fi Internet connections. 
through the channels to see what Wi-FiTV was all about. There were channels from Albania, Pakistan, Serbia, Vietnam, the U.S., and the United Kingdom to name a few. Wi-FiTV serves up a variety of programming ranging including webcams aimed at barroom patrons, live talk shows, and assorted music video channels. The quality of the content was inconsistent, which is to be expected to a certain degree, since Wi-FiTV is acting as a conduit to deliver content from wide range of sources from amateur, public access video to rebroadcast content from existing television stations. Some of the channels had all the clarity of a circa-1975 video of Super 8mm Bigfoot footage, while others were pretty clear. After sampling a couple dozen channels over the course of few weeks, I was able to find some gems in the bunch like:
For those of you into Gaming or in the Gaming Industry and have attended E3 (the Electronic Entertainment Expo) in the past, this bit of news may come as bit of a downer for afficianados of the E3 babes at the booths. E3 draws tens of thousands of professionals to experience the future of interactive entertainment and apparently scantily clad women are not going to a part of the E3 future. A new rule has been added to the E3 exhibitor handbook and includes the following, which indicates that booth models wearing risqué outfits will soon be a thing of E3 history.
the Oscars was held in Las Vegas, Nevada. The emcee and host of the event, Greg Fitzsimmons focused on the symbiotic relationship between the Internet and pornography. "The Internet was completely funded by porn," he said from the stage of the 23rd annual AVN Awards Show. And if it wasn't for the Internet, he added, "you guys would be completely out of business". The entire audience, consisting of porn actors and adult entertainment magnates, like Jenna Jameson and Larry Flynt, roared with laughter. Fitzsimmons' joke isn't fiction. According to the Washington Post, online pornography, a $2.5 billion business and growing rapidly, pioneered such now-commonplace practices as streaming video, trading files and making online purchases. By comparison, sales of music downloads totaled $1.1 billion last year.
Mainstream companies almost never specify how much money they earn from the skin trade because they don't like to talk about it. It's obviously a huge, huge market, but mum's the word. The Porn industry has acted as kind a technology incubator for much of the technology that we're using now for less risque purposes. For instance, online "streaming video" is one major example of a technology that was driven by porn in its early days. While Hollywood is still struggling with how best to put its movies online, entire porn empires have been built by production companies selling streaming-video programs on the Internet.
Amid all of the recent controversy of Wal-Mart’s unfair treatment of its employees and it’s penchant for driving Mom & Pop businesses to the poor house, they make yet another fuck up. Check it…Can anyone explain how 
Scientists in Taiwan say they have bred three male pigs that glow in the dark. They claim that while other researchers have successfully bred partially fluorescent pigs, theirs are the only pigs in the world which are completely green inside and out. Even their heart and internal organs are green. The transgenic pigs were engineered by introducing genetic material from jellyfish into a normal pig embryo. The researchers hope the pigs will boost the island's stem cell research, as well as helping with the study of human disease.
(they basically injected fluorescent jellyfish green protein into embryonic pigs). Four of the female pigs became pregnant and three male piglets were born three months ago. In daylight, the pigs' eyes, teeth skin have a greenish hue. Research using the transgenic pigs will be much easier because the pig's genetic material is green and is very easy to spot. For instance, if some stem cells from a glow-in-the-dark pig are injected into some other animal, scientists can track how they develop without performing a biopsy or conducting other invasive tests. Creating these transgenic pigs was not simple, since many of the altered embryos failed to develop. Researchers hope the new, green pigs will mate with ordinary female pigs to create a new generation of transgenic pigs for use in human disease research.
I believe it was stardate 5131.4, the USS Enterprise, under the command of Captain James T. Kirk, encounters a curious ship of unusual design. Upon contact, the ship emits a transport beam and a mysterious woman appears to the Enterprise bridge. She stuns the entire crew using a bracelet-like device, then examines each of them, taking particular interest in Mr. Spock, so much so, she somehow removes his brain, then disappears. McCoy then fashions a device to remotely operate Spock's brainless body. 
and the electronic-based neuron transistors. The Institute scientists demonstrated their invention by controlling the movement of a living leech from their computer. First leeches, then mice, then dogs and cats, then people! 
There has been some considerable on and offline buzz recently about Emily Stern’s hasty departure from her role as Madonna in the Off-Broadway show Kabbalah, in which she appears partially nude for the last ten minutes of the satire. She has been playing the part of Madonna (yes…based on the actual Pop star, Madonna), who is one of the most visible celebs involved in this mystic Jewish form of study. Uhh…why does anyone care? Emily Stern is the 22-year-old daughter of Sirius Satellite Radio’s hot property, shock jock (some would say “savior”), Howard Stern. Emily was worried that enemies of her father would distribute pictures of her on the Internet. She said, 'My father basically told me that if I take the role, that his enemies would buy blocks of tickets, throw garbage at my vagina, take nude pictures of me and put them all over the Internet.' Howard Stern has spent most of his professional career objectifying women. Now it that there is a chance that his daughter could face the very treatment that is his trademark, he has a problem. Irony meets hipocrisy.
What was she thinking when she signed up? If she really didn’t want to generate any publicity concerning her connection to Howard Stern, she could have used a stage name. She could have come up with some clever anagram of her name like “Tyler Misen” that would have taken everyone, but word jumble nerds, a long time to decipher. The problem with using a stage name that doesn’t connect her with Howard Stern is that she cannot take advantage of his celebrity. No connection. No attention. You can’t have it both ways. Kabbalah was described in the New York Times as "dreadful," "mind-numbing" and "in bad taste." My guess is that Emily probably realized after several weeks of starring in Kabbalah and underwhelming people 136 seats at a time, that it wasn’t worth her time and energy and decided spin her departure into a publicity machine. The whole Madonna Kabbalah thing is only worth about a handful of one-liners at best, but an entire play?
The Flaming Lips are a perfect example of a band that has undergone a continuous metamorphosis from loud, Post-Punk, Indie Rockers to masters of lush, multi-layered, Psychedelia. Over the last twenty plus years, The Lips have succeeded in their musical and creative evolution without estranging their true fans. “The W.A.N.D.” is a teaser, digital release from their highly-anticipated, upcoming full-length album, At War with the Mystics, which will be released on April 4, 2006, on Warner Bros.
