Streaming Media - October 2008 - (Page 58)

Ill.—Soglin and her support team file edited video reports from political hot spots including the presidential debates and the national political conventions. Citizen Kate recently attracted the support of Digital Fountain, which donated use of its new DF Splash video streaming technology. “We’re used to seeing our video on the Internet with a crappy YouTube look,” says Carey Lundin, founder and co-producer of Citizen Kate. “But now our video looks fantastic.” (Note: DF Splash does not yet support Macs.) Remixing the Election In March 2007, Phillip de Vellis’ “Vote Different,” a video mashup (i.e., a digital media file that recombines or modifies existing digital works to create a derivative work) targeting Hillary Clinton’s primary campaign based on Apple’s landmark 1984 MacIntosh ad, became the first political video of the 2008 campaign to go viral, attracting more than 5 million views. Three months later, Barely Political’s “I Got a Crush on Obama” video attracted more than 10 million views and made a national celebrity hosted under Fair Use.” (Note: One indication of the impact that video streaming may have on politics in countries other than the U.S. is the fact that Hidalgo was one of 10 people deported from China for live streaming from their phones during the Olympics.) Remix America hosts an extensive trove of rare, iconic American historical footage that is available for free download and use in video mashups. A community of volunteers throughout the country also records and uploads contemporary political video for later download and use by mashup artists. Budding and experienced remixers can use software designed by Kaltura, an open source platform for the creation and management of online video, to create and publish remixes online, at no cost, using the Remix America player. The hope is to spawn the next generation of video mashup artists in the mold of Michael Fox, Byron Valino, and Craig Meyer, creators of the widely praised remixes,“Baracky,” “Baracky II,” and “The Empire Strikes Barack.” Is the savvy, relatively affluent audience for political streaming video an ideal target for advertisers? That’s the unconventional video Remix America is hoping to build a community of politically minded video artists. Political Lunch streams a daily compendium of political video and syndicates it via iTunes, YouTube, Facebook, and blip.tv. out of its star, the mythical Obama Girl. The will.i.am “Yes We Can” video, based on Obama’s concession speech after the New Hampshire primary, has attracted more than 21 million views on YouTube since its debut in February 2008. These are among the most popular examples of a subgenre of political video mashups that are gaining traction in this election cycle. (JibJab’s Flash movie, “This Land is Your Land,” featuring animated caricatures of John Kerry and George W. Bush, attracted millions of viewers during the 2004 election cycle). Remix America, a nonprofit startup founded by Norman Lear this summer, is hoping to build a community of politically oriented video artists. One of Remix America’s attractions to video artists is that it provides a safe haven for mashups threatened with violating the Digital Millenium Copyright Act of 1998. “As people have become more irate over the past four years, we have found a small but dedicated community of remixers and mashup artists who want to be engaged,” says Noel Hidalgo, community manager at Remix America. “They needed a place where they could have all their video 58 STREAMING MEDIA October/November 2008 bet that a new subgenre of political streaming video hubs is making. One show new to the scene is Political Lunch (www.politicallunch.com), which streams a daily compendium of political video sourced from the worlds of broadcast and web TV. Hosted by Will Coghlan and Rob Millis and produced by New York-based Hudson Street Media, Political Lunch streamed live from the scene of both conventions. Like most political streaming video producers, Political Lunch extends its reach by maintaining a presence on streaming aggregators such as Veoh, blip.tv, and YouTube. It used to be that “home video” would have to find its way to a broadcast television station to have any political impact (e.g. the video of the Rodney King beating). No more. Today, cable TV networks solicit video from VBCJs for CNN’s "iReport" and Fox News’ "uReport." Political blogs such as The Huffington Post and Talking Points Memo now shoot and stream their own videos. Even traditional or “legacy” media have recognized the trend and are following their customers—or former customers— to the web. At the Denver convention, videographers from newspapers as well as television stations shot http://www.blip.tv http://www.politicallunch.com http://www.blip.tv

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Streaming Media - October 2008 Table of Contents Standard Time Technology and Business Trends by the Numbers Encoding for Screencams Meeting the Enterprise Video Distribution Challenge Pulling Back the Curtain on Level 3 The 2008 Streaming Media Readers’ Choice Award Winners The Ultimate Guide to Creating Online Video Content That Works, Part 1 Brave New Platforms Video From the Democratic National Convention—Both Official and Unofficial—Made Clear That It’s No Longer Politics as Usual Creative Suite Turns 4 The Future of Internet Radio Decoding the Truth About Hi-Def Video Production Educating the Next Generation of Online Media Makers ViewCast Niagara GoStream SURF The Past and Future of Online Video: I’m Not Dead Yet!

Streaming Media - October 2008

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