Shame on MTV – Weird Al Censored!

Accordingto TechDirt, MTV’s new video site has decided it’s viewers are too prone to subliminal suggestion of lyrics and have BLEEPED out part of a Weird Al song!

The line “Like Morpheus or Grokster or Limewire or KaZa” from his tune “Download This Song”has all four website names BLEEPED!  Check it out…

[vodpod id=ExternalVideo.737665&w=425&h=350&fv=dist%3Dhttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.mtvmusic.com]

Forgot to Place Your Product – No Problem

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I met with someone from the giant media empire that is GroupM and he mentioned that they had begun to experiment with digitally implanting new product placements into existing content.

The example he gave with Jerry Seinfeld’s fridge, originally filled with Snapple, can now be shown in syndication to have anything in it from Coke to Budweiser.

This piece in SAI has some video from a UK company called MirriAd that does a similar thing.  The possibilities are endless – and a touch scary if these sorts of things were to scare one…

(sadly, snapple is not paying me to use their products in this post…)

On My Phone – More Video Please!

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The US lags way behind much of Asia and Europe when it comes to watching video on our cell phones (question: how many people need to ditch their landlines before we can just say “phone” and everyone know we mean “cell phone?”).

Mashable has a good look at what’s holding us back (technology, lack of rich content, etc.) and sees some hope in the future.

I think that wider adoption on mobile video viewing will come quickly, especially as handsets like the iPhone make the viewing process much more enjoyable.  The iPhone’s lack of Flash-compatibilty is the only thing that stops me from watching loads of videos online while I’m away from my laptop.

It would also be a great boon to producers and distributors of things like webseries that could automatically push new episodes to your phone much like you can have email pushed.

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Video Killed The Indie Film Star?

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It wasn’t all that long ago that the way every young director hoping to make his or her mark would make a short film and send it out on the festival circuit.

Of course, that was before YouTube made online video mainstream.  First, we saw a fair number of short films online but now, it seems, more folks are going the web-series route, to various levels of success.

The excellent Tilzy.tv have posts on two such indie webseries, CATACLYSMO and THE BICYCLIST.

“The two spent $20,000 making the web show [BICYCLIST], $30,000 making the movie, and they expect total costs to rise to $100,000 all told when the movie is marketed and distributed. That’s not much for say, a venture-backed web studio, but for folks who make a web show on weekends, it’s quite a bit of cash.”

Yup, and they’ve received fewer than 500,00 views for the series.  BUT that is one hell of a lot more bang for your buck than you’ll get at a minor film festival with your short film!

These days, you’d have to be crazy to think a film fest will be your route to the big times.

Strike.TV – Big Names and Big Ideas but Audiences?

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So, Strike.TV launched this week.  Founded during the WGA strike as a place for Hollywood creatives to flex their muscles, the site is now home to a huge list of original short-form web shows featuring everyone from SNL’s Kristen Wiig to TV vet Bob Newheart.

That would be big news except that it isn’t.  Having been up now for over a week I can tell you this much: not one single person in my life has mentioned a single one of these shows.  Why?  They had no idea they existed.

This is the big failure right now in online original video – nobody is bothering with true marketing.  You would never launch a show on NBC without marketing so why does everyone thing they can launch a show online, where it is noisier and more crowded (and one click away from porn!), with no marketing?

Viral is a myth.  Want proof?  Ask your friends if they’ve seen that new show from the people who bring you THE OFFICE (“House Poor”).  Spoiler Alert: They haven’t.

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Future Awesome – 3D Printers

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3D Printers are already starting to revolutionize the world and have been a big element is many of the sci-fi books of my youth.

Wondering how long before you have your very own 3D Printer?  Think about this:  a good 3D Printer today is about the same cost as a laser printer was in 1985.

“When the The Apple LaserWriter first hit the mass market in 1985, the desktop publishing revolution was born. With a starting price of $6995 the unit weighed a hefty 77 lb (35kg) and was 11.5 x 18.5 x 16.2 inches”

Sweet!

via

Microsoft Ads – A Big Pile of FAIL

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

It seems like a week doesn’t go by that Microsoft is trying yet another completely different approach to selling America on the Windows OS.

Whether it was blowing untold millions on a couple of awkward, less-than-funny spots with Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates himself or the embarrassing “I’m a PC” campaign that makes one wonder how much you have to bribe someone to admit the fact, it just seems that Microsoft can’t get out of their own way.

A big problem is how much better Apple seems to be at selling stuff.  Their ads are funny, elegant, catchy and hip – much like the products they’re touting.  Microsoft ads also suffer from having to sell something that even they seem to know is far from the greatest thing since sliced bread.

Now comes Microsoft’s last helping of FAIL – they’re combining the “I’m a PC” campaign with the oh-so 2006 edginess of user created videos.  The thing is, Microsoft isn’t just letting people record their incredibly uninspiring renditions of “I’m a PC” and post them to YouTube, they’re actually putting some of them on TV!

I guess the big question is, how completely directionless is your advertising when you can go from Jerry Seinfeld to Jerry Smith as your spokesperson in less than a couple of months?

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