Bwana.org » video

From An iPhone To A T-Mobile G1

Bwana — Sun, 03 May 2009 19:06:52 +0000

T-Mobile was gracious enough to supply me with a G1 review unit. I’ve been playing with it for about a week now and I’ve seen and learned quite a bit. A lot of people are curious about how it compares to the iPhone’s experience. It’s a hard question to answer directly, so I’m going to be producing a series of videos on Bwana.TV (my video blog) about the Android experience and some of the applications that are available. Unfortunately, I’m not able to purchase any applications since the review unit is tied to a separate account, but I’ll do what I can amongst the free applications.

So stay tuned to Bwana.TV for a bunch of T-Mobile G1 videos, and how it compares to the iPhone experience.

iPhone 3.0 Preview Reactions

Bwana — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 02:13:21 +0000

Today, I watched the Apple Live Event concerning the iPhone 3.0 software. Many things were discussed at the event as you can read online, but here are my reactions as I watched today:

Apple covered 3 out of 4 of my “must haves” list. That’s pretty good. The only thing they didn’t mention is Safari stability, but I’m still hoping it’s addressed in some fashion.

Now it’ll be interesting to see all the *new* reasons the haters will say the iPhone is garbage. Here’s to you, haters!

Three Features I Love In TweetDeck 0.21.5b

Bwana — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 16:48:29 +0000

TweetDeck launched a new minor revision today and given all the hype it had yesterday, I was little skeptical. After watching the detailed video on what the new features are, I was most impressed by the little changes than I was the major ones. Here is a video showing my 3 favorite new features:

Translate feature – I never thought I’d like this feature but the speed and convenience of it makes me want to use it more. One can easily (and I do stress easily) convert your tweets to another language OR translate an existing tweet to your language.
Shorten URL tweak – Often in TweetDeck, I’d forget to click the “Shorten” button after putting a URL in the “Shorten URL” box. TweetDeck added a little fix that will automatically shorten a URL in the box when you post the tweet. Little things
#Hashtag tweak – Finally, when you reply to someone who has a hashtag in their tweet, the same hashtag is automatically appended to your reply.

It all boils down to the little things. If only Adobe Air would solve their memory issues, TweetDeck would be a must have for everyone. I like the client so much that I restart it every other hour to compensate. At any rate, good job @TweetDeck on a finely tuned minor release!

Follow me on Twitter, I’m @Bwana.

Youtube Comments: Necessary, But Add No Value

Bwana — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 19:02:25 +0000

Youtube comments have a bad reputation. It is a well deserved rep, that cause many to ignore or even install custom software to avoid. It’s a playground for trolls, racists, and people who are mean spirited and want to get a rise out of content providers. In the midst of the cesspool of comments, there are usually some nice people who have genuine feedback to offer. I’m starting to pay more attention to Youtube, and the more I do, the more I find that people there don’t want to read:

Youtube is a video site and people treat it as such. There’s no reading in video! Just like millions of Americans loathe subtitled movies, millions of Youtube viewers will not read the comments.

Why is this an issue anyway?

Well, most of my videos are howtos, tutorials and Q&A, so I get a lot of followup questions on certain topics. Most times, the Youtube community is generous enough to answer, and so do I, but as time passes, the comments get buried.

Buried comments are generally ignored on Youtube.

That is the issue. Here’s a prime example:

I have a very popular video (#1 on Google Search) on how to create free iPhone ringtones simply by changing a file extension.
A common question that people ask is how do you “chop up” an existing song to make a ringtone. I’ve made a video on this topic and I’ve also answered the question numerous times in the Youtube comments.
As soon as the answer gets buried to page 2, the question is repeated.
It’s very annoying.

Do I fault Youtube users for ignoring the hundreds of comments that address their concern? I’d like to, but in reality, users have a short attention span, especially those who are attracted to 5 minute tutorial videos.

Why even bother with Youtube comments?

Youtube has a metric called “Most Discussed” which displays videos with the most comments. Some users like to watch videos that have a lot of comments. They don’t actually care what the comments are, but they measure a certain buzz factor by this metric. In my opinion, it’s an invalid metric to measure, but I’m by no means a Youtube authority.

So this is the double-edged sword with a barb wired handle: Hardly anyone pays attention to anything prior to the last 10 comments, yet the videos with the most comments, get more views. A big part of me would like to disable Youtube comments due to the fact that people don’t read them. Ironically, they will take time to send an email or Youtube message, rather than finding the answer in the comments. At the same time, I have to recognize that Youtube comments provide “juice” to your video and promote viewership. Notice how a lot of bigtime Youtube providers are encouraging their users to comment? This is why.

It’s ironic that I’m complaining about text comments on a video site, but if you produce videos like I do, you’ll find community interaction is pretty important. It’s sad that I have to constantly repeat the same answers over and over again due to this glaring issue, but at least users are watching. How about you? Does your Youtube community pay attention to comments past the first page?

Let me know in the comments

Youtube HD vs Facebook HD: You Be The Judge

Bwana — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 19:54:27 +0000

Here are embeds of the same source video on Facebook and Youtube. You be the judge on which you prefer:

Facebook:

Youtube:

I’ve noticed the Youtube embed looks better in full screen than the Facebook embed. It looks like the Facebook embed is not even HD! Does Facebook allow HD embeds? It sure doesn’t look like it. If you click through to the original Facebook video and make it full screen, you’ll see it looks a lot better than the embed. Are our HD videos truly free from the walled garden of Facebook? I don’t know. Granted, the Youtube HD embed requires a hack to the embed string to watch in HD, it still should be noted that there isn’t a way to embed the Facebook HD at all. If there is, please let me know in the comments.

As it stands, the Youtube solution is more attractive to me at the moment since I want the HD experience outside of the Youtube site. Plus, the Youtube community destroys the Facebook video community. I’m not sure why Youtube or Facebook won’t make the HD embed option a main feature. If DailyMotion can do it, why can’t they?

Doing The TWiT, Baby

Bwana — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 21:26:37 +0000

So Leo Laporte, internet superstar and ruler of podcasting, contacted me a couple of weeks ago to appear on This Week In Tech (TWiT) as a guest host. After I picked up my jaw and changed my underwear (in that order), I happily accepted and we completed the show last night (listen here). At first I was a bit intimidated with the guest panel most of which have had huge exposure though the likes of TechTV and most recently Revision3, but I did my best to hold my own with such a large panel. Leo thinks the show went well and extended the invitation for future shows, so that’s a good thing

For those of you who don’t know much about TWiT, it recently won the Podcast Award for Best Podcast in the Technology and Science category. Leo Laporte produces a multitude of shows under the TWiT branding that deal with all kinds of interesting topics. For more information, go to http://twit.tv.

Leo has done an excellent job of taking the home grown podcast/video cast hobby and made it professional. If you view his live stream on live.twit.tv, it’s hard to tell that the setup isn’t in a television studio. Leo uses a tricaster to perform many professional effects using an insane setup that I can only hope to dream about for Bwana.TV.

I’m glad to have experienced this colossal event with the new media juggernauts and am already seeing the benefits of such high exposure. My web server has been taking a pounding since it was plugged on the show and also my Twitter follower count has increased by almost 200 in less than 24 hours. Insane!

Thanks Leo and everyone at TWiT for such a wonderful experience and I look forward to future shows.

I also want to thank Chris Pirillo for helping me through his wide, wide network of listeners. I occasionally produce videos for his podcast, the Chris Pirillo Show. I don’t know if Chris contacted Leo, but if he did, I’m even more grateful. Now, I need to get off my lazy posterior and produce more episodes of Bwana.TV and Bwana.org Radio. Look for new videos tonight on Bwana.TV and a new Bwana.org Radio tomorrow (11/11) at 8:30PM EST. Both will be streamed live as I produce them at live.bwana.tv.

Doing the TWiT, baby.

R.I.P. VisualHub

Bwana — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 17:17:36 +0000

Most of you know, I do a video podcast/blog at bwana.tv. I often get complimented on the quality of the videos that I publish. These videos have a great look and do not have large file sizes. While I credit some of the high quality video to my camera (Canon Powershot TX1), I believe the bulk of the credit should go to VisualHub. I did a video on VisualHub back in April:

Click to Play

Yesterday, I learned that the company behind VisualHub, Techspansion, has decided to close its doors and discontinue VisualHub. Naturally, I was saddened by this decision since I use this program at least 5 times a week for my day to day video production. I’m going to continue to use VisualHub for as long as it works (think: software updates could break it without support) and attempt to find another solution in the meantime. The main thing I want to extract from VisualHub is the ffmpeg flags for most of the presets I use in the software. (My favorite is “All Devices” on the iTunes tab)

The power of VisualHub is not necessarily the internals, since most of them are open sourced, but the real power lies in the ease of use and the quality of the outcome. Video conversion can be intimidating and VisualHub made it painless and simple. I thank you, Techspansion, for making my life easier, and I’m sad to see you go.

Flickr Video: I like it.

Seesmic Enables Video Commenting

Bwana — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 05:02:20 +0000

Video blogging has been atop of my interests lately and while I haven’t found my video micro-blogging solution yet, I am experimenting with various video commenting solutions for my WordPress blog. I installed Viddler‘s wordpress plugin which allows video comments. It was easy to install and worked like a charm.

Today, Seesmic has announced a WordPress comment plugin which allows video integration with your WordPress blog. It allows you to:

Post a video blog post on your WordPress blog
Allow users to post video comments on blog posts

I’ve installed this plugin on this blog for the time being and I’ve found one feature that makes it very very useful: Anonymous video commenting. While the plugin does allow you to use your existing Seesmic credentials to post, most users may not want to create a Seesmic account just for a comment. I find this will encourage more users to post a video comment. On the flip side, it’s also a little scary that anonymous users can post a video comment @Critter on Twitter assures me that Seesmic video comments can be moderated just like regular WordPress comments, but I’m still a little scared as to what may fall in my moderation queue

All in all, Seesmic’s WordPress comment is a winner and now Viddler has a direct competitor in the form of video commenting on WordPress blogs. Which is better? I think it’s way too early to say. Both are easy to use, both are well integrated with WordPress, but Seesmic allows anonymous video comments which may be its main advantage. You be the judge. Want a Seesmic account? Check this out:

I don’t know if this is common knowledge, but if I were you, I’d jump on it! Feel free to leave a video comment on this blog post to test it out for yourself and also, to tell me what you think about Seesmic new WordPress plugin.

In Search Of A Video Micro-blogging Solution

Bwana — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 00:46:14 +0000

As we become spread out on the internet, we find that we have less time to concentrate on one thought. Over the years, we’ve created a new disease that I call IIADD which stands for I.nternet I.nduced A.ttention D.eficit D.isorder. I have it and if you’re reading this, you probably have it to. We can’t focus on one blog post, one web page, one application at a time. We tend to jump around from post to post, thought to thought, application to application, forever trying to satisfy our lust for more knowledge.

As a result, we’ve taken internet publishing to the “micro” level. We publish snippets of audio, text, and images on what we dub “micro-blogs”. This gives us an excuse to cherish and nurture our IIADD. “Hey, I just read this great post on TechCrunch… Ooo look, this Flickr image of a bird chasing its tail!… I need to record a podcast…Maybe I’ll eat spaghetti tonight…Ooo food network has a great recipe…Wow FriendFeed is weird, I need to get used to it…. I like turtles“. You know I what I mean.

Micro-blogging is the new black on the internets.

Micro-blogging is a form of blogging that allows users to write brief text updates (usually less than 200 characters) and publish them, either to be viewed by anyone or by a restricted group which can be chosen by the user. These messages can be submitted by a variety of means, including text messaging, instant messaging, email, MP3 or the web.
-Wikipedia

Although that’s a fairly accurate definition, Wikipedia failed to mention one medium: Video. As our dump trucks fill up with more and more information, we are able to push video media fairly easily these days. Youtube, Viddler, and Seesmic (and others not mentioned) allow us to record a video directly from our web browser. The only requirement is a webcam or camera connected to one’s computer.

I’ve decided to embrace video micro-blogging here on Bwana.org. Why? Believe it or not, I once vowed never to do online video, which is why I jokingly made my Bwana.TV motto, “..And you said it couldn’t be done”. Now I have a partnered Youtube channel and have produced hundreds of videos that are well received by the informationsphere. I also do live video streaming via Ustream.TV and stream my audio podcast production daily for the world to enjoy. I’ve decided to do this because video is where it’s at. Also, I’ve decided to go in this direction because my IIADD said so.

On Bwana.org’s main page, you’ll find a video on the top right. This idea was influenced by both Chris Pirillo, and the guys behind theleetgeeks.com (wirelesspacket, bluefox, 4four1ones). Chris embeds his live video stream on every page of his blog, chris.pirillo.com. As a result, his audience grows by leaps and bounds daily. I played with this idea many times, but never streamed consistently enough to make my show grow the same. The site, theleetgeeks.com, has a wonderful layout which I believe was led by a great web developer, bluefox. They have embedded a small video micro-entry on the top right of their page. After I saw that, I was influenced and began to think:

How can I do that on Bwana.org effectively?

My first thought was Seesmic. Seesmic’s sole purpose is video micro-blogging. It is there for you to record short snippets of video, Twitter style. There is one problem. Seesmic is in “beta”, more like “alpha” if you ask me. I do not agree with the interface and it still has work to be done. I’m not trying to knock Seesmic, it’s just I recognize it for what it is: A work in progress. With their acquisition of Twhirl already making waves on the almighty tubes, Seesmic has a bright future. I’ll be watching them closely. [Update: Seesmic was going through a hardware migration today which explained some of my issues. In that light, they still aren't ready for prime time, but I want to use them]

My next thought was Viddler. Viddler has proved to be a very reliable and flexible platform for publishing video. Their use of inline video commenting is nothing short of ground breaking. I uploaded a test video there today and gave it a shot. While it worked for the most part, I would have preferred a much more elegant solution for my WordPress blog. Namely, I want a simple tag to put in my template which shows a static video, or the latest video in a RSS feed (namely a feed based on a particular tag). This solution has potential, but some kinks need to be worked out to fit my workflow.

Finally, I moved to Flickr Video. Flickr does Video? Yeah. First, the limitations: 150MB file size and 90 seconds of video. My test video (after encoding/compression through VisualHub) came to 4.4MB and 32 seconds. Ok, that shouldn’t be a problem. The next task was ease of integration. The situation was almost identical to Viddler’s. I’d have to manually copy and paste (or later script) the embed code into an include file on my server to show the latest/desired video. Flickr video seems perfect for video micro-blogging as it forces you to condense your material like Twitter (140 characters or less). This solution is what I’m currently testing, but I’m not sure it’s my final one.

So what say you? What is the best video micro-blogging solution for you? I’m definitely open to new suggestions.

Flickr Video: I like it.

Bwana — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 03:23:12 +0000

I really don’t have reasons not to like it. It’s in the same category as Seesmic in terms of “video microblogging” from my point of view. I don’t really care about the 90 second limit on the video to be honest. I agree with Gruber in that Twitter is limited to 140 chars, so why can’t video be limited to 90 seconds? Time to be creative people! Don’t even start on the 150MB limitation. I was able to get a 12 minute video under 100MB using VisualHub for Mac, and I’m sure there are similar tools on the Windows and Linux platforms respectively. I’ve already gotten started:

I’ve also joined the “Fridget” meme mentioned on the Flickr blog post. iSobot ftw.

All videos shot with my Canon Powershot TX1 in 720p, and then converted down 640×352 using Visualhub.