“Do you read your newspapers online, or do you still buy the paper kind?”
Next weekend we are offering an advanced shooting course with TCA in DC.
I wanted to show some examples of the grammar of visual storytelling. At first I thought I would go down to Blockbuster to buy some DVDs (which shows you how old I am), but then I just went to Youtube, where you can find clips from just about every movie ever made (including the entire Beast From 20 Thousand Fathoms, my favorite movie when I was 9 years old).
I pulled clips from Sergio Leone’s masterpiece, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, along with the shower scene from Psycho and the monolith scene from 2001, A Space Odyssey. Â But there is everything there, in its entirety.
Lisa came into the room and saw the clip from Leone and suggested we watch the whole movie after dinner. Â We have routed a Mac Mini through our plasma screen in the living room and it was simple to call up Netflix.com and order a streaming version of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly just like that. In surround-sound no less.
Earlier in the day, I participated in a conference on The Future of News conducted by Minnesota Public Radio and streamed in from Minneapolis.
Now, here was the juxtaposition that made me think:
Right here, from my living room, I can cherry pick whatever I want to see or read or even participate in (even if it is 1200 miles away), from the convenience of my computer and screens. Â Yet the discussion in Minneapolis was dominated by the question of newspapers and ‘the news’.
“How can we cover important news stories”, was pretty much the constant theme. Â That is, how can we pay for (but no one talks about money at these things), continuing to cover stories that we (us journalists that is), think are important.
The web has shattered old institutions.
Blockbuster is one I can think of. Â Newspapers are another.
The reason the web has shattered them is that they no longer serve any purpose. Â No one needs them any longer.
Or wants them.
Or even thinks about them.
The question, raised in Minnesota, “how can we get young people to buy newspapers” is as pointless as asking “how can we get young people to go to Blockbuster to rent DVDs”.
Looking around the room in Minnesota, (this was streaming video), I could not help but notice that the room was filled with mostly post-middle aged white men, refugees from the dying world. Â The speakers (when you participate online you can google bios while people talk) were from the same group and most of them academics.
It was sad, in a way, to hear these folks grappling with a world they have known so well and for so long evaporating before their eyes, and not knowing what to do to save it.
“We need more support from the non-profit community for quality journalism”
“We need more support for investigative journalism”
“We need more support for hyperlocal journalism”.
The Good
The Bad
The Ugly
Journalism, I would argue, has never been healthier.
What is dying is the institutions that used to deliver it. Â The newspapers, the magazines and soon the TV networks.
Let them go.
Like the Blockbuster stores, they are dying because they no longer serve any purpose. There is no need for them. No one wants them. It is over.
But as I can plunge into my Mac Mini and find pretty much any movie I want any time I want to see it, so too can I plunge into my Mac Mini and find any news story I want, any time I want to see it.
And this is no bad thing.
14 Comments
Brooks Andrus November 24, 2009
@ pencilgod – Admittedly, most of my chops are in video post, motion-graphics and Flash programming, but maybe you didn’t stick around long enough to figure that out (if you put the quoted statement into context it was a reference to the amazing ability of Adobe Lightroom to fix / enhance your shots)? Oh right, I get it–you’re just out to cover your own insecurities by attempting to belittle and bully. Super cool.
Brooks Andrus November 20, 2009
Michael, as you’re seeing quite a bit of trolling, you might want to clamp down on anonymous comments. The trolls rarely add anything of value and you’ll soon learn that duking it out with them is pointless (Nino points out how no one gave a shit about his “blog” so he quickly gave up and moved on to acting like an ass anonymously on your site–do us a favor and return him to his natural state).
Michael, I fully recognize, that like all human beings you’re full of your fair share of b.s., but trolling anonymously is a tradition that the net savvy long ago gave up supporting–you certainly don’t need to put up with it.
I’ve enjoyed your perspective and commitment to posting regularly over the last year. For an “old media guy” you’re on the right path. Just as cable changed the game for the networks, the web is, and has, changed the game for almost everyone whether in television, music, book publishing, newspapers, or, gasp, software development. Claiming otherwise in the face of overwhelming evidence (plummeting revenues across the board and massive cultural media consumption shifts) is just, well, evidence of overwhelming obtuseness.
@Nino – I’m sure there were plenty of scribes with technical chops getting paid years after Gutenberg changed the game with the printing press. That didn’t alter the fact that, as a scribe, the game was up. Publishing video is accessible to anyone. Cameras are cheap. Software is cheap. Trade secrets are shared openly on the web. More people will be producing an every widening variety of content and a good chunk of will be awesome. If you’re smart and good you will still figure out how to get paid. Chances are slim that ten years from now the average media technologist will be working for the same old goats that have alway paid his / her bills. Get over it. Now please let us know who the hell you are and try to add value to the dialog rather than pissing and shitting all over the place.
pencilgod November 22, 2009
“If your anything like me you have a good camera but no idea how to use it†Brook Andrus
Oh yeah, after that ringing self endorsement you bet I’m going to listen to you for camera industry advice. 🙂
Avery November 18, 2009
Heres another one… professional web site and blog that is.
http://philipbloom.co.uk/
This guy is great, lots of useful information.
Michael Rosenblum November 18, 2009
Since you asked
I think that this is one of the best photography/video sites in the world.
http://mediastorm.org/
and you’ll note there’s a blog section.
Michael Rosenblum November 18, 2009
Drove 470 miles. Then drove back. Jeez. I would fly. As a matter of fact, I just dropped $3500 at a charity auction last night for Cancer Survivors on a net jets prize. SOunds like you could use it. Maybe you wanna take it off my hands? I guess I don’t understand the difference between a social blog and a ‘real professional web site’. Most ‘real professional web sites’ that I go to allow feedback and comment. Even The New York Times (pretty professional, I think) allows comments. I always thought that community was the core of the web. But then again, I guess you understand the online world much better than I do, having discovered Youtube so many years ago and all.
Nino November 18, 2009
It’s usually my call, they pay for whatever I decide. Florida is a big state. The nearest airport is still two hours away from the location and there are no direct flights meaning making a connection usually in Atlanta. By the time we pack gears, then we have to rent a van at the other end, is worth just to drive. My son and I take turns so it isn’t too bad. Our work van is an entertainment center equipped with all the toys and comforts, we even have a small espresso machine that plugs into the cigarette lighter.
Nino November 18, 2009
Find me any photographer or video production site that has a talk back section and I model from it.
I had a blog for one year, just as you asked for, but you never came on.
The problem with Yourtube was and still is for SD work, the compression quality was just awful, it was no reason for a professional to use as the quality was very unprofessional. There are many other “paid” hosting sites that have high quality. The open exposure was meaningless as no client would ever go to youtube to look for someone to hire and I have never heard of anyone getting jobs from Youtube.
The key word is “free” and now that they are at the same quality level as the other hosting services is worth to use. There are many client that still prefer not to post any work we do for them on these sites. We don’t make any money from Youtube and could care less about the exposure, by the time it gets posted there we’ve already got paid.
Michael Rosenblum November 18, 2009
Man, that was really fast!
Aren’t you working today?
In any event, when am I gonna be able to post my comments on your website, that’s what I wanna know.
Nino November 18, 2009
I fully understand the need to move your embarrassment away from your home court. But you still need to understand the difference between a social blog like this one and a real professional web site. The only talk that I accept on my web site is either hire me or don’t bother me.
I also accept your gesture on the magazine front cover, deeply inside I know I deserve it.
I have the day off, I got home at 1:30 this morning. I drove Monday 470 miles to do a four hours assignment on Tuesday then drove back right after. I’m sick and tired of hotels. You’re right, is insane to pay me over $4.5K for what will end up being about five minutes of air time. But is also a compliment that they can’t find anybody to meet their need within 500 miles and are willing to pay me this much, and believe me, they tried but always come back this way.
Something for your followers to think about when I say learn the right way and diversify.
Michael Rosenblum November 18, 2009
And I see you just discovered Youtube
http://www.b-roll.net/forum/showthread.php?t=24565
Well, will wonders never cease.
I guess it’s official. Everyone now knows about Youtube.
Nino November 18, 2009
No Michael, YOU just discovered Youtube and make all kind of noises about it. If you look back you’ll see that I discovered Youtube long before you ever knew it existed. It’s a hosting services, that’s all it is. I also use a half a dozen of other hosting services. Their compression quality went from being the worst to a real good one, I can assure you that all the other will follow quickly.
You still don’t get it, everything that you just discover and consider innovation has been daily routine for us, been there and done that.
Youtube doesn’t generate any income, it’s a tool to host material that already generated income from other sources; just like Photobucket and other photo hosting services. The advantage of Youtube is that’s free. We also use several other hosting service that are not accessible to the public to communicate back and forth with our clients.
So what all this has to do with the posts above like everything that you say is a mystery that will go unresolved, just another of your notorious diversions when you don’t have an answer.
Nino November 18, 2009
Michael, you are like the guy on the street corner walking around with the sign “the world will end tomorrowâ€. In your case “television is finished†the web is taking over.
https://www.rosenblumtv.com/?p=3758 TV – It’s Now Officially Over
Of course you probably are one of those guys that are too busy to pay attention to details, but how will the web pay for these programs when nobody on the web is paying?
The business model for the web in his present form is anti-business, unless of course you are one of the big guys like Google is.
Very few other sites generate any revenue to even support itself, never mind investing into programming, unless by programming you are referring to a pair of feet walking on the beach in key west.
The reality is that unless there’s television there would be no programs because there would be no money.
Cable networks enjoy a subscriber’s revenue sharing based on the number of household receiving that particular channel. As example, ESPN is in over 90 million homes and they receive about $4 each month from each subscriber. This is a sure monthly revenue of apx. 360 millions before they even start talking about advertisers, sponsorships and licensing.
What you are referring to when you are talking about these TV programs appearing on the web is “after market†revenue. The same that until now you can buy an entire season of just about any TV shows at BestBuy of about $19.00, or you can find them on i-Tune.
When you are talking about the end of television and newspapers might as well refer to as the end of the most popular web sites too because is spite of the newspapers slowly dying they are still supporting their own web site with the revenue generates by the newspapers as all these brains that have been driving everybody to the web still haven’t figured out of to make money form it, subsequently nobody is making money on the web. And BTW, the greatest increase in web viewership goes to the newspaper web sites, the very same web sites that would cease to exist if the newspapers would go out of business, so you can see how faulty the entire system is.
You guys better stop having these meeting on content and news strategies and start getting together with advertisers and business people on how to make the web turn around and become profitable, because this world evolves around money and without it everything comes to a halt.
You have these guys all worked up because advertising investment on the web is up so they all think that there’s money to be made there. But you never mention that while on TV the advertising dollar is shared by about 20 companies that owns the bulk TV cable and broadcasting, on the web there are millions of web sites going after those dollars.
Nobody really knows the number of active web sites, could be billions. The rough estimate is that every minute in the world there are over 10,000 new web sites being started, and they all hope to get some of those advertising dollars.
The odds of making money on the web in it’s present form are probably just as good as buying a PowerBall ticket.
Avery November 17, 2009
Michael all this talk about the death of TV Networks and newspapers and such just shows how far out of touch you must be.
If you haven’t learned by now that people will only watch well lit and perfectly composed video then I’m afraid you never will. Only those who have dedicated years of learning and spent large piles of money on schooling will and in fact should be, the sole, content producers.
So, my advice to you is to quit sounding the death knell of… how did you put it? Oh yes, “dying institutionsâ€.
I mean, come on, if what you are advocating is the future then how come YouTube just came out with “YouTube Direct�
Wait a minute… YouTube says that with this new service:
“News organizations can ask for citizen reporting; nonprofits can call-out for support videos around social campaigns; businesses can ask users to submit promotional videos about your brand. With YouTube Direct, the opportunities to connect directly with the YouTube community are endless.â€
Here is the video pitch from YT: http://tinyurl.com/deathknelloftheindustry
Well, Im sure no one will want to watch that stuff so like I said, you must be out of touch ; )