In the Field. Going Live! Tubefilter’s Live Event!

Tracy Pattin, host, SizzleintheMiddle

Busby’s nightclub was buzzing this past Monday night with  Tubefilter and the Hollywood Web Television Meetup:  Going LIVE!.

It was a lively (and of course very entertaining and streamed live) panel with Tubefilter’s Drew Baldwin, Coin-op TV’s Hailey Bright, Mahalo Daily’s Tyler Crowley, The Streaming.TV’s Brian Gramo, and Ooyala’s Bismark Lepe, about producing live television on the web. It’s called, “Live Streaming” and it looks like the next big web evolution.

So what does it take? Tubefilter’s Drew Baldwin says, “You have to be improvisational down to the last electrical cord.” Mahalo’s Tyler Crowley says, “People want live because is the easiest and best way to interact. Live is her to stay.”

So, what are the drawbacks of this new technology? Just that… It’s NEW technology. The Stream.TV’s Brian Gramo says, “The technology is still not perfect.” Assuring us that it will get there…in at most…3 years.

Of course the other big question of the evening was…you guessed it, “How do you monetize?” Bismark of Ooyala, says “It’s all about syndication.” He says he’s starting to see the networks “Open inventory to live stream.” The panel went on to talk about donating, sponsors and other ways to get “eyeballs to the site.”

One last bit of wise advice: ( that never seems to change) It all starts with content. Content is still king.

Check out the upcoming November Tubefilter meetup event

-Tracy Pattin

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In The Field. Digital Media Summit

Tracy Pattin, host, Sizzle in the Middle.com

When I think back to all the New Media events I’ve attended over the past year one thing is for certain in this uncertain world;  just as the world of New Media has expanded, so have the audiences. Seems now they are always at capacity. If this is any barometer, it looks like New Media/Digital Media/Social Media, Non-Traditional Media have reached critical mass.

We’re all hungrier to participate in cyberspace but we don’t know where this is all going. How to navigate it. How to make it work for us. Filled to capacity, The Digital Media Summit at UCLA this past summer addressed those concerns.

“Today is about the existing media structure and the disruptive technology that will change media as we know it”, said the event’s producer and founder, Michael Stroud.

This “disruptive technology” seems to be cutting a wider swath of disruption at an accelerated pace. “We are no longer in the demonstration phase” Stroud says. This is an interesting, exciting time for New Media, Social Media,  and Web 2.0 (about to be 3.0). Although we’re not in the demonstration phase, it seems we’re still theorizing, hypothesizing and trying to figure it all out.  And on everyone’s mind is one word, monetizing. It’s beginning to sound like one of those (old media) broken records. So the questions are “Where is New Media going? How will we and it, get there? And the biggest question, “How will we all make money when we’ve arrived?”
There are all kinds of predictions like, “video on demand will replace the DVD within the next 5 years and disruptive technology will completely change the entertainment business model.

The first panel addressed “Rising Above the Marketing Noise.” Marketing to increase immediate eyeballs and growing brands long-term. Andrew Lin of Miramax, says, “a lot of brands are advertising on the web and it’s a good place to be.” But there has to be a conduit for engaging the viewer. This is where the line is drawn between New Media and (old) Traditional Media. It’s about the “lean forward” instead of the old “lean back” way of watching movies and television. It’s also about getting the marketing message out. ” Then, there has to be a reason to share the message.” Joerg Bachmaier of Endemol USA says “companies make the mistake of creating content while ignoring user behavior.” He goes on to give the example of “Married” the successful MySpace show. “We invited users to the wedding” he points out.

Chris Di Cesare CMO of YouTube, says “Traditional TV media buyers are starting to have opportunities to buy on YouTube as they are integrating brands with content. But he says it’s still a word of mouth world. Digital Media is a new tool for that word of mouth.

YouTube’s Jordan Hoffner in his key note address says YouTube is signing deals with Hollywood but we have to bridge the gap between OLD and NEW media. Once we stop making the distinction, we’ll bridge that gap. Jordan went on to talk about the major Hollywood disruption and resistance to New Media. In other words; Controlling the assets. But isn’t this a complete contradiction? New Media/Social Media is about a leveled playing field. It’s about the democratization of information and creative content. It’s about viewer control in both entertainment and marketing. The viewers can make or break, en masse,  a show or company with the touch of a key.

The second panel answered the question, “Who Controls What Viewers Watch?”
The simple answer in these Social Media times is, the ViEWERS control what viewers watch(At least for now).  But, Hollywood would like to incorporate a pay to play strategy. Then the topic becomes, Pay vs. Free. Always ending up back at the overall topic; Monetization.

As far as marketing is concerned, people are reaching people through Social Media, but there has to be a reason for them to share a message.” So it’s still a word of mouth world, morphing into a word of MOUSE world.  As far as the monetizing, it’s about the audience and the audience is about good content but it’s more than that. It’s about engaging those viewers.

Hollywood executive, Curt Marvis of Lionsgate summed it up best when answering the question, “How do we create content for digital media?”It’s all about the marketing. It’s just like traditional media. You need a budget to make the movie then a budget to market it. This is the formula that has to be there with digital media.”

So there you have it. Maybe the answer is in the question:
“How do we converge New Media and Old Media?” Because it looks like (in some form) both are here to stay.

Check out iHollywood Forum for events throughout the year.

-Tracy Pattin

LA’s BlobLive Pitches a Winning Game

Tracy Pattin, host, Sizzle in the Middle.com

It was a night of great ideas, brainstorming and pitching at its best. “This is an open mic night for entrepreneurs” says BlobLive’s Erick Brownstein. “Tonight I’ve got BlobLive breaking news and big results about one idea pitcher. It was an when evening when only 12 people were in the audience. The entrepreneur shared his video platform idea. Turns out, someone in the audience was connected to The Huffington Post. Then he started working with them and from there? He’s in talks with the White House.”

So, that’s what can happen when you step onstage and present your dream.

Attending several BlobLive events these past months, I’ve seen a slew of ideas and projects at various stages, from the Green Christmas Tree, to the Solar DJ, to the guy who wants to transform the Hollywood Sign. Tonight was no exception.

First up, Solomon’s Movie Pals Open Cinema in its final stages, about to be launched. It’s a collaborative movie making internet site with the cyber audience participating in all aspects of production as voters decide on the process and finished piece. “It has to be a meritocracy though”, says Solomon, “The more you do the more you vote.” When he asked for feedback and suggestions there were lots of hands raised. “What about creating good endings to bad movies?” Someone suggested. “You mean like a heckle section?” So there it was. A new idea for this already fascinating project.

When the British guy jumped onstage, talking about “lovable rogues” and “white Boys with street smarts”, I was mesmerized, but didn’t know what to think. This idea within an idea, was a great example of showing instead of telling. Seems Julian Moss was portraying one of the characters in his movie. The charismatic filmmaker wants to help the homeless and mentally ill with his Community film idea. His movie “The White Boys” is almost finished. Now he needs marketing and distribution guidance. Tweets were lining up on the screen behind. “Great idea! Take it to film festivals.”

Every pitch was compelling! Todd did a pitch within a pitch, presenting his Stealth Auto idea to get ready for his appearance on new reality show, Shark Tank, where entrepreneurs pitch to investors on TV. “Todd will pimp your car” wrote a twitterer.

Pam’s Matchmaking Concierge, generated a great new name, Guydea (hopefully she’s bought the domain by now!), Terrence from USC’s Stevens Institute of Innovation , had a hologram idea.  And finally, the show stopper was 8 year old Lucy who pitched, “BlobLive for kids.” Hands shot up everywhere. This was a winner.

-Tracy Pattin

Then it hit me.  BlobLive is about the kid in all of us.

Upcoming LA New Media Events

Wednesday July 29. Digital Media Summit. UCLA. Los Angeles, CA.

In The Field….At PresentationCampLA

Tracy Pattin, SizzleintheMiddle.

Seems these “Camp” events are really taking off. From BarCamp to LaidOffCamp to PodCamp. PresentationCampLA (this past Saturday, June 20th at Blank Spaces) is a welcome addition to this lineup of unconferences.

So what is an UNconference? The premise is a dynamic, fluid format where participants participate in every aspect of the day, from designing the schedule to sharing their expertise, ideas and feedback and of course helping with clean-up.  There is no pre-arranged format or pre-booked instructors and best of all? No prohibitive cost. They’re either free or very affordable ($10-20) usually with a meal, coffee and snacks. (at BarCamp they even have a scotch tasting and a keg at the end of the day!).

This was my fourth Camp event and I’m hooked. So much so that I’m creating my own camp soon. Founder of PresentationCamp, author of Beyond Bullet Points and owner of BBP Media, Cliff Atkinson, kicked off the day explaining that this is a “self-organizing, collaborative event that is designed to be fun and rewarding with a focus on presentations and public speaking” (Co-facilitator, Colleen Wainwright added her own comedic flair to the intro). Then he threw it open to our group of 30-40 participants to introduce ourselves and share our expectations. This was an eclectic, impressive gathering from marketing executives, to life coaches, authors, tech experts, even a Hollywood acting coach dubbed “The Actor’s Detective.” Some flew in from other states. One woman was from New Zealand!

From there we created the day’s breakdown of 30 minute sessions listing the desired topics on a giant whiteboard. If you don’t want to attend a particular session, you can grab a corner, gather a few people and brainstorm and network with each other or create your own ad hoc session. “And remember”, Cliff reminded us, “you can always ‘vote with your feet.’ “Voting with your feet” means it’s okay to walk out of a session and check out another. No hard feelings.

The first session was with the entire group. A perfect entree to the day. Author Andy Goodman of “Why Bad Presentations Happen to Good Causes” spoke on how to give powerful powerpoint presentations. His unique hook? Research all based on what audiences say about speakers.

Then we broke into different tracks. Marketing mentor Peleg Top gave marketing tips, Terrence McNally taught storytelling, Jeanne Hartman shared improv techniques, Cliff Atkinson gave us insights on self-publishing and mainstream publishing, speaking coach Lisa Braithwaite showed us how to add fun to speeches. I decided to jump in too and shared my knowledge on interviewing and hosting for podcasts and web videos, while BlogHer’s Gena Haskett talked tech tips. Personal Training in Social Media Networking expert, Jodi Womack shared how to start networking groups as her Ojai Women’s Business Social is taking off. Husband and author/international speaker/presenter Jason Womak was our resident photographer, documenting the day.

Of course in true Social Media fashion, we were all tweeting away sharing our experiences with the cyber audience. Cliff gave a session on webinars interacting with that cyber audience.

The day came full circle as we came back around the conference table to debrief, (no long evaluation forms to fill out!) sharing what worked and what could have worked better. All in all, I’d say we all got what we came for. We learned a lot, shared our expertise, met great people, had fun and most likely gained new friends and colleagues for the long haul. Oh, and we all helped with clean-up!

So, look for the next PresentationCamp, any of the other Camps or who knows? Maybe you’ll create your own SomethingCamp!

-Tracy Pattin

In The Field…Another Great Evening of Idea Pitching

Tracy Pattin SizzleintheMiddle

BlobLive is one of the best New Media/Social Media events I’ve attended over the past month. There’s something exhilarating about a roomful of ideas and people passionate enough about them to take a risk, step onstage and share them with a live audience and a cyber-audience.

The live version of IdeaBlob.com, this pitching event begins with Erick Brownstein introducing the concept. “Each idea pitch gets 90 seconds. Then we open it up to the audience for suggestions and to the cyber-audience via Twitter.”

And this was no ordinary audience.

Tonight, at VLounge in Santa Monica, BlobLive is sponsored by Girls in Tech and Pinky Vodka . (We got pink gift bags with eyeshadow, blush and lip gloss and cool bottles of vodka!).

The pitch fest started with an intern internet company looking to go international. Then the Global Progress Specialist wants to help third world countries with mentoring and educational services. But the most interesting and most popular of the evening was the “Green” Christmas Tree, adorned with “Green” ornaments made with recycled materials ideally from children across the country created by Mark Venaglia The ultimate destination for the tree? Where else? The White House. The audience jumped in immediately to give suggestions. It was apparent, this was a winning idea.

This maverick “Steve McQueen” lookalike behind me, blurted out “Love your idea. I invest in new companies.” Clearly he was at BlobLive trolling for start-ups to invest in. That’s what makes this so exciting. Entrepreneur, Marty Stevens-Heebner (Half the sky Designs) was constantly at the mic with great feedback and contacts for every idea pitcher.  So, you never know who’s in the audience, but one thing is for sure, there are power players at every event.

As I marveled at this energizing exchange between idea pitchers and responders to those ideas, it suddenly occurred to me; This is just as much for the audience as it is for those onstage. It’s true creative community in action.

Check out the upcoming BlobLive monthly events.

Also this week:  The UCLA Entrepreneur Institute free seminar. (with UCLA Professor, Seasoned Entrepreneur and avid BlobLive participant, Dr. Dan Nathanson).

-Tracy Pattin

In The Field… Face to Face Face-Off with Facebook

Tracy Pattin, host, SizzleintheMiddle

“Social Media” is the buzz phrase of the moment. Everybody is Facebooking, Tweeting and Linking in on Linkedin at a frantic pace. I love this new way to connect, but I’ve discovered something. We still crave AND need human contact. Nothing has been more evident than the past two weeks with the plethora of events I’ve attended where real humans show up and interact with one another. (click here to read about the events) Judging by the huge turnouts, face to face contact is alive and well. Here’s the trick to all of this. We need both! “Meat space” (the real life physical world) AND cyberspace are key players for many of us. I guess as long we straddle both spaces, we’re okay. But the key here is balance.

Last week I went to one of those events. Heartlink is a “relaxed dinner/networking gathering for women. This unique experience enables you to meet women like yourself who help one another grow their business and strengthen their community.” After a great dinner (provided by a restauranteur and Heartlink member) Host Carolyn Ziel began the 3 minute introductions going around this circle of about 20 women. ” We all need to reach out. Each one of us has a dream to be realized. Being grounded in passion moves us forward” Carolyn said. As we went around the circle, each woman shared their dream and business with a lot of passion and humor.

I was amazed by the variety of expertise; reflexologist, mortgage broker, restauranteur, wealth coach, hand analyst, chiropractor/motivational fitness coach, life coach, executive sales consultant, bodyworker, even a woman who sells nutritional fruit and veggie “gummy bears.” All these women had interesting stories and all were about community and helping each other realize those dreams.

So whether we’re  Facebooking or Facing Each Other,  we need to remember, there is nothing like that real human contact. Afterall, we humans were here long before the internet was born.

You can easily find human contact events in your area by using…guess what? The internet. Go to Meetup.com, join a Facebook group or the other social media site groups.

-Tracy Pattin

In The Field… At The Writer’s Guild of America

Tracy Pattin, Host. Sizzle in the Middle

Last week I went to an excellent New Media event at the Writer’s Guild in Los Angeles, put on by New Media Interchange called, “From Camera to YouTube.” NMI’s  experts, Doug Welch and Michael Lawshe walked us through the process of creating a New Media project from initial recording to final placement on YouTube (or other video sharing sites).

Seems writers from Traditional Media are hungry to learn about this new way of distributing content. Of course, the Writer’s Strike of ‘08 was all about the complicated issues around this emerging medium and how writers need to get paid what their worth and for their content. Still, it’s clear we all have to jump into this new world and participate, otherwise we could miss some great opportunities.

The evening was kicked off by the WGA’s  Elizabeth Flack, who heads up their New Media department. Then, TV writer turned college professor, Roseanne Welch gave an inspired and impassioned speech about New Media’s opportunities for pro-active writers, referencing Diablo Coty  who went from blogger to Oscar winner.

Doug Welch gave a colorful demonstration on the unique pros and cons of the different types of cameras reassuring the audience that “it’s fiddly, but not all that complicated.” From the HD Cam to the Flip Camera, looks like there are many inexpensive ways to create a web movie, webisode or web video.

The key to the production process comes down to one important component; Sound. The audio must be as clean as possible. Video can get by with less than stellar quality, but if viewers can’t hear it, they’ll tune out (or click off!).

Enter top Warner Bros., Sound Supervisor and three time Emmy award winner, Michael Lawshe. “Audio is more than 1/2 of video” Michael says, making the point that in the production phase of a project, audio needs special attention. You can make do with mediocre video but if the sound is distorted or there’s a lot of background noise, there’s very little you can do. Doug chimed in with an easy rule of (sound) thumb; ” Just don’t record noise in the first place.”

So how do you get better audio? “Know your camera” Michael points out.  He went on to talk about external microphones and camera mics.

Then, they shared the steps and tips to editing and exporting with an important tip; “Think about your shoot before you begin.” Great advice in this new era of  on-the-fly production. The more prepared you are, the less time you’ll have to spend in a dark room, editing your project.

We learned how to upload to YouTube, how to imbed and distribute through one-stop-shop sites like TubeMogul where you can share your content easily and efficiently across cyberspace.

The evening ended with audience questions. I was amazed by the amount of technical questions like which editing software is the best, which is the preferred video streaming software, sharing and tagging and more slightly geeky questions!

Impressive and telling. I think New Media has reached critical mass and the marriage of new and not-so-new media is beginning to really take shape.

The best advice in how to get up to speed with this rapidly growing and changing world of technology comes from Doug Welch; “you just have to get out there and do it.” It’s not about perfection, it’s about action.

Check out New Media Interchange for the latest news, information and events.

I’m heading back in to the field this week for more New Media and Social Media events.

-Tracy Pattin

In The Field with Tracy Pattin- New Media and Social Media Travels Around LA

Tracy Pattin, Host. Sizzle in the Middle

This past week has been a week of High Geekery. I went to several New Media and Social Media events, starting with Dorkbot, where I helped Doug Welch (my treasured geek mentor) record the event. I’ve found that the best way to get up to speed with all of this high geekery and changing technology is to go to lots of events and talk to as many brainiac techies as possible. You can go to New Media events every day of the week. And last week, I did.

Thanks to the Dorkbot event, I now know how to Video Stream with U-Stream (well, sort of). The afternoon was a series of speakers in various stages of high tech development, like John Arroyo’s Remix Revolution, a composer’s dream. Where the original piece of music is transformed into various versions as musicians join in, in cyberspace to add their own musical take. Then there was a chess game to music, and Jeremy Douglass’s Playpower Keyboard and even a “Haunting” technology. I had no idea there were professional haunters, devoting their time to new creations for haunted houses. As I stood at the laptop keeping an eye on the video streaming for Doug, feeling out of my element, I realized I could absorb some of this heady technology just by keeping my mind open.

The next night was the wonderful Bloblive pitching event. What is Bloblive? It’s an open-mic night for people with ideas; speed dating for ideas; a fun and engaging networking event. Each person gets 90 seconds to pitch their idea, from new software and green companies to a litany of products and services. (I pitched ReinventCamp). Then they get professional feedback from CEOs, angel investors and other entrepreneurs on why it will work or why it won’t. The rest of the audience chimes in with ideas and suggestions. Twitter is on a big screen behind where the cyberspace participants are Tweeting up a brainstorm of their own ideas. Lisa Greenfield pitched her hand analysis company, MyTruthinHand.com, then there was a green company, Useless.org, a fitness motivation iPod looking gadget, the Simon watch and many others. All in all it’s a great opportunity for ideas at all stages.

The One-Coach event at Blank Spaces was a night of Social Media with a panel of experts even one via Skype in Ohio. Nate Kievman, a Linkedin Specialist, talked about Woovertising vs. Traditional Advertising. Woovertising is where consumers gain control of the conversation and shut the traditional advertiser out. Bryce Maddock of Task Us has gained 100 clients over the past months, all through Twitter. He’s convinced this is where the money is. Then there was Traffic is Gold’s Josh Landsberg, a branding and Twitter expert, echoing Bryce Maddock’s Twitter claim. Josh recently got an appearance on a radio show in Australia because of Twitter! And finally, Social Networking Capitalist, Michelle Price of A Third Mind New Media. She talked about the Social Network business plan and empowering “Thought Leaders.” The panel all agreed that the three Social Media giants, Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin are key places to spend your time in Cyberspace. Branding was the buzzword of the evening with the accelerated growth of Social Media and the masses setting up millions of virtual storefronts. Of course YouTube is a player in all of this as well. So, the word is, Social Media is very alive and well and growing by leaps and bounds and can be a profitable endeavor.

And finally, there was the Twitter breakfast put on by Ideablob’s Erick Brownstein. I thought I was an intermediate Tweeter. Not so. More like an advanced beginner after Erick’s great presentation. Seems there are many layers to Twitter just like all those other platforms. I learned that the power of Twitter is in all the search capabilities where you can reach out and find customers in your niche as well as Tweeting about having a toasted “everything” bagel with lite veggie cream cheese from the Bagel Broker and a Vanilla Chai Latte from Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf while reading Perez Hilton’s latest Hollywood gossip stories.

I can’t end with week without sharing some traditional media experiences. The AFTRA Mastery Panel on Healing As It Relates to Performance Mastery was a fascinating evening. Ending this productive and exhilarating week was the infamous Doug Welch Friday Coffee at the Grove/ Farmer’s market.

So, stay tuned for another week of New Media, Social Media and interesting human experiences along the way. Coming up on In The Field this week: The Writer’s Guild event “From Camera to YouTube” taught by New Media Interchange’s Doug Welch and any others I find.

-Tracy Pattin