Video on the Net: The Personal Recap

As with all things web media, it seems like the residual energy from a major event like VON is yet another "snack-based" item, something that dissipates quicker than it should.

It's logical, considering there are another 20 items vying for my attention the day I step off the plane and return to my "normal" life. But, fortunately, that residual energy doesn't fade away completely; it just wanes, ever so slowly, while my attentions are diverted.

So, before the memories fade completely, let me regale you with my personal recollection of the event. Will this be instructive? Doubtful. Will it make you wish you were there? Quite possibly.

I Love People

I'm a social guy. Drop me in a room full of interesting people and I'll find a million ways to amuse myself.

I'm not always the chattiest guy, nor am I someone who feels compelled to meet everyone within eyesight, but I do enjoy finding out what makes people tick.

At VON, I was fortunate to spend most of my time with people I either already knew and valued, or people I met and grew to appreciate in a very short amount of time.

Old Faces

- Chris Brogan, who made the world go 'round

- Jeff Pulver, who provided the gravity (and the raison d'etre)

- Steve Garfield, who continues to pioneer strange and wonderful new ways to use new media

- Brian Conley of Alive in Baghdad, who continues to strike fear in the hearts of insincere videobloggers everywhere

- Jim Kirks of The Clip Show, who remains one of the web's best "undiscovered" personalities

- Michael Bailey of MobaSoft, who has become nearly ubiquitous on the new media social scene. If there's a podcasting event, chances are Michael is on the guest list.

New Faces

- Clintus McGintus, who went from complete stranger to "my roommate" in the span of five minutes. One of the nicest human beings I've ever met, and without an ounce of pretense to muddy the picture. Great guy.

- Sarah Atwood, one half of Nontourage and co-star of the short-lived (but perhaps resuscitatable?) Vloggy-winning podcast Almost There. The female foil for many male egos in San Jose, Sarah proved her worth to the firm time and again.

- Grace Piper, whose Fearless Cooking podcast is truly the work of a woman to be reckoned with. Especially if you're a squid. (AKA Winner of $200 in a hit-and-run poker game at the after-party...)

- Jim Long, whose 17 years of experience as an NBC cameraman have prepared him well for this world of on-the-fly information gathering. Smart, friendly and self-deprecating to a fault.

- Casey McKinnon, the female half of Galacticast. (We'd actually met at PodCamp Boston, but I wasn't in the business of being memorable at that time.)

- French Maid TV's Tim Street, whom I'd also met at the Yahoo Halloween party in October. (Again, I tend to blend in quietly unless provoked.)

- Roxanne Darling, star of Beach Walks with Rox, who is every bit as calming and visibly wise in person as she is when following nature's paths in Hawaii.

- Schlomo Rabinowitz, "enabler to the podcasting stars of tomorrow." Also knows the right time for shots of Jameson. (Answer: always.)

- Toronto podcaster Vergel Evans, who was easily the silver medalist behind Clintus in the "nicest guy / happiest to be here" 100 metre dash.

- YouTube juggernaut Mark Day, who's nowhere near as blood-curdlingly intimidating as I expected him to be when left alone with him for the better part of an hour. Turns out all he needs is a good chaperone through the technological landscape and he's content.

- Nick Douglas, vlogstar of Look Shiny. We thought for quite awhile that we knew each other. Nope. Just turns out I'd seen Look Shiny recently and thought I knew him. You get that a lot in web video...

- Scott Simpson of iTunes, who -- in addition to being generally hilarious in a completely deadpan manner -- told what shall go down in history as, easily, the most paralyzingly funny story at the VON "after-party" circuit. I've tried replicating the moment with several audiences myself and failed; Scott sets a new bar for "dry delivery."

There were dozens of other folks I had a great time with, and whose brains I picked endlessly for some truly fascinating conversations. But many of them are executives or lawyers or other "behind-the-scenes" people, so I'll spare them the association with a blog post that's shaping up to be more "Entertainment Tonight" than "Inside the Actor's Studio."

If I've failed to mention any of the other wonderful people I met and enjoyed the company of at VON, by all means, consider yourselves lucky to remain anonymous.

The Inside Stuff

So, wondering what exactly goes on among a group of half-drunk pseudo-celebrities such as ourselves at an event like this? Here are, in no particular order -- and in no way guaranteed to make complete sense -- what I recall as some of the highlights of my week in San Jose:

- Arrive in San Jose. Make my way to the hotel. Bump into Steve Garfield, Blip TV's Dina Kaplan and others in the hallway outside the "beta party" suite. Dina talks to me for a few sentences before we both realize she doesn't recognize me. Last time we hung out, my hair was about 6 inches shorter. It takes Garfield, who'd lost his voice after SXSW, to explain who I was in pantomime.

- Pulver party suite: booze, piano, poker. Lots of food. Lots more liquor, mostly in people. People who are playing Dance Dance Revolution and Guitar Hero...

- I'm supposed to share a speaking slot with Garfield and Conley. We ask each other what we intend to speak about.

Garfield? The ease and impact of videoblogging with consumer-level equipment.

Kownacki? How to create engaging, sustainable episodic content.

Conley? "I'm just gonna walk up there, kick over the podium and let them all know they're full of shit."

Sounds like a well-rounded presentation...

- At VON, looking for a plug for my laptop. The only one I can find is being occupied by BuzzMachine's Jeff Jarvis. I momentarily consider asking if I can share his outlet, but some obscure form of "don't talk to the A-listers" stigma prevents me from doing so -- which is odd, considering Jarvis is quite a normal guy. Instead, I blog from the presentation room floor until my battery dies, while Jarvis makes small talk with VON honcho (and raconteur) Andrew Lipson -- not even using the computer that's plugged in.

- Wednesday morning. 11 AM. Garfield, Conley and I are due to speak in 15 minutes. My cell phone rings. It's Conley.

"Where are you?" I ask.

"Walking over from the hotel. I never set the alarm. Where is everybody?"

"Waiting for you to speak."

"Oh... Is there any juice?"

- Walking to a nearby Mexican restaurant on a beautiful spring evening with Kirks and Atwood. Says Kirks, apropos of nothing and with complete contentment, "We're gonna die tonight." This strikes all three of us as being perfectly agreeable.

- Never one to look a gift premonition in the mouth, we later find ourselves (and several of the others mentioned above) standing in a Jack-in-the-Box at 2 AM in the part of town that, it can charitably be said, "is where you get shot."

Never before has Michael Bailey taken SO LONG to open a straw wrapper. Seriously. The entire time, all that's going through my mind is the donut shop scene from Boogie Nights. Fortunately, we escape unscathed...

- A cheerful homeless guy asked us if we had "$100,000." As Jim Kirks noted, that's a bum with aspirations.

- Discussing (and toasting to) agnosticism with Conley and McKinnon as the "little people" at VON -- the actual service workers at the convention center, who REALLY make the event happen -- worked their tails off around us.

- Clintus's shrewd manner of ordering rounds of tequila shots when no one's looking. (Somewhere, never to be Flickr'd, there's a photograph of Atwood doing the tango with a parking meter...)

- Upon cashing out from the Mexican place (Chacho's, I now recall), we eyeballed the check. $1,400? $1,200 of which was for alcohol? Our stomachs dropped.

"How many tequila shots did you ORDER?"

"Who's got Pulver's number?"

Fortunately, the error was soon spotted: the cashier had accidentally cashed out the ENTIRE OPEN BAR to our party. Whoops. Situation amended, no bail money needed.

- Observation from Scott Simpson: "If a plane is allowed to fly lower than 500 feet above your downtown, you don't actually live in a city."

- When I die, I want to come back as Jim Kirks's hair. It's uncanny. That sh*t could survive a wind tunnel unscathed.

- And, of course, my now semi-legendary "drunken fan moment" involving the Pitt men's basketball team.

In Closing

Perhaps the signature moment of the entire week came at the end, when the roll call was down to me, Sarah Atwood and Grace Piper as the only three entities left behind after the masses had flown home.

My flight wasn't until 10:45 PM, so I crashed in Atwood's hotel room and watched some NCAA basketball while she labeled Flickr photos. We'd agreed to grab Grace for one final drink before I hit the road to the airport.

At halftime of the Pitt / UCLA game, we headed down to the bar. I texted Grace on the way:

"Drinks @ Fairmont."

Within seconds, she texted back:

"Already in bath with martini. Good luck!"

Rock stars. We may not yet be them, but for a few weeks every year, we can certainly live like them...

Crosspost: STBD / VON on Geek Riot

On Sunday night, Shawn and Justine at Geek Riot invited me to talk about the STBD relaunch and my experiences at VON.

Joining us for the first hour of the show is Jeff Pulver, VON creator, who also talks about his Video on the Net Alliance and its impending battle to preserve web video from the prying eyes of the FCC.

It's a good all-around show, and features a healthy mix of STBD and VON topics. The whole enchilada clocks in around 2 hours (!), but you can stream and skim if you so desire.

(And yes, I know I posted this at the STBD blog too. Sometimes, there's an overlap. Other times, there are cupcakes. We adapt.)

VON: The Industry Perspective

I don't proclaim to know everything there is to know about our industry. If I did, I'd have retired by now.

But I do know a lot about the content creator's side of the story, and I got a much better perspective of how we're perceived -- and where our industry is heading -- at VON.

Bright, Shiny Things

Six months ago, I said "it's frustrating to be one of the only people in the room (at VON) that gets it."

"It" was the potential of web video, and the other people in the room were primarily old media representatives trying to figure out how to do old things with new media. The possibilities were endless, but they were only interested in looking at it from the pre-existing standpoint of control and monetization, without seeing the bigger picture.

Now, we content creators are no longer the shaggy, ill-portending strangers we may have been percieved as previously. Instead, people recognize that we're here to stay, and that we've earned a place at the table (which we've essentially built ourselves, so thank you).

In one way, we're the bright, shiny things in the room. Everyone else is attracted to our potential, but no one's really sure what to do with us -- or what we CAN do -- yet.

Neither are we.

The Downside

The bulk of the presentations I saw were directed at existing industry employees looking to monetize the space.

This makes absolute sense, because that's who the conference is for. And, without someone finding a way to monetize web video, it won't grow past the YouTube stage anytime soon.

The frustrating part is, listening to a pack of industry "experts" sharing their viewpoints -- and frequently exchanging information that seems flat-out pointless -- does nothing to boost morale among those of us looking to disrupt the playing field. It actually worries me that people are spending this much time, effort and money to NOT get ahead of the curve.

Example: a gentleman from Nielsen was invited to give a presentation on audience metrics. Despite assurances that this man was chock-full of vital information, the six of us from the content creator side could not believe the words coming out of the man's mouth. As any of us will tell you, the high point came in the following quote:

"The bad news is, homes with broadband connections are watching less television."

Um... Bad news for who? Those of us already creating content in this space or those in the industry who still think "Must-See TV" is the cutting edge?

(More alarming: given that the event was called "Video on the Net," who exactly was that comment directed at? The people who see video as a necessary evil, or another task they have to channel into their workflow? Was this conference seen by some as a warning rather than an opportunity?)

Suffice it to say, that kind of talk left a few of us out of the loop on occasion.

The Upside

It's always great to see so many content producers in one spot. Anytime this occurs, a few things happen:

- Old friendships are rekindled
- New friendships are begun
- Information about HOW we do what we do is exchanged, improving everyone's work, and
- New ideas are generated through conversations you just can't have electronically

At an event like this, you also get to take a peek at the new technologies coming down the pipeline and wonder, "What COULD we do with something like this?"

I met so many great people at VON that I don't want to slight anyone by choosing favorites. However, there are three companies whose services stuck in my mind:

- VideoEgg is a service that enables video producers to embed clickable ads in an overlay channel, similar to watching a football game and seeing an ad for the network's news show pop up at the bottom of the screen. Except, in this case, it's clickable. Could be a great alternative to post-roll advertisements. They also offer distribution options through a network of affiliate channels.

- Visible Measures was the exception to the "metrics" rule. These folks understand what we content producers ACTUALLY want: comprehensive understanding of how our audience interacts with our media.

In this case, their systems can analyze every frame of your video and tell you which sections have the highest drop-off rates and which ones are rewound and rewatched the most. Forget "number of plays" -- now you can chart individual interactions on a second-by-second basis. Partner tyhis with an ad overlay service (like VideoEgg) and now you have a marketing weapon.

- Bubble PLY, by PLY Media, is the wild card. I'm most interested in them because, quite simply, I don't think they've yet understood the full potential of their own software.

In a nutshell, this is the interactive web video version of "Pop Up Video": content creators can allow visitors to overlay their own word balloons, thought bubbles and caption boxes atop existing video, thereby changing the content directly by adding a pseudo-narration... or a self-mocking tone... or vital statistics... or trivia... or advertisements... or easter eggs...

The sky's the limit here, and this is one of the first ways I've seen that we at STBD, for example, could open the doors to our audience and allow them to tinker with our "finished product" (i.e., each new episode). We're in discussions with the folks at PLY to see how best we can make this happen. Look for a mini-announcement in the next week.

Summary

We're not light years away from last year's VON Boston, but we have made progress. More than anything else, the space has become MUCH more crowded. If VON Boston was the wild west, this is the Land Rush: everyone wants a stake in what's happening, even if they're not sure what it'll lead to next.

It's a very exciting, occasionally aggravating, and ultimately eye-opening time. Thus, I leave you with three bits of observed wisdom:

1. Make friends. (It's impossible to do this alone. It's even worse to attend an industry cocktail party and not bring business cards.)

2. Keep friends. (It's great to know everyone. It's better to actually know a few people WELL. Those are the people who will make an effort to help you succeed and see you as more than just a number.)

3. Ask questions. (Having surfed the various blogs and Flickr photos after the event, I'm amazed at everyone I didn't talk to. Whether I just didn't see them or I didn't think to introduce myself, there go another 2 dozen great conversations -- and contacts, and resources -- I could have enjoyed.)

Don't confuse this space with something that makes sense. We're all in this together. Start making waves.

VON Photos and Assorted Mayhem

My VON photos are up on Flickr. (Searching for "von2007" should help you find hundreds more from other attendees as well.)

I have much editing and other "real" work to do, but fear not; I've realized I need to sub-categorize my VON thoughts over the coming days, so I'll be doing it as such:

STBD @ VON (already up)
The Industry Look at VON (coming here soon)
VON from the Podcasters' POV (ditto)
The Seamy Underbelly of VON (ditto)

In the meantime, please note that I'll also be interviewed about both VON and the STBD relaunch during tomorrow night's Geek Riot talkcast with Shawn and Justine @ 10 PM EST. If you're free, call in and join the chat!

VON Recap... Tomorrow

Jetlag is a cruel mistress. I look forward to resuming my normal blog schedule this weekend.

LOTS to update about VON, and I'll probably split the posts into STBD-specific stuff at the STBD blog and personal observations here.

Buzzword of the event: "Twitter."

Secondary buzzword of the event (in a close race): "Monetize."

Buzzwords within the podcasting community: "Dinosaurs," along with "coffee, free booze," and "snooze alarm."