Cell phones with build in cameras are replacing cheap pocket size digital cameras and video cameras. Best cell phone cameras can be better in many ways than cheap pocket digital cameras from few years back. And most people do not want to carry separate devices for each function (at least without a very good reason), when a smart phone can handle calls, Internet, photos and video shooting.
CES 2013 fair had more pocket advanced size cameras on display than DSLRs, but the trend on then was that business was going down due cellular phone cameras getting better. So camera manufacturers are integrating more cellular phone like features to their cameras (like Android OS with wireless connectivity to photo sharing sites) and concentrate on building good superzoom and DSLR type cameras. You need to have something clearly different than what cell phone can offer: huge zoom, good performance in low light or works also in harsh environment. Wireless connection is getting more and more common, either built-in or using memory card with WiFi.
As Sales Slip, TV Makers Strain for the Next Sensation because hardware companies want to make their products stand out in a sea of black rectangles that can show the content user want to watch. And one that is particularly acute for television makers. The hardware is becoming kind of boring and exciting things are happening in software. TV manufacturers continue to push the idea of “smart” sets by adding apps and other interactive elements.
Connected TV technologies get more widely used and the content earlier viewable only on TV can be now seen on many other screens. Your smartphone is the screen in your pocket. Your computer is the screen on your desk. Your tablet is a screen for the couch. Almost every major electronic device you own is a black rectangle that is brought to life by software and content.
In the last two years, television makers have tried a push with 3-D sets. But now It’s official: 3D is dead. The tech industry’s annual hot air balloon show is gone. On the one hand, 3D has become ubiquitous enough in televisions that people are unwittingly buying it when opting for a high-end new HDTV to fill their living room.
Post HDTV resolution era seems to be coming to TVs as well in form of 4K / UltraHD. This year, television makers like Samsung, Sony, LG and Panasonic are trying to grab attention by supersizing their television screens and quadrupling the level of detail in their images. They are promoting what they call Ultra High-Definition televisions, which have four times as many pixels as their high-definition predecessors, and can cost as much as a car. It’s a bit of a marketing push. It seems that all LCD makers are looking to move their business models on from cheap mass production to higher-margin, premium offerings. They try to innovate and secure their future viability by selling fewer, but more profitable displays.
4K at CES 2013: the dream gets real article tells that the 4K bandwagon is fully loaded and ready to get rolling. The US TV maker isn’t alone in stepping up to the higher resolution in its new flagship models. Sony, Panasonic and Sharp, Japan’s traditional big-screen TV leaders, are all attending this year’s CES with proper retail products. Manufacturers Need You to Buy an Ultra-High-Def 4K TV. Save Your Money because just as HDTV was slow to take off, the 4K start will be slow. It’s more than the price that’s keeping these things from hitting critical mass. 4K is only for ultra-premium markets this year.
4K resolution TV has one big problem: The entire ecosystem isn’t ready for 4K. The Trouble With 4K TV article tellst that though 4K resolutions represent the next step in high-definition video, standards for the format have yet to emerge and no one’s really figured out how to distribute video, with its massive file footprint, efficiently and cost effectively. Getting 4K content to consumers is hard.
Even though 4K resolution is widely use in digital cinematography, but there is no suitable consumer disk format that supports it and the bandwidth need to stream 4K content would be huge. Given that uncompressed 4K footage has a bit-rate of about 600MB/s. Broadcom chip ushers in H.265 and UltraHD video tells that H.265 video standard, aka HEVC or MPEG-5, squeezes more pixels over a network connection to support new high-resolution 4K TVs.
You should also note that the new higher resolution is pretty pointless for a small TV (where the TV mass market is now). Ultra HD would make a difference only on screens that were at least 80 inches, measured diagonally. For smaller screens, the extra pixels would not be visible to a person with 20/20 vision viewing from a normal viewing distance. Ultra HD TVs can also be a flop. But let’s see what happens in the world where nowadays tiny smart phone screens can have full HDTV resolution.
Keep in mind that 4K is not any absolute highest resolution expected in few years. 8k resolution TVs are coming. Sharp showed a 8K resolution TV with 7680 x 4320 resolution at CES2013. For more details on it read Sharp 8K Super Hi-Vision LCD, 4K TV and Freestyle wireless LCD HDTV hands-on article.
Another development than pushing up the resolution to make high end display products is OLED technology. OLED is another new technology to make expensive products. The much buzzed-about device features next-generation, high-quality OLED screens. OLED stands for organic light-emitting diode, and they offer a bevy of benefits: more energy efficient, cleaner image, wide viewing angle and devices can be made thinner. You can also make TV screen curved in shape. In a race between television titans, LG has beat Samsung in becoming the first manufacturer to introduce a 55-inch OLED television to market: the largest OLED TV panel to date.. OLED products are very expensive (LG TV $10,300 in US dollars). OLED display can also have 4K resolution, so you can combine two expensive technologies to one product. Market analysts say that they believe the technology will not become more affordable until 2015.
The Verge Awards: the best of CES 2013 article lists for example product like Samsung 4K “easel TV”, Sony 4K OLED TV, Teenage Engineering OD-11 Cloud Speaker and Oculus Rift virtual reality gaming.
All your audio, video kit is about to become OBSOLETE article tells that although much of the audio and video technology packed into CES 2013′s 1.9 million square feet of exhibition space is indeed impressive, one panelist at an emerging-technology conference session channeled a little 1974 BTO, essentially telling his audience that “You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.” Deep-geek soothsayer predicts smart audio, Ultra HD eyewear, much more in coming years. Audio is going to become adaptive, changing its wave forms to fit each user’s personal aural perceptions. Active noise reduction is finding its way into cars. HD audio will be coming to mobile phones. MEMS-based microphones and speakers are also on the runway. Consumer-level video will see in the future much higher resolution devices with much higher frame rates.
903 Comments
Tomi Engdahl says:
Chromecast
The easiest way to enjoy online video and music on your TV.
$35
http://www.google.com/intl/en/chrome/devices/chromecast/#netflix
Tomi says:
Multiple Raspberry Pi boards used to create video wall
http://hackaday.com/2013/07/22/multiple-raspberry-pi-boards-used-to-create-video-wall/
Five Rasberry Pi’s are used to drive this four-display video wall.
Each screen has its own Raspberry Pi which generates the HDMI video shown on the screen. These are fed from one central RPi board which acts as the controller. Video is pushed between the boards using the Real Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP) available through the Linux GStreamer package. Synchronization between the different video boards is taken care of using network time. [Samer] mentions that this system is scalable — each additional screen simply requires one more RPi to drive it.
Tomi says:
Complex camera rig controlled with Blender 3D
http://hackaday.com/2013/07/22/complex-camera-rig-controlled-with-blender-3d/
This is a pretty intricate camera mount. Not only does it provide pan and tilt as the subtitles state, but it moves along a track and offers zoom and focus controls. Its great, but you’ll need an equally complex set of controls to do anything meaningful with it. That’s where the real hack comes into play. The entire system is controlled by its virtual model in Blender 3D.
You probably already know that Blender 3D is an open source 3-dimensional modeling suite.
Tomi says:
8 Technologies that should’ve ended yesterday
Unnecessary gadgets that are still hard at work
http://www.electronicproducts.com/Computer_Systems/Standalone_Mobile/8_Technologies_that_should_ve_ended_yesterday.aspx
1. The Fax Machine
Replacement: E-mail; billions of e-mails are sent out every day, so why stand around a bulky machine when you can shoot over a quick message in cyberspace?
2. The Pager
Replacement: Cell-phone alerts
3. Cable Television
Replacement – Hulu, Netflix, and other Internet streaming websites;
4. The CD
Replacement: iPods; who would’ve thought that a 4-inch box could hold up to 160 GB of music and videos.
5. The Roll of Film
Replacement: Smartphones; with a camera up to 13 megapixels, smartphones are easily accessible, thin, and fast for sharp picture taking.
6. The Portable Radio
Replacement: Smartphones; these slabs of plastic can do it all from streaming an AM/FM station, to plugging into speakers, and connecting to Twitter and government alerts for important messages.
7. The Land Line
Replacement: Cell phones; portable phones can be used for in-house and out-of-house calls.
8. The PDA
Replacement: Cell phones; with a calendar just waiting for appointments to be booked and an address book allowing the user to set pictures and ringers for that contact there is no need for a PDA.
Tomi says:
Nokia Lumia 1020 review
Its 41-megapixel camera is great but still eclipsed by iPhone and others
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/2013/07/nokia-lumia/index.htm
Nokia is making a lot of noise about the 41-megapixel camera on its Lumia 1020 smart phone, so the camera experts here at Consumer Reports tried out a press sample to see whether it lived up to the hype. It does, but only to a point. Though the Lumia 1020 takes the sharpest still pictures of any smart-phone camera we’ve seen, with phenomenal performance under low-light conditions, color accuracy was an issue. And video quality was only fair under low-light conditions, far below the performance of phones such as the iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, and Samsung Galaxy S 4.Nokia is making a lot of noise about the 41-megapixel camera on its Lumia 1020 smart phone, so the camera experts here at Consumer Reports tried out a press sample to see whether it lived up to the hype. It does, but only to a point. Though the Lumia 1020 takes the sharpest still pictures of any smart-phone camera we’ve seen, with phenomenal performance under low-light conditions, color accuracy was an issue. And video quality was only fair under low-light conditions, far below the performance of phones such as the iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, and Samsung Galaxy S 4.
Tomi says:
Why YouTube buffers: The secret deals that make—and break—online video
When ISPs and video providers fight over money, Internet users suffer.
http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/why-youtube-buffers-the-secret-deals-that-make-and-break-online-video/
Why does online video have such problems? People may assume there are perfectly innocent causes related to their computers or to the mysterious workings of the Internet. Often, they’re correct.
But cynical types who suspect their Internet Service Providers (ISPs) intentionally degrade streaming video may be right as well. No, your ISP (probably) isn’t sniffing your traffic every time you click a YouTube or Netflix link, ready to throttle your bandwidth. But behind the scenes, in negotiations that almost never become public, the world’s biggest Internet providers and video services argue over how much one network should pay to connect to another. When these negotiations fail, users suffer. In other words, bad video performance is often caused not just by technology problems but also by business decisions made by the companies that control the Internet.
These business decisions involve “peering” agreements that Internet companies make to pass traffic from one to another and negotiations over caching services that store videos closer to people’s homes so they can load faster in your browser. When Internet providers refuse to upgrade peering connections, traffic gets congested. When ISPs refuse to use the caching services offered by the likes of Google and Netflix, video has to travel farther across the Internet to get to its final destination—your living room.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Foxtel farewells 3D TV, citing lack of content
The content never got beyond two dimensions, now the images stay that way
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/07/30/foxtel_farewells_3d_tv/
3D TV continues its nation-by-nation slide into obscurity and irrelevance, with Foxtel in Australia joining the long list of TV broadcasters and Pay TV providers making the weary and footsore slog to the woodshed with its once-favourite pet.
The Pay TV provider has decided that its 3D channel 201 will run down the curtain and join the choir invisible on August 27, sometime between 4am and 6am, causing massive inconvenience to the one or two Australians that believed the hype and bought the boxes.
Tomi says:
How Vice’s Tim Pool used Google Glass to cover Istanbul protests
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jul/30/google-glass-istanbul-protests-vice
‘I want to show you what it’s like to be there as best I can, even if that ends with me running full-speed into a cafe and rubbing lemons all over my face after being tear-gassed’
Pool has been using Glass for his livestreaming coverage of recent protests in Istanbul, Cairo and Brazil for Vice in 2013, but he’s been doing what he calls “mobile first-person” journalism since 2011, and the Occupy Wall Street protests in New York.
His livestreams attracted more than 750,000 unique viewers in a single day at the height of those protests, when police were clearing people out of their Occupy camp and trying to keep professional journalists away.
“Vice were the first company to say ‘we know exactly what you do, we think it’s awesome, and we want you to do more of it.”
Tomi says:
CBS Experiments With Streaming Deals
Amazon Streams ‘Under the Dome’; Netflix Has Rights to ‘Hostages’
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424127887324354704578636011737197322-lMyQjAxMTAzMDIwOTEyNDkyWj.html
CBS Corp. Chief Executive Leslie Moonves said Monday the broadcaster is experimenting with new business models for serialized dramas like apocalyptic summer hit “Under the Dome” and the coming thriller “Hostages,” banking on deals with streaming-video sites like Netflix Inc. NFLX -0.49% and Amazon.com Inc. AMZN -1.22% to help make them profitable.
Amazon acquired rights to stream the show four days after episodes air on the CBS network.
“It has changed the face of summer television,” Mr. Moonves said of the show. “We had to make a deal unlike any we’ve ever made.” He said Amazon hasn’t shared data on how many of its subscribers watched the show.
Tomi says:
The best smartphone cameras are starting to be as good as the pocket cameras. Differences remain, but they find the need to look a little more closely. Smart phones with cameras difficulties begin when shooting conditions deteriorate.
When the light is relatively smooth and it is sufficient to give almost any reasonably successful camera image. All cameras use a fast shutter speed to freeze the motion. Mobile phone and compact camera image is essentially the difference between a slightly different exposure mode, and neither will be on the smaller SLR picture.
The image is high contrast. Now the cameras begin to appear as early as the differences. Smart-phone image shadows are very black and the sky is a burnt white eraser.
Good conditions
When the light is relatively smooth and it is sufficient to give almost any reasonably successful camera image. All cameras use a fast shutter speed to freeze the motion. Mobile phone and compact camera image is essentially the difference between a slightly different exposure mode, and neither will be on the smaller SLR picture.
Lens
Against light is bright and the background in the dark. The image is high contrast. Now the cameras begin to appear as early as the differences. Smart-phone image shadows are very black and the sky is a burnt white eraser. Paperback control of the situation still very, varjoissakin have the details, but the sky is white. SLR camera raw image can dig into the shadows the details of any number.
Twilight and business
When in dimmer enviroment state is moving objects as significant will be used by the camera shutter. If the shutter speed will have to be extended, so that the image can be enough for a bright, moving objects are blurred. At the same time also increases the possibility camera shake. Pocket book starts to become a problem, and the mobile phone images can be easily hand-shake. Images are displayed with small cameras, the picture clearly more motion blur.
Dim in artificial light
When we moved to the park in the underground fluorescent lighting, cameras, automatic programs will increase sensitivity. This is starting to appear in the picture, either graininess or noise reduction produced by a soft blur
Source: http://www.mbnet.fi/artikkeli/lehti/nettijatkot/nettijatko_vertailussa_matkazoomit_ja_alypuhelimien_kamerat
Tomi says:
Loeb blasts Sony’s ‘bloated’ entertainment division
http://money.cnn.com/2013/07/30/news/third-point-sony/index.html?iid=Lead
Since May, the hedge fund investor has pressed Sony to spin off its entertainment division. The Japanese electronics giant has responded by indicating its movie and music business isn’t going anywhere near an auction block at the moment.
Now, Loeb is increasing pressure on the company — and he’s not dancing around the key issues.
“Keeping entertainment underexposed, undervalued and underperforming is not a strategy for success,”
Tomi says:
Google appears ready to ditch Android over its intellectual property issues
http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/07/29/google-appears-ready-to-ditch-android-over-its-intellectual-property-issues
By Daniel Eran Dilger
The discovery that Google’s new Chromecast web streaming device is based on Google TV code stripped of Android features provides additional evidence that Google is working to distance itself from the Android platform that the company developed under the management of Andy Rubin.
The most obvious reason for Google to drop compatibility with Android apps on Chromecast is to be able to offer the device at a very low price using minimal hardware.
Tomi says:
How to play a Game Boy emulator on Chromecast
http://hackaday.com/2013/07/31/how-to-play-a-game-boy-emulator-on-chromecast/
Here’s a proof of concept for playing emulators on a Chromecast which uses the original Game Boy as an example.
The emulator is a JavaScript Game Boy emulator. This is loaded on the Chromecast through a simple html file (called the receiver in the repo). The sender — also a simple html file — loads another JavaScript package on the computer which translates the controller’s button presses to keyboard inputs and sends them out to the receiver.
Tomi says:
Google Play store adds TV shows for high prices
Costs £20 to stream eight episodes of Breaking Bad season five in HD
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2286331/google-play-store-adds-tv-shows-for-high-prices
ANDROID SMARTPHONES AND TABLETS in the UK now have access to a horde of television shows thanks to the Google Play store, which now gives users access to downloadable TV content including Breaking Bad, Homeland and The Walking Dead.
However, the content brought on board from the BBC, AMC, Sony Pictures Entertainment and some others doesn’t come cheap.
The new TV shows join the Google Play store range of apps, games, ebooks, magazines and movies, which are all available to download to Android devices by either buying or renting.
Tomi says:
Fuel3D Affordable Point-and-Shoot 3D Scanner To Complement Your 3D Printer, Now on Kickstarter
http://hothardware.com/News/Fuel3D-Affordable-PointandShoot-3D-Scanner-To-Complement-Your-3D-Printer-Now-on-Kickstarter/
When the folks behind Fuel3D say they have a 3D camera scanner, they’re not talking about a simple stereoscopic device; rather the Fuel3D is a “fully 3D surface scanner consisting of a large number of physical and color measurements” including geometric stereo and photometric stereo data, which it then combines to create the image.
The kicker is that the device—which kind of resembles a Roomba–costs under $1,000, and it works just like a point-and-shoot camera. You simply attach a tag called a target to the person or object you want to scan and snap the picture. Then, you can work with the image and export it in a variety of formats.
Fuel3D is designed for everyone from makers to game developers to artists to industrial applications, and it will be ready to go in nine months. The camera should be a boon to 3D printing, as it provides a fast, accurate way to generate an image to be printed.
clkik says:
like reading the web log and remember that the travelling you are along wish make a very valuable journey toward the wellness of others. Give thanks!
Tomi says:
CBS Blocks Time Warner Cable Subscribers From Watching Full Episodes On CBS.com
http://techcrunch.com/2013/08/02/cbs-blocks-time-warner-cable-subscribers-from-watching-full-episodes-on-cbs-com/
A dispute between CBS and Time Warner Cable over retransmission fees for its broadcast content has spilled over onto the web, with a blackout of television programming also being extended to CBS’ online properties. In the wake of Time Warner Cable dropping the CBS and Showtime signals in most major markets, the broadcaster has decided to block access to full-episode viewing on CBS.com.
The decision to block viewers from streaming full episodes on the web is controversial, but not unprecedented.
Over the last several years, we’ve seen a number of these disputes flair up, and when networks and cable distributors can’t reach a deal, it means that the TV networks go dark for a few days, or sometimes weeks. And then, after some time, they come back online again, with the cable companies paying more and generally passing on the higher rates to subscribers.
Tomi says:
Leapcast emulates Chromecast in your Chrome browser
http://hackaday.com/2013/08/02/leapcast-emulates-chromecast-in-your-chrome-browser/
Our Chrome browser thinks it’s a Chromecast dongle
Tomi says:
Samsung Smart TV: Basically a Linux Box Running Vulnerable Web Apps
http://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/13/08/03/2250247/samsung-smart-tv-basically-a-linux-box-running-vulnerable-web-apps
“Two researchers at the Black Hat Briefings security conference Thursday said Smart TVs from electronics giant Samsung are rife with vulnerabilities in the underlying operating system and Java-based applications. Those vulnerabilities could be used to steal sensitive information on the device owner, or even spy on the television’s surroundings using an integrated webcam.”
Tomi says:
YouTube Co-founder Calls For Global Access To TV Online
http://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/13/08/03/1533249/youtube-co-founder-calls-for-global-access-to-tv-online
“YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley says internet users should be able to legitimately watch content from anywhere in the world at any time. He says the days of national TV networks controlling the global online rights to shows has to end.”
Tomi says:
YouTube co-founder calls for global access to TV online
http://www.afr.com/p/technology/youtube_co_founder_calls_for_global_sFVUIKr17luhpnJYBwCOLM
Chad Hurley, a co-founder of video-sharing site YouTube, says television viewers should be able to legitimately watch content from anywhere in the world at any time, backing recommendations made by an Australian parliamentary inquiry this week.
“Over time, all content is going to be distributed digitally and consumed on any type of device, so rights are a grey area.”
In recent times YouTube has been making a move on sports broadcasting rights, which in many ways have been the lifeblood of pay TV stations. It has taken rights to an array of minor sports around the world, including some Australian basketball matches.
Tomi says:
Your TV might be watching you
http://money.cnn.com/2013/08/01/technology/security/tv-hack/
Today’s high-end televisions are almost all equipped with “smart” PC-like features, including Internet connectivity, apps, microphones and cameras. But a recently discovered security hole in some Samsung Smart TVs shows that many of those bells and whistles aren’t ready for prime time.
But the glitches speak to a larger problem of gadgets that connect to the Internet but have virtually no security to speak of.
Security cameras, lights, heating control systems and even door locks and windows are now increasingly coming with features that allow users to control them remotely. Without proper security controls, there’s little to stop hackers from invading users’ privacy, stealing personal information or spying on people.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fujifilm and Panasonic create organic CMOS sensor with 88 dB dynamic range
http://www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/2013/06/fujifilm-and-panasonic-create-organic-cmos-sensor-with-88-db-dyn.html
Tokyo and Osaka, Japan–Fujifilm Corp. and Panasonic Corp. have developed organic CMOS image-sensor technology that has a large dynamic range of 88 dB, preventing simultaneous overexposure in bright image areas and underexposure in dark areas.
“Thin Organic Photoconductive Film Image Sensors with Extremely High Saturation of 8500 electrons/μm2″ and “An Ultra-low Noise Photoconductive Film Image Sensor With a High-speed Column Feedback Amplifier Noise Canceller,”
Fujifilm developed an organic photoconductive film (OPF) with a high optical-absorption coefficient instead of the usual silicon (Si) photodiode for the light-receiving portion of the sensor.
The thickness of the OPF is 0.5 μm, which is several times thinner than that of a Si photodiode; this allows a signal saturation value four times higher than those of conventional image sensors.
Tomi Engdahl says:
60 fps 4K x 2K CMOS image sensor developed by Panasonic and imec
http://www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/2013/06/60-fps-4k-x-2k-cmos-image-sensor-developed-by-panasonic-and-imec.html
A 4K2K CMOS image sensor developed by imec and Panasonic (Osaka, Japan) is capable of capturing 12-bit 4000 x 2000 (4K x 2K) pixel progressive images at 60 frames per second (fps). Based on a stagger-laced dual exposure, the image sensor was processed using imec’s 130nm CMOS process on 200 mm silicon wafers to deliver high-speed and high-quality imaging, at reduced output bit rate. The number of pixels on image sensors in video and still cameras keeps increasing, along with the frame rate and bit resolution requirements of the images. 4K2K will be the next-generation broadcasting format, offering an increase by a factor of two in both horizontal and vertical resolution compared to current state-of-the-art High Definition TV.
The image sensor chip is a floating diffusion shared 4T pixel imager, with a pitch of 2.5 micron and a conversion gain of 70 μV/e-, which allows for both a classical rolling shutter or stagger-laced scanning mode.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Imec presents 4K2K CMOS image sensor together with Panasonic
http://www2.imec.be/be_en/press/imec-news/imecpanasonic4k2kimager.html
The co-developed imager sensor chip targets high speed, high resolution imaging applications such as next generation HDTV
The image sensor chip is a floating diffusion shared 4T pixel imager, with a pitch of 2.5 micron and a conversion gain of 70 μV/e-, which allows for both a classical rolling shutter or stagger-laced scanning mode. The 4K2K 60-fps imaging performance is realized by 12-bit column-based delta-sigma A/D converters. The stagger-laced scanning method improves imaging sensitivity and realizes a 50 percent reduction in output data rate by alternating the readout of two sets of horizontal pixel pairs arranged in two complementary checkerboard patterns. Additionally, the overall power consumption of the imager is less than two Watts.
“This is an important milestone for imec to demonstrate our capability to co-design, prototype and manufacture high performance CMOS image sensors in our 200 mm CMOS fab,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Wireless sound: A perfectly acceptable solution has been found
http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/brians-brain/4418154/Wireless-sound–A-perfectly-acceptable-solution-has-been-found?elq=c211933653304f0e8fa383a4575cefe7&elqCampaignId=197
As I’ve aged, my requirements with respect to multimedia quality have grown increasingly pragmatic or, if you prefer, pathetic. 96 Kbps WMA and AAC audio is completely acceptable to me in most listening environments, particularly given the higher content-per-capacity that it affords versus higher bitrate format alternatives, as long as I retain access to the original CDs, etc for (increasingly rare) critical listening situations. And no, it’s not because my hearing is sub-par.
the outdoor audio system experiment that I began discussing last week. Here’s the short version of the story: it sounds great. The Yamaha NS-AW150 speakers have plenty of fidelity, particularly given how little I paid for them
the Griffin Twenty is capable of driving the speakers to volumes
I’m forced to rely on its 2.4 GHz signal for any wireless gear operating there. Streaming audio from the laptop to the Airport Express is therefore not always glitch-free
Three simultaneous streams (in opposing directions, to boot) over the same 2.4 GHz wireless connection is seemingly too many. Instead, I use my laptop to control the media center PC downstairs, via either VNC or Remote Desktop Connection, and stream audio (using Rogue Amoeba’s Airfoil) from it.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Comcast Developing Anti-Piracy Alternative to ‘Six Strikes’ (Exclusive)
http://variety.com/2013/digital/news/comcast-developing-anti-piracy-alternative-to-six-strikes-exclusive-1200572790/
Cable operator pitching TV industry on plan to convert illegal downloads to legal transaction opportunities
Comcast Corp. is developing a new approach to fighting piracy in the U.S., and wants other major content companies and distributors on board.
The owner of the nation’s largest cable operator has begun preliminary discussions with both film and TV studios and other leading Internet service providers about employing technology, according to sources, that would provide offending users with transactional opportunities to access legal versions of copyright-infringing videos as they’re being downloaded.
Comcast is said to be keen on getting content owners and ISPs from outside the conglomerate to join the effort, even for a beta trial that would be concentrated to a limited selection of programs and Internet subscribers. No timetable has been set, however.
As sources described the new system, a consumer illegally downloading a film or movie from a peer-to-peer system would be quickly pushed a pop-up message with links to purchase or rent the same content, whether the title in question exists on the VOD library of a participating distributor’s own broadband network or on a third-party seller like Amazon.
While that may keep Comcast from deriving incremental economic benefit, the new system would still help combat congestion on its broadband network and help drive usage to Xfinity, the MSO’s vast collection of VOD titles available on digital platforms.
Comcast has nearly 40% share of the broadband market among cable operators, totaling approximately 20 million subscribers.
Comcast comes to the piracy problem with a vested interest in more ways than one. In addition to being one of the leading providers of broadband Internet in the U.S., the company also owns a movie studio, Universal Pictures, and myriad broadcast and cable TV channels from NBC to E!. Programmers have long complained that the value of their content has been undermined by copyright infringement.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Future of Cable Might Not Include TV
At Cablevision, Broadband Could Become Primary Offering Eventually
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424127887323420604578647961424594702-lMyQjAxMTAzMDAwNDEwNDQyWj.html
Predicting that transmission of TV will move to the Internet eventually, Cablevision Systems Corp. CVC Chief Executive James Dolan says “there could come a day” when his company stops offering television service, making broadband its primary offering.
His comments may be the first public acknowledgment by a cable CEO of the possibility of such a shift, long speculated about by analysts. It comes amid growing tensions between cable operators and channel owners over rising programming costs, highlighted Friday night when Time Warner Cable Inc. dropped CBS from its channel lineup TWC in major markets such as New York and Los Angeles.
If cable operators drop TV service, charging only for broadband, channel owners would have to sell directly to the public or through Web outlets.
He added that the cable-TV industry is in a “bubble” with its emphasis on packages of channels that people are required to pay for, predicting it will mature “badly” as young people opt to watch online video rather than pay for traditional TV services.
If Cablevision does drop video service, “I don’t want to be saddled with an infrastructure that is as big as the one that I have now,” he said.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Digital usage overtaking all legacy media
http://newsosaur.blogspot.fi/2013/08/digital-usage-overtaking-all-legacy.html
Americans this year are likely to spend as many hours consuming content on digital devices as the combined amount of time that they devote to gazing at TV and paging through print, according to eMarketer, a research-aggregation service.
After culling through reports from more than 40 institutions, eMarketer forecasts that the average amount of time likely to be spent on digital media this year will climb to five hours and 9 minutes (5:09), as compared with 4:31 in 2012.
If the prediction holds true, then the amount of time spent with digital media will for the first time surpass the roughly 4½ hours per day that Americans historically have watched television.
The digital surge is being driven by the explosive adoption of smartphones, tablets and other mobile media, which provide consumers with the sort of intimate and individualized experiences that are beyond the reach of the traditional broadcast and print media. In June, the Nielsen market research service reported that 61% of Americans own smartphones and Pew Research Center said that 34% of Americans own a tablet.
Given the rapid adoption of captivating devices that were nonexistent a few short years ago, eMarketer expects non-voice mobile activity to rise to 2:21 in 2012, as compared with 24 minutes as recently as 2010.
With the use of digital gear growing, eMarketer expects the consumption of newspapers and magazines will continue to fall in 2013, as they have for the prior three years.
Although the appetite for digitally delivered news may be high, the declining utilization of printed media spells further trouble for publishers who historically have generated the preponderance of their revenues from print advertising.
Tomi says:
US feds: ‘Let’s make streaming copyrighted content a FELONY’
SOPA zombie may creep, undead, out of its deservéd grave
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/07/us_government_considering_making_streaming_a_felony/
A report by the US Department of Commerce’s Internet Policy Task Force recommends that the government make the streaming of copyrighted material a felony.
Currently, streaming content is a simple misdemeanor that breaches rules on violation of the public-performance right, but the report recommends upping the penalty to felony status for those who push out audio and video material for which they haven’t paid royalties.
prior call for increased penalties was contained in the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA)
Tomi says:
Math Advance Suggest RSA Encryption Could Fall Within 5 Years
http://it.slashdot.org/story/13/08/06/2056239/math-advance-suggest-rsa-encryption-could-fall-within-5-years
“The two encryption systems used to secure the most important connections and digital files could become useless within years, reports MIT Technology Review, due to progress towards solving the discrete logarithm problem. Both RSA and Diffie-Hellman encryption rely on there being no efficient algorithm for that problem”
“companies large and small begin planning to move to elliptic curve cryptographycompanies large and small begin planning to move to elliptic curve cryptography”
Tomi says:
Spotify: If musicians don’t give us their stuff they get pirated more
Most people only steal when they can’t buy – but some just like stealing
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/07/22/spotify_to_stayaways_youre_only_hurting_yourselves_my_dears/
A study by economist Will Page sheds new light on the relationship between streaming services and piracy. Artists who withhold from Spotify may suffer from increased piracy, he finds.
The study concludes that legal services have a significant effect on unlicensed music downloads – which has been noted before – but hardcore pirates remain. The Swedish record industry saw a sharp decline in revenues from 2002 until 2008 when Spotify launched. A third of the Swedes over the age of 15 had downloaded pirate material in 2008, but by 2012 it was just over one in five. They’d got out of the habit.
Since unlicensed TV and movie downloading increased during this period – when there were few legal alternatives – it’s reasonable to conclude that legal services reduce piracy.
As with previous research, the numbers show a large “passive” population and a small number of hardcore, high volume pirates: 10 per cent of freetards download 52 per cent of the unlicensed files.
The conclusion might not be surprising, as Spotify wants to reassure nervous labels and artists that their long-term interests benefit from a relationship with Spotify.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Music publishers file copyright suit against big YouTube channel operator
http://www.theverge.com/2013/8/6/4594018/music-publishers-file-copyright-suit-against-one-of-the-big-youtube
A group of music publishers and songwriters have claimed in a copyright lawsuit that Fullscreen, which operates a network of popular YouTube channels, is including unlicensed music in its videos.
YouTube and the music industry once bickered over the music that users included into their videos. Eventually, YouTube agreed to pay so that creators could freely stick songs into their clips, and that’s one of the reasons YouTube is now one of the most popular sources of music online. But these rights apparently don’t extend to the growing number of Multi-Channel Networks (MCN) — services that assist YouTube video-makers with such things as promotion, partner management, and digital rights management. According to the NMPA, there are numerous other MCNs not paying for music and this lawsuit could mark the beginning of a protracted legal battle.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cord-Cutting No Longer an ‘Urban Myth’: Pay TV Operators Drop 316,000 Subs in Past Year
http://variety.com/2013/biz/news/cord-cutting-no-longer-a-urban-myth-pay-tv-operators-drop-316000-subs-in-past-year-1200574763/
The number of Americans jettisoning pay TV is still fairly small — but data clearly shows that cord-cutting is picking up the pace as the cost of cable and satellite TV service continues to climb skyward.
The U.S. pay TV sector as a whole lost 316,000 subscribers for the 12-month period ending in June, even as the housing market shows signs of recovering, Moffett Research analyst Craig Moffett wrote in a research report Tuesday.
“Cord cutting used to be an urban myth. It isn’t anymore,” Moffett Research analyst Craig Moffett wrote in a research report Tuesday. “No, the numbers aren’t huge, but they are statistically significant.”
The latest figures showing the industry decline — which has hit cable operators including Comcast and Time Warner Cable the hardest — comes after pay-TV providers shrank subscriber rolls 80,000 on a year-to-year basis in the first quarter of 2013, according to an analysis by Leichtman Research Group.
The second quarter is seasonally weak for pay TV
In the face of customer losses, cable and satellite TV operators say they’re focusing on higher-value subscribers, willing to sacrifice bargain-hunting consumers who at satisfied with over-the-top video options like Netflix and free broadcast TV.
Tomi Engdahl says:
AOL Makes the Biggest Buy of the Tim Armstrong Era: $405 Million for Adap.TV
http://allthingsd.com/20130807/aol-makes-the-biggest-buy-of-the-tim-armstrong-era-405-million-for-adap-tv/
Tim Armstrong hasn’t bought anything for a couple years. Now he’s made his biggest purchase since taking over AOL in 2009: AOL is buying Web video company Adap.TV for $405 million in cash and stock.
Instead of producing content, Adap.TV uses software to match video ad buyers and sellers.
Video has been a big focus for AOL in the last few years, spurred by its acquisition of video syndicator 5Min in 2010. Last year, Armstrong said the company was on pace to do $100 million in video revenue.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Why The Video Ad Space Is Having A Moment
http://www.adexchanger.com/digital-tv/why-the-video-ad-space-is-having-a-moment/
Adap.tv was not the only video company to have a good day yesterday. On the same day that AOL snapped up video-ad marketplace Adap.tv for $405 million, digital ad management provider DG saw its stock shoot up 25% to $10.31 at yesterday’s closing bell.
“We continue to make solid progress in our online business as demand builds for our digital campaign management platform,” said DG CEO Neil Nguyen in a statement. “The 19% increase in our online business this quarter reflects customers’ growing use of video, data driven campaign optimization and greater campaign insights through our new analytics tools.”
Online video is one of the fastest growing advertising markets and companies are attacking it from various directions. While DG has been busy combining the various technologies and products it has bought and built into its “VideoFusion” platform, AOL is ramping up its programmatic capabilities in video.
The Adap.tv acquisition “shows how much online ad buyers and sellers are transitioning to video formats; all media companies, including newspaper, magazine and radio companies, are becoming video companies,” noted BMO Capital Markets analyst Dan Salmon. “For all parties, including ad tech and intermediaries, it also shows how much the adoption of programmatic is changing the sale/transaction process.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
BBC introduces cautions for user-generated content
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/aug/06/bbc-cautions-user-generated-content
Research finds three quarters of amateur footage used in coverage of the Arab spring was not accompanied by warnings
The BBC has started issuing on-air cautions for user-generated material it broadcasts, following research showing that three quarters of amateur footage used during the Arab spring was not accompanied by warnings about its provenance.
The corporation now alerts viewers when it has not been able to independent verify pictures or video taken by members of the public, according to a BBC Trust report published on Tuesday.
The BBC now routinely warns viewers about footage it has not been able to verify independently, issuing on-air cautions such as: “The BBC has not been able to fully authenticate this footage but, based on additional checks made on it, it is believed to be genuine.”
“All our UGC material goes through a stringent verification processes”
Tomi Engdahl says:
CBS Blackout Triggers Surge in TV-Show Piracy
http://torrentfreak.com/cbs-blackout-triggers-surge-in-tv-show-piracy-130807/
Since Friday more than three million Time Warner customers throughout the United States have lost access to CBS programming, including the popular Showtime network. In what appears to be a direct result of the blackout, the percentage of unauthorized downloads from affected regions has risen pretty dramatically this week. Piracy rates of the popular show “Under The Dome” shot up 34% over the weekend, while official ratings dropped.
One of the main motivations for people to download and stream TV-shows from unauthorized sources is availability.
If fans can’t get a show through legal channels they often turn to pirated alternatives.
So when Time Warner Cable dropped CBS last Friday after the companies failed to reach a broadcasting agreement, there was a good chance that many of the blacked-out subscribers would turn to file-sharing networks to get their fix.
Data gathered by TorrentFreak shows that this is indeed the case for the popular show “Under The Dome.”
With hundreds of thousands of downloads Under The Dome is one of the most pirated TV-shows at the moment. Of all sampled downloaders in the U.S. 10.9% came from the blackout regions for last week’s episode, and this increased to 14.6% for Monday’s episode, a 34% increase.
At the same time that piracy spiked, the official ratings took a large hit. On Monday, Under The Dome reached its season low ranking with only 10.49 million viewers compared to 11.41 million the week before.
Tomi Engdahl says:
New Technique Creates 3D Images Through a Single Lens
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/08/07/2038212/new-technique-creates-3d-images-through-a-single-lens
“A team at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) has come up with a promising new way to create 3D images from a stationary camera or microscope with a single lens. Rather than expensive hardware, the technique uses a mathematical model to generate images with depth and could find use in a wide range of applications”
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Science Behind the Netflix Algorithms That Decide What You’ll Watch Next
http://www.wired.com/underwire/2013/08/qq_netflix-algorithm/
“many people tell us they watch foreign movies and documentaries, but in practice, that doesn’t happen.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Roku app now beams videos from your iOS device to your TV
http://www.macworld.com/article/2046226/roku-app-now-beams-videos-from-your-ios-device-to-your-tv.html#tk.rss_all
Roku has moved a step closer to Apple’s AirPlay abilities with a cool new trick in the latest version of its iOS app.
The 2.3 update expands on the “Play on Roku” feature introduced back in September 2012. That feature let you stream music and display photos from your iOS or Android device on your TV via a Roku device. On Thursday, the company added video to the mix—for iOS users only right now—allowing streaming of videos in your iOS device’s Camera Roll.
That means you can play anything you’ve shot with your iOS device—family ballet recitals and 15-second Instagram video masterpieces, say—but not TV shows or movies you’ve synced with your iPhone. Which makes it somewhat less useful than the Apple TV’s AirPlay streaming, but still a pretty cool addition.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cord Cutting: How To Enjoy TV Affordably
http://themarketingrobot.com/cord-cutting-how-to-enjoy-tv-affordably
Depending whose research you believe today, between 10 and 20 percent of U.S. TV households enjoy network television in crystal clear high definition at absolutely zero cost. That’s right. Zilch. Nada.
Wondering where to sign up? Look no further than a local Radio Shack or online at Amazon, or a handful of other companies who sell indoor and outdoor HD TV antennas.
It’s called cord cutting — a play on cutting the cable or satellite cord that can cost anywhere from $80 to $125/month, depending on the level of service you subscribe to. Cutting the cable cord is sweeping across the nation as more consumers wise up to the fact that a majority of the cable channels they’re paying for are never watched and begin to understand that a majority of TV’s most popular shows today are broadcast for free, over-the-air, in beautiful looking high definition.
Think of this step-by-step guide as the gift that keeps giving. Each month, instead of paying more than $100 to your cable subscriber (that’s more than $1,200 each year!), you can save that money and put it toward something more important.
Consumers are almost oblivious to the fact that their local, network-affiliated TV stations broadcast not only the local news, but also their favorite shows like The Big Bang Theory and Modern Family, for free. The only investment consumers need to make is a basic antenna.
If you live within 20 miles of your local broadcast towers (you can check how far away you are using this site), a basic pair of good-ole fashioned rabbit ears that cost no more than $20 will do the trick.
The basic antenna setup for cutting the cord is simple. In fact, consumers will likely be surprised how many channels can be picked up.
Cutting the cord isn’t a perfectly ideal situation. Sport fans have to do without ESPN and other local cable-only sports networks. But the situation can be made easier.
Streaming services, like Netflix, Hulu Plus and Amazon Prime, offer a bevy of favorite programming for a small monthly fee ($8/month for Netflix and Hulu; $90/year for Amazon, and the online retailer will throw in free 2-day shipping, no matter how small the order.) $8-$16/month is significantly cheaper than the average cable bill, but still gives consumers a wide variety of programming — including several cable-only show — to enjoy on-demand, and in most cases, commercial free.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Facebook Moves Cautiously on Video Ads
CEO Zuckerberg Tries to Find Right Balance for Users and Advertisers
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323838204578654684050767080.html
Facebook Inc. FB has been planning for months to dive into the lucrative market for online video ads. The holdup: CEO Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t want to annoy its 1.1 billion members.
As soon as this fall, Facebook plans to launch a video-ad service that will show members 15-second-or-less clips on both smartphones and the Web, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Facebook needs the ads to be sufficiently splashy that they will convince brands to fork over roughly $2 million per day.
Yet since earlier this year, Mr. Zuckerberg and his engineers have toiled over how to make the ads not so distracting and slow that they alienate users, according to current and former employees and advertisers. The videos will appear prominently on members’ homepage news feeds, the people familiar said.
One particular concern for Mr. Zuckerberg was that the video ads should load quickly. His engineers have toiled to develop the needed back-end technology for fast delivery, according to the people close to Facebook.
Facebook debated, for instance, whether to give users the option to stop the video ads from playing automatically—a sensitive issue for users on mobile phones, according to one person close to the company.
Several ad executives said Facebook told them that the videos will automatically play without sound. But a user needs to tap an ad, to restart it and enable audio, these executives said. Users will only be exposed to one video advertiser per day, though may see content from this advertiser up to three times a day.
Facebook will allow brands to showcase up to three videos in “carousels,” a feature in which users swipe from right-to-left to see two more videos from the advertiser
“Time will tell if this is viewed as intrusive or highly relevant and welcomed by Facebook users,”
Facebook joins a growing legion of traditional media and Internet companies, including Google Inc. GOOG and Twitter Inc., that are trying to grab money that advertisers currently spend on television, a decades-old medium. Advertisers are expected to spend $66.4 billion on TV ads in the U.S. this year and just $4.1 billion on online video ads during the same period, according to eMarketer. Still, the amount spent on online video is expected to grow by more than 40% this year, the research firm says.
Tomi says:
Rant: Why I love what the Chromecast stands for
http://hackaday.com/2013/08/09/rant-why-i-love-what-the-chromecast-stands-for/
I’ve had my hands on this Chromecast for almost a week now and I love it.
I’ve dreamed of a device which can be hung on the back of the TV with Velcro and run XBMC. We basically got there with the Raspberry Pi, but the Chromecast is the form-factor that I had always envisioned. This lets me watch Netflix, while the RPi runs XBMC. The two are match made in heaven for under a hundred bucks.
That’s why I love the Chromecast device itself, but the bigger picture is that I love what it stands for. Keep reading to see what i mean.
No, it’s not open hardware, or even open software; both things that I value. But Google has invited the community to help guide the device’s future by providing an API and getting some semblance of documentation out for developers right from the start. This is in stark contrast to Apple’s living room business model that has the Apple TV locked out from any third-party app development whatsoever.
So really it’s the implied direction for the media industry that makes me embrace the Chromecast concept. It’s closed where it needs to be (Netflix is a binary app that protects their assets). It’s open where it can be, giving devs the tools they need to develop what will surely be the new features found in Chromecast V2. And it helps to further justify that expensive smart phone — no matter the brand — you paid for, which does the brunt of the work by controlling the device.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Software-enhanced sound solution targets portable devices
http://www.edn.com/electronics-products/other/4419487/Software-enhanced-sound-solution-targets-portable-devices
Wolfson Microelectronics has just released the Ez2 listen software solution which works alongside the company’s existing hardware platforms
Ez2 listen includes many sound enhancement features such as 5.1 Virtual Surround Sound for speakers and headphones, bass and treble boost, and multi-band compression sound level equaliser, which brings music, movies and games to life by improving the output volume of the device and delivering up to 7dB more volume whilst maintaining quality and without compromising the speaker.
Tomi Engdahl says:
OmniCam360 Camera Cluster Lets You Choose the Viewing Angle
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/13/08/11/2348257/omnicam360-camera-cluster-lets-you-choose-the-viewing-angle
“Most sports fans will have been frustrated with their shot selection at one time or another, but a new panoramic camera would put such decisions in the viewer’s hands. Comprising ten individual cameras, the OmniCam 360 provides a full 360-degree of the action.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
OmniCam360 would let viewers choose the camera angle
http://www.gizmag.com/omnicam360-panoramic-camera-fraunhofer/28639/
Armchair sports lovers are at the mercy of TV directors who chose what camera angle is shown when. Most sports fans will have been frustrated with their shot selection at one time or another, but a new panoramic camera would put such decisions in the viewer’s hands. Comprising ten individual cameras, the OmniCam 360 provides a full 360-degree of the action.
Rather than arranging a number of cameras in a star formation, with the lens of each facing out, the team at the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications, Heinrich-Hertz-Institute, in Berlin designed the OmniCam360 with the cameras packed into a cylindrical base with their lenses facing up. A multifaceted mirror that angles out from a central point above the cameras is then used to reflect the surrounding view into the lenses.
To ensure a seamless panoramic view, the researchers made sure that images from neighboring cameras overlapped by a few pixels so that the software could merge them without any seams. Unlike a gap at the seams, the researchers say the slight shift in perspective that results from the pixel overlap is unnoticeable to the eye.
Although the all-in-one system is no lightweight handycam, with a weight of 15 kg (33 lb) it is still light enough to be carried by one person and mounted on a tripod.
OmniCam360 would allow those viewing a telecast on a PC, tablet or the latest TVs to choose their preferred angle using a special app or even perform a virtual 360-degree pan of the action.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Camera sensor size: Why does it matter and exactly how big are they?
http://www.gizmag.com/camera-sensor-size-guide/26684/
The megapixel myth has treated camera manufacturers well over the years, those ever increasing, and often meaningless, numbers have sold millions of cameras. But consumers are getting wise to it. We’ve all seen dodgy images from high megapixel cameras and know that after a point, megapixels don’t matter for most people – a 16 MP compact isn’t ever going to be as good as a 12 MP Full Frame DSLR. What does matter is sensor size!
The size of sensor that a camera has ultimately determines how much light it uses to create an image.
Megapixels are a passionate issue for photographers; they’re up there with the “which is better, Canon or Nikon?” debate.
The truth is that it’s always going to be a balancing act between the efficiency of sensor technology, lens quality, image sensor size and ultimately what you want to do with your photographs. If you’re going to heavily crop images or print them very large, extra resolution could be useful, if you’re only sharing them online or producing normal prints, not so much. What we can conclusively say is that you can only make a call on megapixels in conjunction with considering sensor size.
Tomi Engdahl says:
AquaTop Display – A True Immersive Interface
Written by David Conrad
Sunday, 11 August 2013 13:14
http://www.i-programmer.info/news/194-kinect/6230-aquatop-display-a-true-immersive-interface.html
This is another simple idea with results that go well beyond what you might expect. Take a tub of cloudy water, a projector, a Kinect to sense objects on its surface and you have the first “immersive” interface – literally. You can place your hands in the water and play with the virtual objects projected onto it. See it!
If you put some bath salts in a tub of water the result is a milky liquid, which makes a really good projection surface – so why not project something on to it.
A projector and a Kinect depth camera work together with some software to allow the user to interact with the water in some amazing ways.
Tomi Engdahl says:
New milestones for freelance video journalism platform
http://www.journalism.co.uk/news/platform-for-freelance-video-journalists-marks-new-milestones/s2/a553476/
Storyhunter lets video journalists pitch content, and those accepted are offered editorial support and feedback before the final package is submitted to media outlets
Storyhunter.tv, which went live in May last year, was prompted by co-founder and chief executive Jaron Gilinsky, based on his own experience as a video journalist.
Having spent time working as a “one-man-band video journalist” himself, Gilinsky noticed the difficulties video journalists can face in finding outlets for their work.
Gilinsky launched Storyhunter as a response, creating a platform where freelance video journalists can pitch their ideas and receive editorial support and feedback, as well as a $1,000 fee for a four to six minute package, before the work is delivered to media outlets.
The licences agreed with media outlets may offer a time period of exclusivity, but Storyhunter will still “maintain the back-end rights and be able to re-sell it if possible”.