Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

An Interview David J. Neff about American Cancer Society's Sharing Hope Project

Skip, David's dog

I'm doing a series of blog about lessons learned from nonprofits in adopting social media projects as the Cute Dog Theory.  (If you want to do an interview and have a dog, feel free to add your dog to the NpTech Dog Group) David J. Neff is the Director of Web, Film and Interactive Strategy for the American Cancer Society.  He has been with the American Cancer Society for seven years since he graduated from college.   He agreed to do an interview with his organization's socal media project, SharingHope.tv.

1.   Tell me about the project - give me your elevator speech re: project. 

SharingHope.TV is the place for people to share their stories around cancer. Whether you
are a survivor, pre-vivors, a caregiver or just someone with a story to tell SharingHope.TV
is the place to share that story in Video, Audio, Artwork or Photos.

2.  What were the objectives?

We wanted to give people a good enviroment to share their stories of hope in anyway they wanted. From video to audio to photos.  YouTube has like 7 hours of video uploaded every 3 minutes. A firehose of information. We want to be the gardenhose of information. YouTube has tons of trolls and comment spam. We want a friendly enviroment where people can share and learn. I believe our community does just that.

3. How did the project unfold?

We said if we are going to do this let's make it happen. In the American Cancer Society we have a group called the Futuring and Innovations Center. Think of them as Venture Capatlists for non-profits. They liked the idea and funded it within two weeks of me submitting the idea. The within 6 monhts we have a fully functional "Beta" Web Site up adn running. We are doing Beta for 6 months then Gamma then BAM we take the labels off and start advertising.

4.  Define how you overcame challenges.

Our biggest challenge was explaining to decision-makers why didn't use an existing platform like YouTube or Flickr or Facebook.  We felt that there was not one single platform that caters to the millions of people who care about cancer and want to share their stories. Now hopefully they have that platform. Our main challenge right now? How do we tell people about it? How do I get people to test it and break it and make suggestions.  I'm reaching out to bloggers.

5.   Let's talk about numbers.  How much did it cost?  What were the results?  How are you measuring them? .

Well the costs are I have to do this all for under $25,000. That's the grant money I have. Right now with hosting and staff time it's costing me about 2,000 a month. The programming was around $4,000. The days of million dollar web sites are dead. Open source and local talent. It's all about that.

We are learning to not give a crap about page view and hits. What I want at the end of the day is number of registered users and number of conversations. What are people commenting on? What discussions are they
having?

6.  What advice would you give to other nonprofits?

Video is the future! Imagine a world where your customer tells you what they want ......and you actually listen. It's what we are doing right now. 

Here's a few inspiring videos on SharingHope.TV that David would like us to see:

http://www.sharinghope.tv/video/1706386
http://www.sharinghope.tv/video/1857977

Video Blogging in Rural Cambodian Province

Photo by MeanLux

Last August, I was invited organizers of the Cambodian Bloggers Summit to give a keynote and teach Web2.0 and video blogging workshops in Cambodia.   I launched a personal fundraising campaign so I could help be a sponsor for the conference and get over there with video cameras, shwag (t-shirts and stickers donated by nonprofits and tech companies) and teaching resources.   Folks from the video blogging community - like Jay Dedman, Ryanne Hodson and Coffee With Doug came up with the idea of video blogging kits and donated some cameras.

Mean Lux emailed to let me know that they had taken the cameras up to a Youth Festival and Training in a remote corner of Cambodia called Pursat!   Viirak (the guy behind the stickered laptop) and Be Chantra were there to help.  Mean Lux wrote a blog post, but it is in Khmer can't translate fully.  May Mean Lux will drop a comment in english?

Videos to come shortly!  Meanwhile, enjoy these photos.   I am thinking now that Flickr 90 second video would be awesome, although I'm sure the Internet access in that remote province is definitely cell and slow ..

The 1 Second Film: Amazing Collaborative Art Project, Micro Fundraiser, and Micro Video Blogging Project Ever!

The One Second Film is The World's Biggest Shortest Film is several things rolled into one.  It's a collaborative art project reminding me of the early Internet projects like Douglas Davis's "The World's First Collaborative Sentence."  It's a micro-fundraising project - donate a dollar and participate.  And, its another example of micro video blogging.

Hat tip Michael Hoffman.

Another Cambodian Video Blogger .. Yeah!

Click To Play

Earlier today I posted about discovering some new photo blogs, podcasts, and videos from Cambodian Bloggers.  Vuthasurf left me a comment that he created a video clip, uploaded to blip.tv, but was having trouble getting the video to display in his word press blog. 

So I posted it on my wordpress blog and discovered that perhaps he didn't use the drop down menu to set it to word press.  So, I made a quick screencast with jing project to illustrate the steps. 

I also suggest to Vutha that he do the following:

• Post the video (use the word press setting - see flickr)
• Write one paragraph describing the setting for the video.  Where is it?  Who are those kids? Is this what a vacation resort looks like?  Why did you capture this?
• Write one paragraph describing what you learned about shooting a video or how you might improve what you shoot the next time.

Any other video bloggers want to offer some advice?

I also noticed in the comments that Pagna wants to do some video blogging too!

Some Cambodian Photo Blogs, Podcasts, and Video Blogs!

Starting to get reports of podcasts, videos blogs, and photo blogs from Cambodia.

Norbert Klein has started a photoblog - I love the photo of family on the motorbike.   A typical scene in Phnom Penh. Norbert is a long-time ex-pat and perhaps the first person to bring Internet access to Cambodia via a Unix to DOS program and using a dial up modem.

Denith has posted a new photo album that contains pictures of Udong Mountain, aka Phnom Preah Reach-
ja-troub. In my opinion, in the next few years, this place will be a good place for tourist site, because the Buddish Centre will be completed soon. I found only a few foreign tourists when i visited that place last sunday, but i hope there will be more. I will find more information about Udong Mountain.  He's also been putting some videos on YouTube.

Chesda Sar has started podcasting! 

The Power of Web 2.0

 

A recent newspaper article about the Cambodian Bloggers Summit mentioned that the video cameras were donated by American companies.   Actually, they were purchased with donations from individuals to the personal fundraising campaign.   The idea came Doug who contributed the first batch of cameras that Jay Dedman and Ryanne Hodson took over to the Sharing Foundation computer school in July.   Maybe in the future we can convince Hasbro or another company to donate them.

Videos: Leng Sopharath and Google Lesson in Roteang

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I didn't spend any of my free time being a tourist.   On Monday, when I landed, I went straight from the airport to meet Leng Sopharath, the college student our family sponsors through the Sharing Foundation's program. (Some of you may remember that I used Chipin for my first personal fundraising campaign last November to sponsor her and write a case study here.)

I got to spend about an hour and half with Leng Sopharath.  She showed me her room, her photo album, talked about her family, her daily activities, her job goals and how much she appreciated the opportunity to attend the university. I was touched that our photos and the kids drawings that we exchange on a quarterly basis were on her wall.  I took this video so I could show it to the kids.

I got a tour of the girls dorm.  Later the boys arrived and we sat and talked. I presented them with some of the tech shirts. The young woman with the google t-shirt is a IT major!  The shirts were very much appreciated. In contrast to my blogging friends, I asked the college students if they knew what a blog was. They were not sure. They were familiar with google and yahoo and they use the Internet for email, but blogging was a new term for them as it is for many Cambodians.

Click To Play

The next day I went out to Roteang and observed a google search lesson being taught at the Sharing Foundation computer school by Mam Sary the head of the Sharing Foundation's English School program. (You can read more about the program over at the Sharing Foundation's web site).   Mam Sary is able to access the Internet via his cell phone connection.  It's slow, but he is able to teach a lesson to the students about how to find supplementary materials for their school assignments.   One of the students asked if Google was the best search engine.  Mam Sary said, 'Yes, Google is the best."   This is quite amazing because several years ago these students would have had no idea about the Internet.

Mam Sary also received several of the video cameras that Jay Dedman and Ryanne Hodson brought over.  So, I invited to the Cambodian Bloggers Summit and he was thrilled to learn about the Web2.0 and is very interested incorporating some of the ideas into his instruction.

Video of Cloggers Summit by Preetam

Just found this video from Preetam via Lux and just had to blog it!

Reflectons from Video Blogging Session at Cambodian Bloggers Summit

 

On Friday,  I co-presented the video blogging presentation at the Cambodian Bloggers Summit with Virak, Cambodia's first Cambodian video blogger (I think).   The curriculum is here

I did a lot of preparation for this workshop to document as much of the how-tos and resources because I only had 30 minutes to present.  Upon my arrival in Cambodia and actually experiencing the how slow the Internet is, how long it takes to upload, and that the videos posted to hosting sites don't necessarily play here.   A lot of the reaction to video blogging can be summed up by Chandee's face below which I included in the presentation materials I revised the day before.

The most challenging part of training is the skills transfer and adoption.   You can come in as a expert, do a presentation, provide some hands on exercises, and leave behind well documented manuals.  But what happens when you leave?   How do you build capacity.    So, my initial goal was to find someone who was interested in doing video blogging, had the ability to train, and understood the technical stuff.  That person, ended up being Virak.   I worked with him on Wednesday afternoon so he could be resource to the others who might want to video blogging.   Here's Virak's first video blog post. 

I was impressed with how quickly he picked it up and invited him to co-present with me.   Train the trainer in action!  Since Virak was also one of the organizers and I was also doing too many other things, we didn't have the luxury of indepth planning and we had never worked together!  So, we did a bit of improvisation.

When I co-train with other trainers and we speak the same language it is easy to trade of roles.   For example, one person may be talking while the other is demonstrating on the computer.  Virak narrated, but in Khmer - so I had to guess approximately what he was saying.  I had to turn it into a little bit of comedy act and the audience laughed.  They got a kick out my Vanna White style of demonstrating how to take the SD card out of the camera and put it into the card reader.

Of course, the ideal way to accomplish this would be been to have more time to transfer the skills to the trainers, model the skill transfer, and observe it.   Nonetheless, I'm confident that there will be more video bloggers in Cambodia.

Jay Dedman and Ryanne Hodson brought over 3 video blogging kits to the computer school in Roteang.  Sari, the computer teacher is here today and he brought along his camera.  He also told me that based on yesterday, he started a blog.  At lunch, we talked some student lessons he could do to have the kids at Roteang document their village.   Of course, his Internet access is very slow - via cell phone.  So, he may need to travel into Phnom Penh to send or copy onto a CD and give to a sharing foundation rep on their regular visits.    So, now he is another resource and Cambodian video blogger!

And, of course, there were the winners of the Clogger Awards which included the two other video blogging kits I brought over.   I will be following up with a post about the winners once I get back to the US (now in the Singapore airport before my 18 hour flight)

Some notes:

• Incorporate the people into the presentation.  Take photos while in country and incorporate into your presentation material.
• Listen for resistance and incorporate that in your teaching materials.   Name it and claim it.

more later.

Video Blogging from Cambodia

Click to Play

Ryanne Hodson and Jay Dedman were in Cambodia and are in Thailand right now.  They are traveling with Christina Arnold from Project Hope to document her project.    Here's the backstory about how they got there, etc.    Jay and Ryanne were delivering "video blogging kits" to Sharing Foundation in country staff to begin to capture some video of the work.   Jay and Ryanne also took some video of the Sharing Foundation orphanage, computer school, and sewing school in addition teaching staff how to use the cameras.  I will follow up to figure out we begin to get clips posted. 

I love what they did - it really brings the programs to life.

I hope that over the next year or two the Cambodian Bloggers or Cloggers can cultivate, grow, and nurture a few video bloggers.  I know there are tremendous challenges to that happening, but maybe we can look at finding some solutions, some possibilities.

24 Hours for Darfur User-Generated Video Campaign

 

24 Hours for Darfur, a grassroots video advocacy campaign dedicated to ending the conflict in Darfur and promoting peace and security for the people living there.  The campaign video will explain, but take a look at some of the ones submitted by people all over the world.

The goal is to collect thousands of personal video appeals from people all over the world. All appeals will be displayed on our website and sent directly to participant's political representatives. On September 16, 2007 they will screen 24 hours of rolling footage at a rally in front of the UN headquarters and at smaller events at halls of power throughout the world - all connected through a real-time online broadcast.

Check out the hundreds of videos already submitted!  There are videos from US Presidential candidate John Edwards, Author Samantha Power, Actress Mia Farrow, two former United Nations Deputy Secretaries-General, two former United States Deputy Secretaries of State, and  private citizens from around the world have already submitted videos. You can out against genocide by submitting a video appeal of your own. Use a webcam to record a video right in your web browser, or upload a video you've recorded offline.

You can learn more about Darfur at the website's education section.

Also that they are asking people to spread the word on Facebook by embedding one of their videos in your profile! 

Lee and Satchi do it again! Social Networking in Plain English!

I love the plain English series that Lee LeFever does.  Here's the latest installment.   It is an excellent basic introduction and gives a great illustration about how social networking can be personal learning tool -- getting answers from your network.

Typing for B-Roll

Interesting Saturday morning. got interviewed by tv station on how I live blogged my summer vacation las year using wayfarer

Learned a few things from the interviewer and camera person about b-roll and directions of where to look and how to respond .. some points that Andy Carvin made during the videoblogging and nonprofits session we did at NTC.

Interview with Roshaneh Zafar, Kashf Foundation, part of Global X Social Entrepreneurs Video Series

 

There is a terrific video series over at Social Edge called the "X Interview" where you can watch and listen to social entrepreneurs tell their stories.  The videos are short, most less than 3-7 minutes, are simple -- a significant event that had a major impact on their life and how they see the world in 2017. 

The interview above is with social entrepreneur Roshaneh Zafar, founder and managing director of The Kashf Foundation, Pakistan's third largest microfinance institution, tells Global X why she had to unlearn what she learned about economics. She also shares what happened when she realized that she was sitting at a conference next to a gentleman called Muhammad Yunus.

Will Video for Food! Promoting Video on YouTube

May 25, 2005, Beth's Flickr Stream

That photo was an update of old visual joke.  Ten years ago, I had a similar sign that said "I'll HTML for food."  I was reminded of this when Steve Garfield sent me a link to the Will Video for Food Blog's post "How to Promote Your Videos on YouTube."  Some really good tips here, but these three particularly resonated:

• Remember It’s a Social Network. The most-viewed creators often got popularized by interacting with other frequently-watched YouTubers. Zipster08 got his start mocking Renetto. Renetto got famous by addressing other YouTubers. So you’ve got to socialize on YouTube. It’s not just a video-sharing site, it’s a commune.

• Keep it Short. This is an ADHD generation. This is so, so, so important. I’ve violated my own rule lately, but I can’t stress enough that people don’t want more than 3 minutes. And if you can do it in 30-60 seconds you’ll get twice the views. I often won’t even start a video that’s more than 5 minutes. It’s just not yet a long-form platform. Maybe AppleTV will allow us to consume longer videos, but short is good.

• Collaborate with YouTubers. Find other YouTubers in your area and participate in a video together. You’ll pick up some of their subscribers and vice versa. Everyone wins.

I think this advice holds true for other social networking sites as well.

VloggerCon 2006 T-Shirts Put To Good Use in Cambodia

A few months ago, Jay Dedman  posted a message on the videobloggers list that he was moving and had a box of Vloggercon T-Shirts.  At the Sharing Foundation, we are always on the lookout for t shirts and other items to bring over, so I asked if I could have them.  Jay Dedman sent the box of leftover Vloggercon T-Shirts from 2006 and they were hand carried over the Cambodia and presented to the college students being sponsored by the Sharing Foundation.

Now, next step is to get a couple of cameras, some help with skill transfer, and start a video blog from Cambodia.    It will take some time to pull together because I want it to see it be sustainable.   stay tuned.

See you at Boston Media Makers on June 3rd

The next meeting of the Boston Media Makers is on Sunday, June 3rd

I'm hoping that we'll end the discussion with a kick-a** tip sheet for video bloggers who want to get started promoting their blogs and shows.

Here's the description that Steve Garfield posted:

I’m looking forward to the next meeting at Sweet Finnish in Jamaica Plain on Sunday June 3rd at 10:00 AM.

10:00 - 10:30 Mingling
10:30 - 11:30 Roundtable
11:30 - Noon ( or later ) Discussion

Beth Kanter will lead us in a discussion about how to get your video seen. Using social media tools and other methods to help people find your videos.

Bring your best promo tips to share. 

This isn’t going to be a lecture or presentation. We’re all going to share what’s worked for us and think about ideas for the future.

The intelligence is in the room!

Here are some of Beth’s ideas we’ll talk about:

-Use of tags — many as possible to describe your videoblog post
-Tag your video blog post into del.icio.us - forward to your del.icio.us
network
-Screenshot in flickr with url to blog post or videoblog post
-Send your flickr screenshot to groups, contacts
-email to list of friends
-RSS feed (of course)
-send your video to appropriate groups on video hosting sites
-ego feed and topic feed via watchlists on technorati - and comment on those
blogs with similar content and leave your url
-linked in appropriate directories/collections related to your topic
-posted to blog, ping technorati
-post to any social networking profiles and ping your friends

She’ll be presenting these ideas at this week’s Making Media Conference.  Here’s her presentation and a wiki with tons of resources.

Take a look at this article she recommends for ideas:

Online Marketing Strategies: Ten Ways To Promote Your Business With Social Media

In the News:
CBS Partners With Leading Community Sites and Social Application Providers to Add New Layer of Interactivity to the CBS Audience Network

Martin Varsavsky: My Investments in the Video Online Space and My Take on the Whole Sector

33 Places to Hangout in the Social Networking Era

Everyone is welcome.

Register for the meeting on Upcoming.org.

My Workshop for Next Week's Making Media Conference

I have the honor of leading a workshop for documentary filmmakers at the  Making Media Now: Filmmaking in Transition Conference to be held Friday, June 1, 2007, from 9:30 am to 6:30 pm at the Photronics Center at Boston, University. You can still register.

The conference is focused on the opportunities that new and emerging digital technologies create for media makers.  My workshop is called the "Social Media Game: Market yourself and your film using blogging, tagging, wikis, photo sharing and social networking sites."  I've remixed David Wilcox's Social Media game -- I've focused it on more individuals versus organizations and of course, on media creation.  Here's the wiki I created with resources, links, and examples.  The cards are here and I have to figure out a way to cut them evenly this time.

It marks the first time I'm incorporating Twitter in a presentation.  So, I just had to tweet about the presentation.  Chris Brogan noticed and blogged it.

Anyway, looking for feedback and pointers to other filmmakers using Social Media.

SplashCast: MyPodcast Network

 

Marshall Kirkpatrick pinged to let me know of a new feature over at SplashCast - My Podcast Network.   Here's what had to say about it on Splashcast's Blog:

The basic idea is that it’s an easy way to collect all your favorite audio and video podcasts and display them live on your startpage or webpage. That means a whole lot of fresh content automatically available in one small space. It’s an easy way to show off your brilliant taste in online media to your website visitors.

To see our directory of indexed podcasts check out this link.  To create your own podcast network, go to this link, create an account, and choose “Podcasts and RSS” when you create a new show for your channel.

You can add any feed with standard media enclosures and/or you can select from our catalog of already indexed feeds. In the player to the right, which is set to start at the guide page instead of the first show, you can see some of my favorite podcasts.

So, I grabbed Marshall's favorites!  I so want to play with this right now, but must finish deadline. 

Scoble, Kanter, Carvin, Shapiro, & Goldstein

Is that a law firm?  No, those were the five video bloggers on a panel for DC Web Women's Meeting tonight which is also celebrating their 12th Anniversary - the video is here.   

Maryam Scoble and I participated remotely by doing a pre-recorded podcast and Happy Anniversary good wish video (Maryam's is here) and since school was out this week, I made one with Sara.  Jonny Goldstein, Andy Carvin, and Phil Shapiro were there in the room.

Showing YouTube Videos Offline

I've been doing more and more presentations that are dependent on having Internet access and I've learned over the years, to always have a backup.   I'm glad I went to the trouble of having a backup plan, particularly for
the Screencasting Session at NTC which include showing some screencast.  What I did was download local copies.

Michael Stein (East Coast), who attended the session, emailed me today and asked how I managed to download the screencasts on YouTube.  The secret is KISS and thanks to Amit, you can find out all aobut it here.

NTC VideoGeekOut Session: The Video

f

Click to Play

At NTC, I organized a panel and drop-in clinic called 'NTC Video GeekOut"  featuring Jonny Goldstein and Andy Carvin.   I also video blogged the session and caught up with a participant for a quick interview about their impressions.

Our morning panel went well despite a few technical glitches with the sound system.  (Note to self: write on AV set up that sound is needed along with the projector)  We improvised the order and covered everything, including this demo of making a video blog post and uploading it to Blip.TV.  I have seen Steve Garfield do this at Boston Podcamp and it is reallly powerful way to demonstrate to folks how easy it is to get started. 

Next time, I think I might keep the video really short so it doesn't take so much time to render. 

We created a wiki for the session that has all the links and key points we shared during the session.  Some questions:

• What kind of camera should I use?  Andy and Jonny explained the various types of cameras and we showed the ones we use.    We also pointed to two review sites:  Digital Camera Review and camcorder information.
• There were questions about signing a release form.  Rule of thumb:  If you are video blogging for an organization, have people sign a release.  We modeled that in our demonstration.  As promised, Ihere's a copy of the release form that NTEN used for the "This I Change" video project.
• I learned a lot from Andy Carvin about A Role and B Role - and interviewing techniques (like get the person to repeat their name and the whole answer and asking them to look into the camera) .  He has two more indepth powerpoints packed with advice just on making documentaries.
• We gots questions about blogging platforms, feeds, distribution, video hosts, compression, editing software and more.   We did a lot of pointing over to FreeVlog, Steve Garfield's Squido, and OurMedia Learning Center.  We also mentioned the video blogging Yahoo List.

Over lunch, we prepared for the afternoon sessions.  Jonny demonstrated his computer sock and both Andy and I video blogged it.  (Little did I know that I was going to receive the first annual NTEN Award and wasn't in the ballroom ..!)  Although, if I had been there, Katrin Verlcas would not have made her debut as a video blogger!

The afternoon sessions consisted of a drop-in video skills coaching.  Both Andy and Jonny did an interview with Christina Arnold of Project Hope International who spoke about the root causes of human trafficking in Southeast Asia.

We were hoping that clinic participants might make some videos and participate in the "What Inspires You" video project.  We ended up interviewing each other (Andy, Jonny, and me)

We've already had one or two people leave some questions over at the wiki, which I'm reposting here.  If you have some good answers, please drop a comment in the blog post. 

• How do you develop and employ an organizational in the most-commonly improvisational medium of vlogging without making a huge investment in editing?
• How far off is convenient consumption of videoblog programming. ie: when and how can or will users be able to subscribe to a set of videostreams so that they are downloaded, placed in a playlist, and played, so that users can watch these easily and conveniently?
• How does video content get organized. Is there an nptechvideo tag, or other tags, or aggregations of video blogs for the nonprofit sector?

For that last question,  use the NpTech tag.   There is a NpTech group over at YouTube.  It isn't very active.  I've also used the npvlog tag in delicious to tag videos made by nonprofits. 

If you're interested in learning more, I'd suggest joining the Yahoo Video Blogging list, although it does have a far amount of traffic.  I also set up an NTEN Affinity Group called "Video Blogging and Nonprofits" - I set this up about 7 months ago with the idea that I'd launch it after the session.   I will summarize and cross post relevant posts from different places.

Video Blogging Week:2007

It starts on Sunday.  The details are here.

StopCyberbullying, Video Messaging Reminder, and My BBC Interview!

I'm pulling a few unrelated threads together here, mostly because it is one week before NTC and as my UK friends say, "I'm mental busy."

First, and foremost, tommorrow is Stop Cyberbullying Day, an excellent idea that Andy Carvin suggested in light of the Kathy Sierra incident earlier this week.    If you have not already checked out the ning site that Andy put together, it's here.   It's worth reading the discussions for the ideas being suggested as well as for the excellent resources being shared.  I will draw on it for my post tommorrow.

Scott McLeod created some badges and over at the site there's more discussion going on about what message should be on the badge.  I like this one with the bandaid, as I think the one with the horse is a little disrespectful.

This afternoon, along with Andy Carvin and Elisa Camahort, I was invited on the BBC as part of their World Have Your Say radio program, a face-paced talk show with Paul Coletti.  The segment was on cyberbullying and the need for a code of conduct. (more here).  Over on the Stop Cyberbullying Social Network Site,   David Weinberg suggested a no bullies pledge, a sort of creative commons licensing for acceptable conduct.  It is bringing to light how complicated this issue is and the subtle differences between cyberbullying and online sexual harrassment.

Here's an interview with Kathy Sierra with the local TV station.

Paul Lamb sent me a pointer to a cool video messaging tool called Eyejot that he had just posted about on his Cool 'n Conscientious, a social networking site dedicated to leveraging emerging information tools for social change.  So, I felt it was appropriate to combine the message with the tool .... and I created a video message reminder for this post, but unfortunately the service is rather buggy and it didn't work!

Eyejot was the second example of video IM that I saw today.  Rupert posted on the Vlogging list posted about twittering video blog messages posted from his cell phone.   It's sort of complicated, but check it out.  I just didn't have time to futz with it and besides don't have a mobile phone with a video camera.
 

While these video messaging tools have a cool factor, I'm also a little concerned about how they might be misused by cyberbullies.   Are you?

Open Source Cinema

Brett's Remix of Lessig's Words

Brett Gaylor is a amazing!   His newest project is Open Source Cinema.  Here's his description:

Open Source Cinema is the web platform for the creation of a feature documentary film about Copyright titled Basement Tapes.  Through the film, I'm examining how our concepts of "intellectual property" have been radically altered by the Internet.  The film will use music as a lens to examine the greater issues of gene patenting, bio-piracy, medicine, and the ownership of culture.  Its also going to be a lot of fun - I'm filming with Negativland, GirlTalk, The Freelance Hellraiser, DJ Food,  John Oswald, Mark Viddler, and Lawrence Lessig among many others.

This film is open source - and thats why I created.   OpenSourceCinema.org to help make it.   Footage I shoot during the  production of the film will be released under a Creative Commons license on the site - and I'm asking for key remixes to be created by participants like yourselves.  I've created several "requests" for videos to be created around key topics - using footage I've shot, your own, or footage found online.

And finally - I'm looking for videoblogs from creators like you.  I  want your opinions on the issue, as raw or refined as you see fit.   My first challenge is in acknowledgment of March being Boycott The 
RIAA Month: The RIAA theme song by the New York Times' David Pogue.  I've started the first karaoke version - you're next!

"Know what?
They’re a lawsuit machine.
They say so what
If you’re only thirteen?
And you know what?
They were equally mean
To an 80-year-old grandma!

You’ve just been sued by the R.I.A.A.!
You’ve just been sued by the R.I.A.A.!
Their attorneys say, you committed a crime, And there’d better not be a next time!"

With videoblogging week coming up - I'm hoping some of you might use this as one of your days entries!  Stealing is, after all, a deadly sin.

To see what's going on - http://www.opensourcecinema.org  - there are tons of videos and clues and opportunities for collaboration.

The film is going to be released in 2008 - online, on TV, and in theatres as well.  I'm blessed with a co-production with the National Film Board of Canada (www.nfb.ca), which is Canada's cultural film 
agency.   They're excited to see the film spread as far and wide as 
possible.