To Free or not to Free?
I’m confused. Is ‘Free’ good business or bad?
Last week, just days after the disappearance of one of London’s evening freesheets, the venerable Evening Standard announced it is going to be given away. A thousand forests shivered at the thought of circulation increasing from a quarter of a million to 600,000.
Bizarrely, the decision puts the Standard head-to-head with the paper that was launched to protect it from the threat of of Murdoch’s TheLondonPaper. There’s even a content sharing deal between the two papers – but while the London Lite is still owned by Associated, the Standard is now owned by Russian Oligarch Alexander Lebedev.
Meanwhile The Economist – which should know a thing or two about business models – today announced it will erect a paywall (a dread image that reminds me of Glastonbury Festival’s Superfence) in front of archive content.
Like The Financial Times, The Economist has the sort of information that helps shape financial decisions and therefore has value. But by giving away The Evening Standard for free, is Lebedev devaluing its editorial content? Or, worse (for us journos at least), devaluing ALL editorial content?
Video: talking iPods and upgrade culture with Simon Armitage
At the end of last year I was asked to take part in a BBC4 documentary, which involved being gently probed by softly spoken rock’n'roll poet Simon Armitage. How could I refuse (media tart that I am)?
Simon Armitage and talks tech with Tom Dunmore
The result was finally broadcast this week. It’s called Upgrade Me and I think it’s a rather splendid documentary – even the 56 minutes that don’t feature me. If you’re quick (and live in the UK), you can catch Upgrade Me over on the BBC iPlayer.
And for tardy or foreign visitors? Well, fear not. In flagrant disregard of copyright law, I’ve uploaded the chat between Simon and myself to YouTube. Fingers crossed it stays there. If we had a fair use law in the UK, I reckon this would fall under it. But we don’t, so i’m going to say this blog post is a review and the YouTube clip is nothing more than a quotation.
Albeit a self-aggrandising quotation. Click for more.
Video: launching Sony Ericsson’s motion-sensitive MH907 earphones
Last week I scripted and hosted (for Flying Leaf) a Sony Ericsson webcast revealing their new MH907 earphones.
The earphones feature a capacitive sensor that activates when in contact with skin – so you just insert both earpieces to launch your phone’s music player (or radio) application and begin playback. Take an earphone out, and the music stops.
Gloriously simple, button-free fun – unfortunately it only works with Sony Ericsson phones. For now.
Anyway, the webscast has finally surfaced on YouTube (in two pieces – part two below) – and includes a wonderful Kristoffer Ström animation. Enjoy!
Video: B&W Zeppelin Mini product tour
The B&W Zeppelin is the iconic iPod dock. So I was overjoyed when Bowers and Wilkins approached my new company, Flying Leaf, to script and present a product tour of it’s little brother, the B&W Zeppelin mini.
B&W Zeppelin Mini product tour
I worked with a really talented young director by the name of Matthew Watts, and filmed the product tour in Abbey Road studios. I’m really chuffed with the results – and it’s great to be working with a British company that’s producing world class products.
Uh-oh! 3D format war incoming!
Oh dear. As if the consumer electronics industry didn’t damage itself enough with the whole HD-DVD/Blu-ray farago, it now seems that a 3D format war is on the horizon. And just when I thought there might be some traction behind the idea of an extra dimension in your living room.
3DTV - let the battle commence
Next year, Sky will launch its 3D channel. I saw an impressive demonstration of the system (see my Sky 3DTV first impressions over on Stuff.tv or the YouTube vid below), which uses polarising glasses to allow the left and right eye to see different images (just as like most cinematic 3D films). Polarising TVs are already available in the far east, and cost a few hundred pounds more than equivalent two-dimensional LCDs.
But a new technology is nothing without content – so alongside a mixture of 3D movies and documentaries, Sky plans to broadcast live sporting events in 3D. Which might be enough to persuade people to upgrade to a 3D-ready TV. Perhaps one made by Sky’s official HD partner, Sony.
Funnily enough, Sony is about to announce that it will have 3D TVs on the market next year too. But there’s a problem: according to a report in the Financial Times, Sony is planning to sell displays that use ‘active shutter’ glasses. So instead of a polarising filter sending alternate lines of a screen to each eye, the glasses actually block each eye from seeing alternate frames.
The benefit to active glasses: you get 3D and HD together. The drawback: it work with Sky’s 3D channel as it currently stands.
It’s possible that Sky knows about Sony’s plans and will offer active-shutter compatibility. But it’s unlikely, as Sky 3D will use the standard Sky HD box for broadcasts, so doubling the framerate won’t be an easy task.
What’s more, Sony is expected to commit to making 3D-compatible Blu-Ray players and PS3 games. Which suggests it wants to control as much of that 3D hardware as possible.
Think of it as a landgrab: the sort of action that directly preceeds a drawn-out and bloody war. My advice to early adopters – who usually occupy the frontline of format wars – is sit this one out and wait for screens that don’t require any glasses at all.
Video review: LG GD910 watchphone
The LG GD910 goes on sale in the UK today. Here’s why I love it:
See also:
LG GD910 first impressions: pure gimmick, pure gadget joy
The government pretends to get tough on filesharing
Another morning, another unworkable scheme from the outgoing Labour administration. Lord Mandleson – surely Britain’s second-favourite favourite unelected ruler – has announced that the carefully considered Digital Britain report simply wasn’t tough enough on filesharers.
And so we’re back to a ‘three strikes and you’re out’ scenario where serial downloaders have their broadband connection terminated. Or, at least, we would be back there if it weren’t for the fact that the entire plan is completely unworkable, as has be proven in France, where a similar law was struck down by the Supreme Court.
Could free web movies destroy TV?
The success of the BBC iPlayer has inspired a raft of new video streaming services, offering free TV shows for anyone willing to sit through a few adverts.
This is a TV. Kind of.
MSN Video Player is offering classics from BBC Worldwide, such as Big Train and the Young Ones, along with unclassics from like How To Look Good Naked from independent powerhouse All3Media (to be fair, All3Media all supply the sublime Peep Show).
We’ll soon see the UK launch of the popular American streaming service Hulu (which has the backing of three of four of the big networks, and so shows great stuff like Family Guy). And the company that runs the digital terrestrial infrastructure has just announced it will be launching an on-demand video service built from technological leftovers from Kangaroo (which would have united BBC, Channel 4 and ITV content, if the pesky regulators hadn’t got in the way).
LG GD910: Pure gimmick, pure gadget joy
Yesterday I was lucky enough to receive a review sample of the LG GD910 Watch Phone from Orange.
LG Watchphone - Do I look like Dick Tracy or just a dick?
Lucky? Stop snickering. I honestly think I’m lucky, alright? Yes, the GD910 is a gimmick. But it’s a good gimmick – a gadget in its purest form: something I want but really don’t need.
But it’s not just the miniaturisation that appeals – in fact, I’ve always been cynical about watchphones (and I’ve seen a few of them). But the GD910 works beautifully – as a watch, as well as a phone. Yes, it’s chunky; but only G-Shock chunky. And with the Tokyo Flash-style theme (pictured), it could pass an an oversized fashion watch.
Until it starts ringing. Amazingly, it works as a phone, too – I’ve made a call out on the streets, without using the included (fugly) Bluetooth headset. So, just my wrist within 30cm of my mouth. The speaker is clear but not too loud, and – according to my gadget weary partner on the end of the line – microphone picks out my voice very clearly too.
Magazine circulations take a tumble, Stuff holds up
It’s ABC day, when the 6-monthly circulation figures for UK magazines (Jan-Jun 2009) are released. And the report makes pretty depressing reading.
Fact is, people are buying fewer magazines. Big sectors are down: women’s weeklies (-4.8%), men’s lifestyle (-4.7%), sport (-4.6%) and even TV listings (-5.4%). And when you strip out the freebies like Shortlist (up 0.9% to 510,720), things look even worse.
The men’s monthly lifestyle has been decimated. Even the closure of Maxim and Arena can’t stop the numbers looking horrible.
Stuff is down 4% year-on-year to 84,565. Given the recession (and the fact that we sell most mags around Christmas), it’s a pretty good result. Others in the men’s category haven’t fared so well: FHM down 16.2%, Loaded down 23.8%, even the previously solid GQ is down 7.7%.
And the men’s weeklies are in freefall – Nuts down 24.6% to 188,532 and Zoo down 31.2% ton a mere 111,012 (from over 200,000 in 2005). Given the costs of producing these mags, and the dearth of advertising, it could be curtains for one of them soon (No guesses which. Seems like the weekly phenomenom wasn’t so phenomenal after all.
Only Men’s Health and Men’s Fitness bucked the downward trend – in fact, Men’s Health has finally overtaken FHM and is now the UK’s best-selling men’s monthly. Congratulations to them – it’s a victory for great magazine making. And great abs.