It called Public Radio Maker’s Quest 2.0.  The project — funded by CPB and administered by the Association of Independents in Radio (AIR) — will distribute up to $400,000 in grants ranging from $20,000 to $40,000 each to about a dozen forward-thinking individuals eager to surprise traditional listeners with audio programming and sounds influenced by new media technology.

Business models of video websites may be still indistinct. YouTube tries to break the bottleneck. The site launched “click-to-buy” links on selected partners this Wednesday. After viewing EMI artist’s music video, you can download the song directly from Amazon or iTunes. Now these links are only being used by EMI, Universal music group and Spore. In the following month, more partners will join the cooperation with YouTube.  

I just read a review which gives an interesting metaphor. It says Amazon is an old department store and YouTube is the new TV wall on it. The TV wall displays several kinds of products. People who pass through the building see the videos, find out something they’re interested in and walk into the store. Well, the cooperation seems beneficial to Amazon.

Although the idea is also available from other sites, YouTube seems has more advertising plans to prove how can a video site make profit. Let’s wait and see.

See also : Yahoo!News

                Next Big Thing for YouTube:E-Commerce Links

                YouTube推出「點擊購買」玩長尾重新粉刷，看完影片還可以買東西 (In Chinese)

In my first entry here on Flip The Media, I thought I’d share some thoughts I’ve had about automatically refreshing comments within a blog. I write a fan-site/blog about the Pittsburgh Steelers for Sports Blog Nation, the world’s largest independent network of sports blogs. The network was started by Markos Moulitas, whom you may or may not know from his pioneering political blog Daily Kos. Suffice it to say, when I was recruited to join the network, I immediately signed on, eager to be a part of any brave new journey Markos was leading into the vast wildnerness that is the new digital media landscape.

Kos Media, including Sports Blog Nation and all its individual sites, originally was powered by a blogging platform called Scoop, a collaborative media application. Unlike WordPress or Blogger, Scoop facilitated community participation intuitively. The main feature in Scoop that was highlighted on our sites network wide that did so was the ‘diaries’ (now called ‘fan posts’ to better reflect the ‘sports’ ethos of our blogs) function, which allowed readers of the sites to post their own thoughts about whatever subject they chose. The site’s readership could then comment and respond to that ‘diary’ just like they might with a front-page post by the site’s primary author. It gave readers a sense of ownership in the site, and encouraged them to be activtely engaged in the respective site’s niche topic. For sports blogs written by mere passive fans like myself, without a press credential of course, this additional member-generated content was huge. It provided me and my readership with extra thoughts/opinions, links to relevant stories, etc. Because I wrote, edited, and managed the site in my free time, any extra help was more than welcomed. Read more…

Social media’s democratizing effect is still under interrogation, but I think we can all agree that real gains have been made in how individuals affiliate with other individuals and groups.

Case in point:  NYTimes.com features a story (http://tinyurl.com/3u2bsr) about www.hiphoprepublican.com, a blog written by a black Republican who lives in Manhattan. The article discusses the fact that black Republicans often find themselves in a Catch 22 when it comes to group forming. They are subject to ridicule from both the black community and the Republican community. While, in the past, such ridicule constituted a barrier to group forming great enough to discourage public assembly, the Internet and social media have enabled what Shirky would call a “latent group” to become realized.

If nothing else, the breadth of groups that form on the Internet lays bare the complexity and diversity within seemingly monolithic groups. That some blacks have economically conservative values might surprise some, but now that voice of the electorate has the medium and the milieu to articulate its message in the public sphere.

The latest New Yorker cover was created by Bob Staake using Mac OS 07 (released in 1991) and Photoshop 3.0 (1995).  You can watch him create the cover (and check out his unusual drawing style) here:

Which begs the question — who needs CS4? And when does technology become truly obsolete?

Not according to recent survey a recent survey by Pew which concludes “there is no evidence that the polling in the Democratic and Republican nomination contests is biased by the fact that most polls rely only on landline interviews.” Pollster John Zogby told me his research also knocks down the theory.

One of my favorite sites is YTMND.com. YTMND isn’t news to a lot of people on the intarwebs, but its relevance as a social media tool remains viable. Its hordes of users constantly submit loads of new content, plenty of which contains sharp insights into a plethora of cultural, political, and social matters – but mostly it’s just there for the lolz. The submitters at YTMND could pump out enough fresh memes, or at least recycle oldies-but-goodies frequently enough, to sustain the internet underbelly all by their collective selves. It’s a machine. In 2006, Frank Ahrens at the Washington Post wrote up a more thorough examination for the uninitiated as to just what the site is all about. He actually labeled the site’s central conceit, more or less, “a new art form”. I guess for myself I’ll just call YTMND a backwater meme manufacturing center; you’ll certainly find it firmly planted as another island in the internet subculture on XKCD’s “Sea of Memes” map. Read more…

The media landscape is changing, will you change with it or fall behind?

This film explores how the media landscape is changing, as the traditional media gate-keepers (print, radio and TV) are being challenged by the rise of the amateur content creator.

With the barriers to technology and distribution becoming nearly non-existent, how will traditional media compete with the masses who will produce work for free?

This film was created by the students of the MCDM program at the University of Washington using the ubiquitous Flip Video Camera, with additional footage shot with the Canon HF10 HD camcorder, edited in Final Cut Pro.

-Kirk