One of the stories in today’s business papers is especially poignant to Flip the Media. Just over two years after it acquired pocket-size Flip video camera from manufacturer Pure Digital Technologies, Cisco Systems is shutting down a number of its consumer businesses.  Sadly, one of the casualties is the little camera that was the inspiration for the Flip the Media name.

Begun as a blog for students to share lessons learned in a Winter 2008 MCDM video class, FTM continued on after the class ended and evolved into the news journal you are reading now. Living on Internet time, Flip the Media has gone through several iterations in the past three years and will continue to change just as the digital world around us changes.

Is there a lesson to be learned from the fate of the Flip camera? What does the end of something that showed quality video could be made with something that fit in the palm of your hand tell us? Drawing grandiose conclusions from Cisco’s action might be premature. Yet, for those of us who don’t sit in boardrooms or study corporate balance sheets, the speed (two years!) with which the company went from spending $600 million to buy the technology to dropping it like hot potato is startling.

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This is the third and final blog post of a three part series about my experiences as a presenter with fellow MCDM student Katherine Turner during the 2011 American Society of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO) conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico. See the second post Monday, February 28th, 2011, “Easy Like Sunday Morning.”

Crowdsourcing

I had kept word that I was attending the conference from my parents. I also had to block my sisters from my Facebook updates about the trip to Puerto Rico. I had known for months. My plan was to surprise my mother at the mall, grocery store, or where ever she might be.

Everyone’s reaction to my plan – that’s a bad idea. Even the taxi driver on the way to Condado from Fajardo turned back while driving and looked at me square in the eyes and said, “Mijo, la vas a matar.” He was not the only local who concurred that I was going to give my mother a heart attack. So, I called my mother that afternoon. “Guess where I am?” A few seconds of silence goes by followed by “Get the **** out of here! How can that be?” Said a very stunned Señora, or as she will very happily point out to you, Señorita.

Whenever Katherine and I talked about presenting at an oceanography conference it always seemed strange. People would reply, “I thought you were into video or photography.”

Yes, we are into video. No, we aren’t oceanographers. “So, why are you presenting at an oceanography conference?”

My mother grew more confused and perplexed when I explained the reasons why I was in San Juan presenting at an International Oceanography Conference.

Carlos Miguel Sanchez & Julia Rodriguez (Dad and Mom)

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This is the second blog post of a three part series about my experiences as a presenter with fellow MCDM student Katherine Turner during the 2011 American Society of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO) conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico.  See the first post from Saturday, Feb. 26, 2011 “Hurry Up and Wait.”

Episode II, A New Hope

After waiting in line for nearly 40 minutes and salivating for a traditional  bocadillo I had to settle for avena or oatmeal. I was not able to upload the video for the conference to YouTube or Vimeo as the uploading time kept getting longer and longer. The panaderia was a ghost town as the morning rush had come and gone. Things were looking bleak.

Finally, I was able to send the video via a drop box service to the film festival producer — and the crisis was averted!

The day of the film festival we made our way back from Culebra to the mainland via an hour and a half ferry ride at the break of dawn. The whole point of coming to Puerto Rico early was to have plenty of time to fine-tune our ASLO Conference presentations.

Oh, hindsight. Why you are always two days late and a dollar short?

Sunday morning from Fajardo to El Condado was just 35 minutes and the same route in the afternoon is an hour and a half. Since check-in time was not until later in the afternoon we had to take refuge at the only familiar place we knew our kind was always welcomed. A place that inspires and nurture the human spirit – one person, one coffee cup and one neighborhood at a time. That’s right – Starbucks.

The line at the Starbucks in El Condado seemed to be one self-generating infinite loop. The irony of the situation was not lost on us. We come all the way to Puerto Rico and were now seeking settling in comfortably at a Starbucks. (In case you are wondering the only difference on the menu is Café Con Leche is listed under local favorites.) Here the tourists outnumber the locals 3 to 1.

The baristas were somewhat bilingual but not to fear I speke the Spanish.  Thirty minutes later it’s my turn and I blank on how to say quad espresso. We edge our way to a table, plug in our laptops to one of four electrical outlets in the store and boot up to get online. But …

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This is the first blog post of a three part series about my experiences as a presenter with fellow MCDM student Katherine Turner during the 2011 American Society of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO) conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico.  Part two Easy Like Sunday Morning

The Road Less Traveled

Last week was the second time I had been home in the last twenty years. Pick any excuse and I will tell you that’s the reason it’s been so long since I’ve been back to Puerto Rico. Truth be told it’s because I’ve been go! go! go! ever since I left developing a career as a visual journalist. I have documented small-town politics, the immigration debate in our nation’s capitol, the effects of the war in local communities, hurricane Katrina, the fall of Enron, and ground-breaking research being conducted by university faculty and students in the Pacific Northwest. I’ve photographed four U.S. presidents… but I haven’t been home.

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Throughout the Spring quarter, Flip the Media has been featuring some of the best video projects from the winter Multimedia Storytelling classes. This is the final installment of this MCDM Showcase series.

“Locks of Love” by Nicole Siegel

The subject of my video is Locks of Love, a nonprofit organization that provides hairpieces to children who have lost their hair due to illness. Volunteers donate at least 10 inches of hair to be used for the hairpieces. Locks of Love’s mission is to restore self-confidence and normalcy for children suffering from hair loss.

I chose Locks of Love for my project because it is a wonderful charity that helps minimize the suffering many children endure when battling illnesses that result in hair loss. My objective was to increase awareness of the organization and to stress how easy, painless and rewarding it is to get involved.

I wanted to capture multiple angles of the haircut (and I am neurotic) so I actually used several cameras, including two Flips and three Canon Vixias.

As a beginner project, this took more time and patience than I had ever imagined. I reworked the story several times – even minor tweaks changed the delivery/outcome of the piece. With something like a haircut that can only take place once, proper planning/storyboarding is crucial. Good audio is also crucial (I learned that lesson the hard way).

slideshare

Have you ever been somewhere and wanted to know what the name of a song was but could not figure out the name of it. Or maybe you wanted to record an interview or joke but did not have a digital recorder. Well Audiofile Engineering has released a iPhone and iTouch application that allows you to record at any moment.  I consider this phone application solution a comparison to what the Flip Camera did to the camcorder.  Providing Pure Technologies a commanding 23% of the video camera market in less than two years.

This new application has many things to brag about making it the first application broadcast WAVE data, and instant downloading formats in multiple files.  At $5.99 this application offers Sound Cloud integration so that users can upload audio files directly online and “share” them instantly.

If you have used the Fire application send us your personal feedbacks.

Oldie News Vets Hold to Journalistic Principles but Embrace Newer Practices

Only on-site gathering, only online reporting.

• They will not cover U.S. stories.
• They will not focus on breaking news.

A new American internet news organization equipped some 70 international correspondents with Flip video cameras to embark “on a bold journey to redefine international news for the digital age.”

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