Tag: 1

  • Happy Birthday to Me, Episode 32

    Present for me, Present for Crystal.
    Present for me, Present for Crystal

    So, this time last year I set a couple goals for myself for the year and now its time to go back and see how I did as well as set some more goals for this coming year.

    1) Be the best father, husband & friend I can be.
    Well, I have to say that while fatherhood is certainly a job, it’s one that I wouldn’t trade away and every day with Finley brings such joy to me. I’d like to think that I scored pretty well on the best father and husband bit, but I probably could have done a better job keeping in touch with friends (and family) who aren’t out here in LA. I’ll give myself a B on this one due to the somewhat lack in keeping in touch with friends. So, I think I’ve got an idea on goal for 2011-2012.

    2) Blog regularly.
    By a rough count, I got twenty-five or so posts up in the last year. That’s bearly two per month and they tend to be grouped in bunches. I’ve got a stash of notes for posts I want to put up, so I may need to be more aggressive on this goal in the coming year. Again, this sounds like a B level effort.

    3) Read 6 books.
    Well, I certainly crapped out on this one. I read my fair share of the magazines I subscribe to, but books? Nope, didn’t really get near reading six. D effort, way to go.

    4) Make something.
    Yeah, hmmm, I think I struck out on this one too. E effort? Damn, this whole “grading my goals” isn’t looking so good right now.

    5) Get my fighting weight to under 200lbs.
    Well, I did manage to buy a scale at some point last year so I know how my weight has trended. Unfortunately it hasn’t managed to get under (or frankly, near) 200lbs. Looks like another E. We joined the YMCA at some point last year, so I may need to reconsider the amount of time I’m spending there.

    6) Participate in 6 races.
    Bah, this isn’t looking good at all. And no, I’m not going to settle for “well, I just had a kid so give me a break”. E effort. *sigh*

    7) Homebrew.
    Well for Pete’s sake, I definitely bit off more than I could chew. I kept looking at the Mr. Beer kit, but never did anything with it. We definitely juiced some fruit & veggies a couple of times and bottled them for the weeks following, but nothing close to home brewing. E.

    8) Go to church.
    Ok, this one I know I’ve done extremely well at. We’re now regular members at Visitation Catholic Church and even when we’re away we manage to catch a service somewhere. On top of that, I’ve started going through the RCIA process at Visitation with the goal of becoming a become full members of the Roman Catholic Church. That way we can go to church and receive communion as a family. This one definitely comes in at an A+.

    9) Vegas.
    Ok, I made it to Vegas, but only as part of a work trip to CES. I went out and gambled a bit, but didn’t really have what I’d call a “Vegas experience”. So, I’ll put this one down as a B- and will have to see about getting back for a personal trip later this year maybe.

    10) Enjoy SoCal, enjoy life.
    Ok, I definitely take advantage of living out here. Bonfires at night, beach on the weekend, enjoying being outside with Finley at night in the “winter”. I could probably spend a bit more time outdoors, but we’re certainly taking advantage of our options. I’ll mark this one as a B- as there’s certainly some more we could be doing outside in SoCal.

    Ok, so what does that leave me at? B, B, D, E, E, E, E, A+, B-, B-. Doing some rough, middle school, math gives me an overall grade around C-, ouch. Sounds like I either need to tone down the goals a bit or do a better job of keeping them in mind and working to attain them. Let’s not go easy on me, I’m going to aim for the latter.

    So, goals for the coming year?
    1) Be the best father, husband, brother/son/etc. & friend I can be.
    2) Update website regularly via blog posts, picture galleries & videos.
    3) Reduce back catalog of unread magazines to under 5.
    4) Make something.
    5) Get my fighting weight to under 200lbs.
    6) Participate in 6 races.
    7) Homebrew.
    8) Continue going to church & RCIA.
    9) Travel more (locally: CA coast, Vegas; afar: Hawaii, London).
    10) Enjoy SoCal, enjoy life.

    There you have it, my 2011-2012 goals. I’m hoping those of you out there reading this blog will help hold me accountable for them and smack me when I’m not doing a good job on them.

    I’ve setup a Birthday Giving page on DonorsChoose.org, won’t you consider making a tax-deductible donation to some worthy causes I’ve picked out? And if you don’t find anything interesting in my list, please search the site and find something that does interest you. Consider that a birthday gift to me, thanks!

    Ok, so now on to the birthday weekend. It’s a bit raining in the forecast, but I’m hoping to get in some triathlon practice for a race next weekend at UCLA and get Finley to a park to go for her first ride on a swing set. Maybe even start some homebrew and enjoy a bonfire?!?!

  • CES 2011: Social TV

    CES 2011
    CES 2011

    Friday’s day-long panel discussion track continued with the Social Television – The Merger of Content, Social Interaction and the Video Platforms panel. The panel was moderated by Richard Sussman (VP of Digital Entertainment, The Nielsen Company) and included
    Michael Kernan (Chief Executive Officer, NuMedia Studios), Greg March (Director of Digital Media, Weiden + Kennedy), Raviv Moore (VP Business Development, Eyecon Technologies), Marty Roberts (Vice President of Sales and Marketing, ThePlatform), Christy Tanner (General Manager, TVGuide.com), Matt Wasserlauf (CEO, BBE), and Gayle Weiswasser (VP, Social Media Communications, Discovery Communications) as panelists.

    We’re seeing the formation of telecommunities with viewers chatting while watching and even seeing some networks work it into their broadcast with Fox’s Fringe as a prime example. One in ten watched the 2010 Oscars while on the internet, but there are issues if you have to pause to take care of the kids and then jump to live to get caught up with the group instead of watching linearly.

    Discovery saw 14,000 users for a live chat during an east coast airing and 5,000 during a west coast airing of Captain Phil’s farewell from Deadliest Catch. Along with the viewer participation, they saw 135,000 page views and 15,000 comments during the live chats while the live broadcast of the episode on July 13th, 2010 garnered 8.5 million viewers and was the show on cable that night for men & women aged 25-54. In terms of the differential between east & west Coast, they felt that many west coasters tuned in to the east coast broadcast.

    In October 2010 Discovery added GetGlue stickers and saw 1,400 get the MythBusters premiere sticker with a potential social media reach of 1 million users. If viewers continued to view the live episodes on Wednesday, they were able to unlock additional stickers. In under three months of check-ins, there were 38,000 for MythBusters 12,000 for Sarah Palin and 10,000 for Storm Chasers. Discovery Super Fans get a discount code to use at the Discovery Store online by checking into a show five or more times. They’ve also added the check-in widget to select fan sites to help spread the word about the program.

    Eyecon provides software to allow consumers to discover media more efficiently. thePlatform is a video management system that allows publishers to take their content to different destinations. They can work with content providers and video sites to build in ads to roll on embeded clips as well as ensure specific hashtags appear when something is retweeted.

    NuMedia Studios partners with advertisers and talent to create content for web and TV. Recently they launched AssCastles.com with FunnyOrDie.com and sold the show to VH1 as a smart comedy tv show. It had 57,000 views and 2,000 comments in four days after launch.

    Specific Media acquired BBE to bring together display and video. Their video is targetable and more than 10 billion US impressions and 1.9 billion video streams monthly. Mom Life was a 2010 Webby winner with 52 million unique users for season one & two, 100 million web streams with the twenty five episodes integrating 40+ brands.

    TV Guide focuses on original content, linear TV listings grid, and full episodes from networks, cablers and web outfits. They have 23 million unique users, iPad/iPhone/Android apps, 300,000 fans of their pages (tv shows, movies, celebs), syndicate to mobile/YahooTV/OMG, and launched check-ins for tv shows on their site in October under the moniker of “I’ll Watch”. They’ve noticed that their top twenty checkin shows don’t match the top shows according to Nielsen or fan page counts. The Glee Christmas episode was , but was It’s A Wonderful Life and Sons of Anarchy was in the top twenty.

    In general in social TV and online video the advertisers set the KPIs while on TV its GRP. Any way to record fans is beneficial (eg., unlocking special content). Vindico provides an ad serving system that can help with this. Measurement online as a whole is a disaster, meanwhile TV has a digestible metric in GRP. Online doesn’t have a common vocabulary for metrics. Across both platforms (TV & online) we need to measure live, DVR, on demand & online to get a true idea of ratings. Comcast wants to allow subscribers to watch their on demand library online and then take the ability to watch to mobile devices as well.

    Many thanks to NBCU for the opportunity to be here in Vegas, I hope to keep posting this weekend with additional company & product reviews as well as panel session updates.

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