6 posts tagged “conference”

Damn it's tough to find good people.

Have a couple of roles open for some great folks to join the team. Click on www.digital-outlook.com/jobs to find out more. We're also always interested to hear from talented designers, illustrators, developers, marketeers, project managers and strategy folks interested in digital entertainment.

Anyone know people, interested in moving or have experience they wish to share at what works best to find elusive talent... bring it on.

My career as an astrologer is doomed.

While my prediction of the profile "new media" had at the Summit was right (e.g. AOL US was on the panel for the Leaders Forum and Animax were running a session) I totally underestimated the blissful ignorance people have of the medium and the difficulty they'll face embracing it. They are SO not asking the right questions!

I was surprised to hear Malcolm Bird from AOL Kids (aka KOL) declare that...

• They're not taking everyone's content because they haven't enough promotional slots on the service to do the content justice. Has anyone heard about word-of-mouth or search?!!! How are today's hits happening and what does that tell us about how people will decide what to watch in future? Based on what we see going on, consumers will discover stuff because friends say "check this out" or "this is good" and because they're searching for it. Promotion will be very important, don't get me wrong, but in my opinion the importance of these two "alternatives" will continue to grow significantly (just check out Joost) and surely, as long as the ads are AOL's, why should they care? 
• They're only willing to pay a licence fees and don't see AOL offering content creators revenue share going forward. I'll place a bet now... next year their position will have changed. The predominant model is ad share. Just see what Joost, Google Video and AtomFilms are up to. Don't just look at video... see what bloggers are doing... affiliates and Google Adsense anyone? As these alternative channels and ways of monetizing grow in importance and as content creators catch on... why would anyone go to AOL? Promotion on AOL's homepage... yes... but in an online world (see previous point) this will become less and less valuable.

I was even more surprised to see people nodding at what was being said, considering this as Gospel and probably going away thinking... we need to get onto AOL. The questions should be... what's this new medium about, how did I hear about the last piece of online content and what does that offer in terms of opportunities?

What also surprised me was to see panel after panel accept the importance of online but in the same breath admit that they need to focus on priorities (i.e. their core business). This will be a major issue for them in the long run as online is all about incremental. It is not about 26 or 52 episodes... it's about 1. It's about being nimble. It's more akin to software upgrades.

The questions whould be... how do we focus on producing one episode for online that we're financing ourselves and may (or may not) generate revenue from, when we've got the potential for a broadcaster to fund an entire series? How do we work on small projects for a new medium when we're carrying a big overhead for an old one? Sadly nobody was discussing the basic nuts and bolts issue of managing transition with one foot solidly in the traditional world, the need to dip a toe into a new one... and not lose balance along the way.

So in a nutshell... while I predicted the issues (yes) I didn't predict the questions (bummer). Maybe next year.

Well that went by quickly.

Dino and I did our session on Thursday which went well by all accounts. Full room, lots of questions and interesting chats afterwards. Really felt people need to wake up to the potential of online rather than think of it either as a threat or just another set of pipes. Tried to give people useful information to take away and hope we did.

The rest of the day was filled with (great) meetings particularly with Megan from Atom and the guys from Yo Gabba Gabba. Followed this with drinks thanks to the "Irish Mafia" and dinner with (Odd) Todd Rosenberg at Franks Trattoria.

Odd Todd - Laid Off

Friday was more meetings, emails at dawn, nice lunch with the folks from RDF and popping my head in to more sessions. Phew!!

Friday night and Saturday was with old friends in Jersey. Lovely to catch up. Knackered.

Kei & Didi's Place

Then home... and UPGRADED to World Traveller Plus!!! RESULT!

Taxi to JFK

 So, a conference that started with the smell of smoke on the 26th floor had a happy ending.

Well, what a start...!

26th Floor View From Sheraton NY

Room on 26th floor. At 3am we were woken up to a garbled message on the tanoy shouting,.. "attention attention. there is no need to panic, there is no need to panic... there has been a fire on the second floor which is being brought under control. PLEASE stay in your room. Don't evacuate."

Don't Panic

It was so garbled that you weren't sure whether what you actually heard was "attention attention... panic... panic... fire on second floor... do evacuate". This went on for a WHOLE 2 HOURS... every five minutes a new announcement with the same level of noise and confusion, and a woman on the other side of the corridor talking about 9/11 telling everyone that she can smell smoke.

NY Kidscreen Summit Fire

End result?... I stayed in my room as instructed (every 5 minutes!!!) and EVERYONE had something to talk about the next day.

From there... all great. How could it NOT be.

New York

Lots of quick catch ups in the corridor, interesting Leader Session emphasising the importance of online to the future of the industry, the fact that everyone is trying to figure out what that means, and (to Dino and I sitting there) the obviously but largely un-tapped power for community and search in this mix

Last but not least, a chat with the guys from Yo Gabba Gabba! What fun.

Yo Gabba Gabba - Don't Take It Away

Sitting in lobby and now signing off.

Arrived at hotel.

Sheraton New York

Long flight. No upgrade. :-(

Flight to JFK

Bitter cold. Good dinner with Dino.

Dino in Sheraton lobby

Off to bed. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

More to come once sessions actually start.

Whenever I go to "traditional entertainment" industry conferences I wonder what the vibe will be this time.

Last year's Edinburgh TV Festival and Showcomotion went beyond the educational "what is new media" type sessions (just), started taking online seriously and made a reasonable attempt at discussing what the implications and challenges are for broadcasters and producers.

What will be the question at this year's Kidscreen Summit? It will be interesting to see as it's always a good indicator of where the industry is at. My current bet is that all the major players get the importance of "new media", see what's coming and have placed their hands firmly on the ship's wheel... but haven't quite figured out which way the compass is pointing and realised how difficult it is to turn a tanker.

Dino and I will report back mid Feb so stay tuned.

If you're planning to go, our session is on Thursday, so maybe see you there.