My Birthday Wishes

My Birthday is this week and friends and family have been asking what I would like. There aren't too many things I really need so I've had to think long and hard about what I want and I've come up with a list.

I don't think I'll get all of these things by my birthday but I do hope that by next year this time all of my birthday wishes have come true.

My Birthday Wish List (in no particular order)

1. Beers on the Diggnation Couch with Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht.

2. A comedy writing lesson from Kent Nichols and Douglas Sarine of Ask A Ninja.

3. Cocktails on the set of Tikibar TV with Dr. Tiki, Lala and Johnny Johnny.

4. Discover some new music and a cool new websites with Steve Woolf and Zadi Diaz of Epic FU.

5. A "How To Snowboard Episode" of French Maid TV.

6. A massage after playing paintball with The guys from Big Fantastic.

7. Getting a cool new video gadget the same time as Steve Garfield and having Steve set it up for me and explain to me how to use it.

8. Share a bottle of wine with Gary Vaynerchuk of Wine Library TV

9. Being able to watch all of my friends shows on my TV as easily as I can watch Heroes or any other Network or Cable TV Show.

10. Some hugs from my online video friends because we are all making more than a living from online video.

NewTeeVee Is Building Community Online and in the Real World

Last night online video blog NewTeeVee had a real world meet up in Hollywood as part of their NewTeeVee Pier Screenings series.

Some of online videos biggest celebrities were there including Kent Nichols from Ask A Ninja, Hayden Black from Good Night Burbank / Abigail's Teen Diary doogtoons' Doug Bressler and Casey McKinnon and Rudy Jahcha from Galacticast. Also present were new media agents from UTA and ICM as well as Judges: Lydia Antonini from Warner Bros.,Allen DeBevoise of Machinima.com and Aaron Simpson of Cold Hard Flash,

Execs like Angel Gyetvan from UStream and others from College Humor and CBS Interactive were also there.

I had a great time and got a few moments to chat with Liz Gannes about what NewTeeVee is, what they are doing and what they mean to independent content creators.

A New Media Movable Feast Welcomes Galacticast

American author Ernest Hemingway wrote about his years in Paris as part of the American expatriate circle of writers in the 1920s painting a picture of a struggling young writer in hi book, A Movable Feast.

Currently there is a group of online content producers here in the "ohs" of this century living a very similar yet digital lifestyle in Los Angeles and all around the world.

We have a "local" community across the Internet but come together in person every once in awhile as we did this week to welcome Casey McKinnon and Rudy Jahchan of Galacticast to the LA Area.

ZadiDiaz, Steve Woolf and Sarah Atwood of Epic FU fame rounded up the troupes to enjoy a little Rock Band Karaoke at Sardo's in Burbank.

Felicia Day of Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog and The Guild, Kent Nichols of Ask A Ninja, Doug Bresler of Doogtoons, Hayden Black of Goodnight Burbank and Abigails Teen Diaries,Lara Doucette of Tiki Bar TV, Annie Tsai Ricky Rey, Lan Bui, Vu Bui, Bonnie Pierzina of Noodle Scar, Daniel McVicar and a couple other folks including my agent from UTA all made it out.

We are living in a very special time. I wish the energy and fun of this moment in my life could last forever.

Have You Voted For Next Year's SXSW Panels Yet?

Did you know it's time to start voting for next year's SXSW 09 panels?

Hugh Forrest and Kathryn Lasater have sent out the email that the 2009 SXSW Interactive Festival Panel Picker voting application has now launched.

This means that YOU now have the opportunity to help pick the Interactive panels that take place March 13-17, 2009 in Austin, TX .

REPEAT: The SXSW 09 Panels are up for voting on the Interactive SXSW Panel Picker.

You can use the search function to find a term or a presentor, or even to gauge the zeitgeist of this community. "Trends that we have noticed for 2009 include web apps, brands, lessons, news, things that are long, the popularity of the word "suck" and a lot more advanced-level proposals than last year."

Here are a few of my pics:

Advertising is Entertaining - Who's Selling Out?
Felicia Williams, YouTube
Description:
How are popular online video creators making advertising work without losing the authenticity and credibility that are their biggest assets? A panel with real experience tackling these issues will talk about things they’ve learned, successes and failures, and emerging best practices for making sponsorships entertaining without selling your soul


Video Content: Super Distribution or Super Disaster?
Daisy Whitney, TelevisionWeek
Description:
With hundreds of video-sharing sites, social networking and blogs, devising an effective video and social media strategy is daunting. Creators face a myriad of tough questions. Discover how your strategy impacts your revenue model. Take away a list of tools, trends, and tips to save time, money, and your sanity.

Online to Big Screen: Filmmakers Reflect
Kent Nichols, AskANinja.com
Description:
Hollywood is sending online video directors to the big leagues of feature films. Find out how these online pioneers made the leap, how the mediums differ, and how you can turn internet success into a dream come true.

Sex, Lies and Online Videos
Zadi Diaz, EPIC FU
Description:
As the online video world evolves, how do we properly evaluate what's been working and what hasn't? How do the old media mantras and models apply themselves to the new media world? Our experienced panel will bring together their combined knowledge and discuss what has worked for them and what hasn't. We dispel the myths about money and production, tell you what you should watch out for, reveal our new media experiences in the Hollywood world, and teach you what you need to be aware of as a producer in the digital age.

Anytime, Anywhere, Any Device: Navigating the Distribution Paradigm
Damon Berger, Revision3
Description:
How do you get online content in front of the biggest audience? What are the best distribution platforms to use? Online video sites want their content accessible – and on as many devices and networks as possible. Attend this session to learn the latest in navigating the new distribution paradigm.

Lessons Learned from Successful Online Video Producers
Tim Street, FrenchMaidTV
Description:
These popular video producers beat the odds and created profitable online videos. Learn the essential ingredients for success and how to avoid time-consuming and expensive pitfalls. Improve your chances for launching a successful online video or movie trailer by implementing the necessary elements and strategies.

Are there any panels on the panel picker list that you would like to see?

ACT NOW Time is running out!

Voting will close at 11:59 pm Central Standard Time on Friday, August 29. Panel organizers will be notified as to whether their idea was accepted (or not) beginning in mid-October.

What Would You Say To CEOs?

Kent Nichols of Ask A Ninja twittered, "I need your input" and posted a link to a new blog entry where he asks for help as to what he should say about small media to a bunch of CEO's at an upcoming conference.

Here's my comment to his post:

I think I would find a correlation between small media and the word processor or some other tool of democratization and show how CEOs have benefited from previous revolutions and project how they might be able to benefit from this one.

Last night I had drinks with a music producer who has produced over 150 albums for many artists that you have heard of and he was telling me about the music industry when he started producing back in the 1960's at the age of 16. The stories he told about that time made me think of our online video community now and about the time of Ernest Hemingway's A Movable Feast in the 1920's.

The revolutions of the 20's and 60's changed the way people used their artistic voice to write books and write music that had passion and that passion changed those market places to the benefit of corporations.

Once corporations got involved and tried to replicate the passion of the artists with the skill of trained craftsmen the "soul" of the artist's message was lost and the mediums took dives.

As online video creators we now have the opportunity to spill our passion to a global audience with no one standing in our way and it's all thanks to the tools that corporations and individuals have created to use on this thing we call the Internet.

You can ignore it. You can pretend that it is just a fad but as I sit on the couch of my living room and pound out these words using technologies that CEO's approved and sent to market I know that my words will reach 100's of people maybe 1000's and my words will effect people in a way that will bring about change. Maybe these words will inspire some new online video that will lead to something new, something exciting, something passionate and something meaningful...and I'm not talking about a new episode of French Maid TV. I'm talking about something artistic and truly meaningful.

As an artist I've been sitting on my hands waiting, waiting for all the tools to be in place to be able to create and make a living off my art. For me French Maid TV has just been a test in spectacle but now I feel we are at the point that we can tell stories online and monetize them.

I think the new stories that we produce will lead us to new formats and new creative ways of telling stories that use technologies like Twitter, IM, SMS and Video Chat to entertain in ways not possible on traditional TV or DVD.

We are now entering a new age of emotionally engaging interactive entertainment and the CEO's will have much from which to benefit.

Ad-Tech San Francisco is Next Week

Popular online show Internet Superstar will tape their next show as the closing keynote presentation. Attendees will hear from Internet stars Kevin Rose of Diggnation, Ask a Ninja's Kent Nichols, Jeff Macpherson of Tiki Bar TV, Gary Vaynerchuk of WineLibrary.tv and hosts Martin Sargent of Jay Speiden of Internet Superstar/Revision3, who will talk about what this new world of Web video programming looks like and explore how users can leverage these programs to deliver tremendous results. Opening keynotes on the first two days and the closing keynote are free with pre-registration for an expo hall pass at http://www.ad-tech.com/sf/adtech_san_francisco_register.aspx.

If you want a "DEEP" Discount on a Full Pass let me know.

If you are not sure why you should go to Ad-Tech ask yourself if you want to make money in online video advertising. If the answer is "yes", go to Ad-Tech.

Rides To The Prom

In his blog Ask A Ninja Co-Creator Kent Nichols talks about what goes into the Ask A Ninja videos that he and his creative Ninja partner Douglas Sarine create and own. Kent explains why when the costs are averaged out each episode of Ask A Ninja costs about $6000 per video. Kent does a great job of explaining what has gone into building their business and their brand that will continue to grow but what Kent doesn't talk about are all the videos by Independent producers that are made for $6000 or less for large corporations.

Large companies are calling online video producers that have had viral videos and they are offering money to create new online videos for their major corporations and that's great. When I first started producing I would have loved to received a call from a large corporation who wanted me to produce something for them. Are you kidding? I would have done it for FREE. But times are different now. I'd still take the work but I want something more than money.

Today if you are creative and can produce a viral video that builds and audience you don't need a Fortune 500 company to pay you money. Just look at what Kent and Douglas and other online video producers that have come before them have done as well as what people like Greg Goodfried and Miles Beckett are doing with LG15 and Kate Modern.

What you need to watch out for are the "Rides to the Prom" as I like to call them. "If you give us a ride we will show you a good time later on." What I mean by this is that when a big company says, "Hey, we want you to do this video for us cause we think you are the most creative and wonderful person out there and here's $6000." be very careful.

There are some TV Networks that have been doing this tactic in cable television for years. They get talented kids to work for cheap and instead of giving the kids a raise when they do a good job they just find new talented kids. That's a little bit different. As the kid you are getting experience and you have that TV Network name you can put on your resume and go find work at a network that pays more money for experience. Now you can create your own videos and get experience doing it.

The thing to remember is that now the rules have changed. You don't need a TV Network to get the experience to create something that is watched by millions and you don't need to work for a TV Network to make money. Don't get me wrong it's great if you can get work from a big company and it can be great money but you are not going to be able to build a business on $6000 videos that you don't own. Sure there are wedding video guys that make this kind of money and can shoot four videos in a weekend but that's not what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about pursuing your passion and taking your wacky ideas and turning them into something that you own that pays you a check every month for years to come.

Now if you do get an email from a large company asking you to create a video for $6000 see if you can negotiate ownership. Could you imagine if you used someone else's $6000 to create the first episode of something like Ask A Ninja?

Different Online Video Monetization Solutions

Last night Liz Gannes and Chris Albrecht from
New Tee Vee (the video blog about online video) threw a party in Hollywood at the Cat and the Fiddle. The bar was filled with online video creators including Kent Nichols from Ask A Ninja, Greg Goodfried and Miles Beckett from Lonely Girl 15 and KateModern, Hayden Black from Goodnight Burbank and Abigail’s Teen Diary, Felicia Day from The Guild, Douglas Cheney and Ryan Wise from Big Fantastic, Alec McNayr from Space Shank and David Nadelberg from Mortified, were there as well as people from companies playing in this space like Jane Hu from Vuguru, Sarah Szalavitz from Veoh, Angela Gyetvan from Revver, Jamie Flam from Independent Comedy Network, Zach Posner from National Lampoon, Philip Hodgetts from Open Television Network and Jeremy McMillan from Soda Entertainment.

What really hit me was that as diverse as the content was from these different creators so were the business models of the different online videos represented by these people.

Ask A Ninja has an online advertising agency selling their ad inventory. The Lonely Girl 15 guys are selling their own product placement deals. Hayden Black is using Revver. The Big fantastic guys are creating content for Michael Eisner and Jane Hu at Vuguru and also doing content in a partnership deal with Brent Weinstein's 60 Frames. Everyone is trying different ways of getting to the advertising dollars. Phil Hodgetts seemed to be the only one at the party who was doing a pay-per-view model although the guy from CBS Interactive who bought Wall Strip for $5 Million was there but I'm not sure you can say that's a pay-per-view model ;)

As I keep reading terms of service agreements from online advertising companies I keep seeing how different media companies are better for different types of content creators. Just because someone has online video ads doesn't mean those ads are right for your content and even if the ads are right for your content doesn't mean the video player or delivery device they have is right for your website and don't get me started on getting ads in your video podcast.

Right now it is truly the Wild West in online video and just because someone is building a fancy train doesn't mean that it will fit on your tracks.

It will all work itself out in time just like the banner ads industry has worked itself out with IAB standards but it takes time.

My advise right now is don't lock yourself into anyone monetization opportunity just yet. Keep your options open and look at what might work best for your content.

Frustrations Abound in the Online Video Community

Last night Ask A Ninja Co-Creator Kent Nichols posted the question on his blog, "Is Online Video Dead?" On Twitter this week Epic FU's Co-Creator Steve Wolfe lamented his frustrations to his followers and said, "today's lesson: sometimes it's darkest AFTER the silver lining appears."

Many of us online video entrepreneurs have built audiences. Some of us have made a little money. Others continue to enter the space hoping to build an audience and make money but the fact is that the marketplace is not built yet.

If you have an online video do you have an ad server installed? Do you have an ad sales team actively selling your ad inventory? Do you know what your ad inventory is? Are you using a video player on your site and on your video podcast that allows for dynamic ad insertion, pre-rolls, post-rolls and overlays that you control? Are your banner ads integrated with your video ad server? Are you listed with online video ad exchanges to sell your backfill?

My guess for most of you would be, "No" to most of these questions.

Large scale advertisers want to reach millions of people in a short amount of time and they are willing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to do that. Unfortunately they can't do that in online video...yet. First media buyers are not budgeted for Online video yet. Second there are no standards in place for online video advertising and third how do media buyers find online videos to advertise on?

If you are serious about selling advertising on your videos you first need to get serious about your website. Ask A Ninja is doing the best in online video because they have lots of traffic to their website and they have a conversation going on with their audience. For more on the theory behind the company that is paying Ask A Ninja check out this CNET interview with Federated Media's John Battelle.

As for monetizing your online video?

Here are a few steps to monetizing your online video:

1. Place banner and text ads on your website.

2. Install an ad server on your website and define your website's advertising inventory.

3. Join an ad network and place network ads on your website.

You may notice that none of these steps involve video. Get these steps done and shoot me an email and let me know when you're ready for the next three steps.

If you need help with the first three steps shoot me an email.

I know there are lot's of frustrated online video creators out there but Online Video is not dead, it hasn't even begun. It's time we all start building the online video marketplace together.

A Movable Feast

The above video is a bunch of us reading comments that were sent in to Epic Fu at a party Zadi and Steve had.

Just like those artists before us we are in a time of "A Movable Feast" or maybe "A New Media Movable Feast." Some of us are doing better than others but it's still a very fun time, as long as someone has money for beer and pizza.

Thank God Steve and Zadi did.

I think this is going to be a great year for independent video creators and I can't wait to see who the next break out hit that self monetizes is.

Who do you think it will be?

Ask a Ninja Co-Creator Launches Blog

So Kent Nichols of Ask A Ninja fame started blogging today and he blogged about how you should not put your online video fate in the hands of YouTube. He's reffering to Perez Hilton being suspended on YouTube.

Kent also gives some great advice on the way you should do things because it worked for him.


"In this new media world, build your own domain. Create traffic that you can sell your own ads against. Build up your video views through your own site and then monetize them using Revver et. al., and then sell CPM ads as soon as you can."

He also says that because of his post about YouTube he's worried that his videos might be taken down.

I've posted one of his YouTube videos up above just to keep track. It's the What is podcasting? episode.

The Hardest Working Couple in Online Video

Most people throw a Holiday party to kick back relax and enjoy some downtime with friends and family, not Zadi Diaz and Steve Woolf of Epic FU.

Last night several of the "Online Video Movable Feast" gang were invited over to Steve and Zadi's house for drinks and pizza but instead of serving small talk and pigs in a blanket the Epic FUers had us reading things for them on camera. We even had to sign talent releases - not that anyone had a problem with it.

From Notourage's Sarah Atwood to Ask A Ninja's
Kent Nichols and Tiki Bar TV's Jeff Macpherson to Doug Bresler, from Doogtoons and Bonny Pierzina, Vu Bui and Lan Bui from Noodle Scar the group was taking turns reading lines while Steve worked the lights and camera and Zadi held the cue cards. Steve and Zadi didn't even stop to have a drink. They just kept working the whole time I was there.

These are the early days of online video and if you are looking to get some ideas on how to make money with online video pay attention to what Steve and Zadi are doing.

1. They keep costs low by not having office space and they shoot in their home.

2. They are a two person team who write, produce, direct, host, edit and do their own website work.

3. They involve their friends and their online fans to generate content and build a community.

Steve and Zadi are absent from many online video social events because they are always working and that work ethic is starting to pay off for them.

They signed with UTA as their agent and struck a deal to produce Epic Fu for Next New Networks and besides all that they are really nice people.

International Day of the Ninja

The very first episode of Ask A Ninja was posted in late 2005 on a blogspot blog for Beatbox Giant. The first question was Matt's questions about when and where ninjas get their uniforms. (I wonder who Matt is? Maybe the bass player for the band that does the theme some but I never asked the Ninja)

In the Question #1: The Ninja-Mart Store episode the Ninja didn't even have a real Ninja uniform because the shows creators Kent Nichols and Douglas Sarine couldn't afford one. They shot the show with a broken camera, a good mic and launched with a catchy theme song "I Am Ninja", by the German band The Neu Tickles. Two years later it is the International Day of the Ninja and Kent and Douglas are grossing $100,000 per month in advertising revenues.

That's right $100k per month for a guy dressed in a Ninja suit standing in front of a wall yelling answers to a question that one of their viewers asked via email. But keep in mind their videos do get millions of views.

At the risk of being killed by the Ninja I'm going to give you a little bit of the story on how it all came together.

Kent and Douglas met in an Improvisational acting class in the Los Angeles area. From there they started creating an animated show about Ninjas living in Orange County, California. As they got further and further into developing the show for another production company they realized that animation was really, really hard to pull off so they were ready to throw in the towel and call it quits but Douglas wouldn't let it die. Douglas started asking Kent questions about video production and internet videos and how they could do something - anything - on the cheap. After spending some time watching other popular videos on YouTube they came up with Ask A Ninja.

I first met Kent in the Spring of 2006 at Vloggercon. We were on a panel together about creating characters and I got slammed by the crowd. They hated me but loved the Ninja. At that time Kent and I were both amazed by what Andrew Baron and what he was doing with Rocketboom but then came the big break up. Andrew and Amanda from Rocketbook had a big public falling out.

Later in the Summer I met Douglas for the first time when Kent and I were on another panel together at Comic-con and Kent and Douglas were making changes fast.

At that point because of the big Rocketboom breakup Kent and Douglas realized that no one in this online video space knew what they were doing when it came to monetizing online video. So Kent and Douglas decided they would figure it out for themselves and to do that they knew they would need money, which they borrowed from their family.

They were using Revver to host their videos and Podtrac to get advertisers and both services worked but just not on a big enough scale to make enough money to live on and pay back the money they had borrowed.

The Ninja boys also had a few great little things happen. They were asked by NPR to do a movie review for Pirates of the Caribbean and the Ninja was asked to be the judge of the Yahoo Talent Show. Both events gave Ask A Ninja more visibility and more video views.

Along the way Kent and Douglas picked up UTA as an agent and signed with a high profile Manager and high powered entertainment attorney.

Once they had those pieces in place they started talking with an online video podcasting company, Podtech about taking over advertising for the Ask A Ninja videos but at about the same time they also met with a very smart man by the name of John Battelle from an online advertising agency called Federated Media to talk about handling the advertising inventory for both their website and their videos.


Now keep in mind that Federated Media had never monetized online video before but John Battelle put together a very detailed and well thought out plan of how Federated Media would bring money to the Ask A Ninja Brand and Kent and Douglas liked the man and they liked his plan.

UTA brokered the deal with Federated, it took a few months to get things up and running but now my best guess is that the Ninja boys are taking home around 30-40K each per month and in the scheme of things they are just getting started.

Best of all Kent and Douglas are still nice guys, they are now dept free AND they still own Ask A Ninja. Now that’s something worth creating a special day to celebrate.

Friends vs Fans

How can you have over 1000 Friends? If you did, how often would you talk to each and every one of your friends? How often would you see them? Send them a gift? Have dinner with them? What makes someone your friend vs a fan?

I think a little common sense goes a long way here but beyond that think about your brand vs you. Are you your brand or is your brand your brand and you are you?

If you are building a brand online your online "Friends" need to be treated as fans and feel free to get as many of them as possible. If you are building relationships to help grow your brand be careful about mixing your fans and your friends. It can come back to hurt you.

I hate it when someone I know in real life sends me a SPAM email about their project. "It feels very disingenuous and makes me want to "unfriend" them. I'm sure there are things that I've done and continue to do that rub people the wrong way as well but that's not going to stop me from talking about this.

Last night Chris Brogan (who I really enjoy hanging out with and drinking beers with at new media events - especially cause he's the one usually buying) twittered (or tweeted as some of you like to say) that he had posted over 10,000 times on Twitter. That got me thinking about how many of his postings were of any interest to me. The answer was very few and I removed Chris from my list of people that I follow on Twitter. Eric Rice then Twittered that he had Chris beat by a few hundred posts. I then thought about removing Eric but I realized that some of Eric's posts are informative to me because Eric likes to mix things up and create controversy. Eric also interacts with others way more than Chris. From what I see, Chris is usually Twitter Out" not "Twitter back and forth".

This morning I saw Susan Bratton twittered that she "just crested 1,000 FaceBook friends" and that prompted me to write this post.

Ask A Ninja is a Brand, and serves as a good case study for this. Associated with Ask A Ninja is Digital Filmaker, Beatbox Giant and the shows creators Kent Nichols and Douglas Sarine.

On Ning, they have their official Fan Page, with 4802 members (at the time of this posting)on Facebook they have a Ask A Ninja Page and Kent has a page and I don't know if Douglas has a page.

They have kept their fans separate from their friends.

Now comes the gray area. Sometimes as a content creator you will have fans within the Internet video community that want to be friends with you. This makes things very confusing. I think the best way to approach this is to set some standards for yourself and think about what works best for you. Don't just click the "accept" button thinking the more friends you have the more money you will make because in the real world, the more "friends" you have the more you will dilute your relationships. However online the more "fans" you have the more money you have the potential to make.

All that said I'm sure Chris Brogan will still buy me beers because he's that nice of guy but my point here isn't really to ridicule anyone it's to have us all focus on the real power of the social networks and how we can best use them to grow our brands and monetize Internet Video not just have the most posts.

Remember, "Fame without fortune turns you into Joey Buttafocco." and you can't pay your rent with Twitter posts.

I think Chris Pirillo explains the "friends thing" pretty well in the above video and he also talks about how sites not sharing revenue "cheeses" him off.


Lower your head, watch your step and enjoy the rest of your day on the Internet.

New Tee Vee Live

"
Scott Beale from Laughing Squid" took a great photo of my heros Kent Nichols from Ask A Ninja and Jeff Macpherson from Tiki Bar TV and me while we were at the New Tee Vee Live conference this week.

If it wasn't for Jeff I wouldn't have launched French Maid TV and if it wasn't for Kent I wouldn't have UTA as my agent. I love what both of these guy have done for our industry and getting to hang out with them together is always fun.

As far as the New Tee Vee Live conference goes... well.. I'd have to say it was...great.

The VC suits were out in force and there were even some advertising people there as well.

Liz Gannes, Om Malik and the whole New Tee Vee gang did a fantastic job of bringing the right crowd together and I hope they do another conference soon.