Yesterday afternoon, EchoDitto's D.C. headquarters had a FIRE ALARM. Mysteriously, our building's parking-lot turned out to have wireless internet access. And so we were able to continue working, even in the face of impending immolation.
(I took this with my cheap Verizon cameraphone. More on Flickr.)
Fortunately, it was a false alarm, so don't worry, no actual immolation occurred. more
Jim Brayton has been EchoDitto's Chief Technical Officer and the guiding force behind our technology strategy since our humble beginnings last March. This week, Jim's leaving EchoDitto to work as Internet Director for Barack Obama's senate office. It's a dream job-- we wish him the best of luck and are looking forward to seeing what he does with it.
In the meantime, though, we have a job opening. EchoDitto is officially seeking a CTO. If you live near DC (or would consider relocating), have strong technology management experience, and would enjoy using your expertise to fight for child hunger, workers' rights, and other exciting projects, we want to hear from you. Write futures-at-echoditto-dot-com.
Reporting directly to the Chief Operating Officer, and with minimal supervision, the CTO is responsible for all facets of EchoDitto’s technology operations, both internally and on external, client projects. S/he also leads the EchoDitto technical staff and ensures timely and on-budget completion of client deliverables. S/he leads EchoDitto and its client organizations on technology decisions, including: software platforms; third-party vendors; web-based technology and tools; and strategic direction.
Here's another example of how grassroots are using the internet to fight back.
Earlier this month, Nike stole the album cover from Ian MacKaye's 1981 punk/hardcore classic Minor Threat to promote a new line of shoes. Nike's advertisers have been courting American skater culture and subculture in general for a long time now, but ordinarily they at least ask for a celebrity's permission before using him/her as a spokesperson. more
There's an evolving discussion on the blogs today about the politics of web technology providers. The focus is on Convio, Inc., an Austin-based company that made its name last year providing web services to the Dean campaign.
It began Friday afternoon, when John Aravosis' AMERICAblog linked to a little-noticed Washington Post article revealing that Convio has begun working for The Alliance For Marriage, a major advocate of the constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Aravosis contends that in doing so, Convio is violating its own "Right To Be Heard Policy," which promises that Convio "does not work with groups that promote prejudice and hate even if they are in full compliance with the law."
John called for a left-wing boycott of Convio. The call was picked up by trendsetters like Daily Kos and Atrios, followed by a host of other political blogs. The chatter promises to only get bigger. more
There's been a lot of talk about MeetUp.com's decision to charge $19/mo to MeetUp Organizers, but what struck me the most was this email I got in my inbox this afternoon.
Your Organizer, Matt Jarjoura, sent the following message to
the members of The Washington PHP Meetup Group:
Well, since they are asking me to fork up $19 a month for this
and PHP DC has barely gotten off the ground, I am going to step
down as organizer.
Maybe someone will step-up and revive this group, otherwise it
will probably be frozen in time.
-Matt more
Quickyblog! Quick, blog! Blog quickly!
ITEM ONE: EYEBEAM CONTAGEOUS MEDIA SHOWDOWN!
Announcing the world's first Contagious Media Showdown.
Do you have what it takes to corral enough traffic to win the cash prizes?
Can you make the next
Dancing Baby,
All Your Base,
or Star Wars Kid
and ride into the sunset with the bounty?
This is your chance to prove you are the best in the West... In short, it's a formalization of the general phenomenon of lots of people making lots of silly stuff on the internet, some of which lots of other people see and enjoy.
ITEM TWO: LIZ WINSTEAD SAYS CBS SHOULD PODCAST!
Liz Winstead, creator of The Daily Show, talked with The New York Times on Sunday about how CBS should change the format of their evening news and recoup their sad sad third-place market-share. Among her excellent recommendations:
It's also important that they provide this as a podcast. They could charge people. You could listen online. You could listen at the gym.
ITEM THREE: PEW STANDS BY ITS DATA!
The saga continues:
We also thought that it was useful to report these findings even on a relatively small sample because there is growing interest in podcasting and we at the Pew Internet Project are being asked more frequently if we have any data on this subject. We thought these numbers were legitimate to report because they are the first from a national sample to take a stab at defining the podcast-user universe.
OK, we're cool. Actually, "Stand By Your Data" sounds like a great title for a great twenty-first-century love-ballad. So does "Listen At The Gym". Consider this story in-development. more
A few days ago, The Pew Internet and American Life Project reported that 6,000,000 Americans have listened to podcasts-- a figure which I then called "surprising", but should now more accurately call "surprisingly WRONG".
Pew is the primary source for most of what we think we know about how Americans use the internet, so it's bizarre that their own research director doesn't appear to stand behind their methodology or conclusions.
Engadget's Peter Rojas puts it aptly:
"Not that podcasting as a phenomenon isn't growing rapidly or anything, but there's no reason to overinflate its importance, you know?"
Pew should respond officially to the controversy, or they risk damaging their credibility. Meanwhile, I've learned to read the fine print on a survey before I believe it. (Thanks, Reed.) more
Yesterday, The Pew Internet & American Life Project published a report on podcasting. Their numbers are a little surprising:
Read the whole thing for details, but the main take-away is that the numbers seem to back up the hype. (!!) more
If you have a Windows computer, you can view video of last Thursday's trendspotting NBC-4 News segment about podcasting. Go to NBC4.com, scroll down until you find the "Podcasting Moves To The Mainstream" link, and then click on it. It features Ed Churchman and myself representing EchoRadio, as well as Eric Gunderson holding it down for Development Seed.
Two earnest suggestions for NBC-4: Consider providing permanent links to your content so that tedious instructions like the ones above aren't necessary. And: I know your corporate partners might not like this, but consider adding support for Macintosh machines to your streaming video. more
I'm always faintly embarassed by the word "podcasting". Like "blog", it's always felt a little self-consciously cute, its phonemes precision-engineered to stick in your head and Go Viral. (That on-line "grassroots" movements seem to spontaneously co-opt corporate branding techniques might deserve an entire post of its own sometime.)
Broadcast media's attention to podcasting was officially kicked off last month by the perpetually buzz-starved Wired, which declared "THE END OF RADIO!!", and then added-- in tiny parenthesis-- "...as we know it". Coy, Wired. Very coy.
The meat behind the media is this: There's now a new infrastructure for distributing audio, and the "podcasting" buzz may be the first wave of a cultural change brought on by a change in how we, as a culture, can receive and send information.
I.J. Hudson gets it. He's a reporter for the DC-area NBC-4, and he decided to do a segment about podcasting for his trendspotting technology program Digital Edge. Thanks to Eric at Development Seed, he wound up chilling in the EchoRadio studio last week discussing the new medium with Ed and me.
I.J.'s been producing news radio and television since the 1960s, so he has a solid perspective on podcasting and its ramifications. I tried to spin the show as "Old Media vs New Media" but had trouble finding much we disagreed on. Maybe the Old and New aren't as diametrically opposed as Wired would like us to think.
Our podcast about broadcasting is now live on EchoRadio-- download it any time. NBC 4's broadcast about podcasting is live on DC-area television tonight at 5pm. more
Tim Jones was a co-founder and strategy architect at EchoDitto.
We joined the New Leaders Council in announcing the first EchoDitto New Media Award for the 40 Under 40 Awards.
