MS / SKYPE PRESS ONFERENCE LIVE

THIS IS THE LIVE (AS OF 11 AM EASTERN MAY 10, 2011) PRESS CONFERENCE FROM MS & SKYPE WITH THE CEO'S OF BOTH COMPANIES: (Note -- Live conference ended at 11:48 AM and is expected to be available for re-viewing shortly after -- move the red cursor to 47:00 for the start of the re-broadcast program!!!) --

Plans are

1- Integrate with all MS products, including Lync, XBOX, Kinect, Hotmail

2- Maintain Skype as an independent division

3- Maintain Skype on non-MS hardware (iOS, Android, ...)

4- New revenue streams, especially advertising & premium services
5- Overseas cash  - Skype is a Luxembourg company -- accounting benefits
6- Skype on PC's, now going to mobile phones, living room (now on 50M TV's)
7- Connect all the platforms together
8- Business & consumer applications
9- Will work hard to develop relationships with carriers.

WEB VIDEO UPLOADS -- CHECK WITH YOUR LAWYER

Every time you upload a video, you first check on some box that purports to say you have complied with and agree to the terms of the upload on the site.

The terms of the site may not be to your liking. By uploading and checking the box, you may (or may not) be giving away your video, or accepting liability for something that happens in the future, or accepting other terms or conditions you might not like.

Below is an excerpt from a typical agreement associated with a contest. The names of the sponsors of the contest and the name of the site have been omitted. This agreement (like many others I've seen) seems to be poorly written; in this case, contradicting itself, first saying you give up all rights in the video just by uploading it, then saying you are providing non-exclusive rights. In neither case is there any compensation for giving up rights unless you win the contest. This agreement (in other places) does not seem to ask you to assume liability, but it does ask you to waive potential avenues to seek redress for some things from the sponsor.

Typically, the most important issues are rights, compensation and liabilities; but there may be other parts of an upload agreement (or contest rules) that you need to check also.

S0, read it carefully, and check the agreement with your lawyer before you accept an upload agreement. Make sure that the value of the particular upload is worth accepting the terms at that particular site!

A typical agreement:

> "By submitting your short film to XYZ
> for this contest, you hereby assign any and all
> rights, in and to the film to XYZ for
> their use, in their sole discretion, throughout the
> universe in perpetuity.
>
> Grant of Rights:
>
> You grant to XYZ and their respective
> designees a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual,
> royalty-free, sub-licensable right to make use of
> the short film and any person's property (physical
> and personal and indicia) contained therein, in any
> media now or hereafter known, without any payment or
> other consideration of any kind, or permission or
> notification, to you or any third party.
> XYZ reserves all rights, on a non-exclusive
> basis, including without limitation, the right to
> reproduce, record, alter, amend, edit, publish,
> publicly perform, use, broadcast and stream the
> short film in connection with any and all media now
> or hereafter known throughout the world, in any and
> all media, now or hereafter known, in perpetuity,
> for no additional consideration. Without limiting
> the foregoing, XYZ shall have the
> right to use the short film in any merchandising,
> advertising, marketing, promotion or for any other
> commercial or non-commercial purpose, including,
> without limitation, the promotion and/or marketing
> of XYZ and their respective goods
> and services. You forever waive and relinquish all
> so-called "moral rights (droit moral)" now or
> hereafter recognized."
>

RIP OTL

So... At around 6:00 this evening, NY time, the last vestige of On The Lot (OTL), it's interesting website thelot.com, just evaporated into space, redirecting all visitors to the FOX web site.

The show had a great concept: filmmakers competing for a development deal with DreamWorks, making a short film each week with professional Hollywood crews and actors, and the public voting for their favorites. More than ten thousand filmmakers submitted films for the contest, and tens of thousands more loaded additional, serious short films onto the website.

Unfortunately, the TV show was marred by poor writing, an awkward hostess, lack of compelling "judging" and no publicity, so it did poorly in the ratings. It was also on Tuesday at 8:00, where it was afraid to create a really edgy style (the website even BLEEPed out words like screw -- as in screw in a lightbulb) and it competed with the popular America's Got Talent.

The website was marred by bugs, and though it had many interesting and excellent features, it lacked a powerful search function (and other features), which were badly needed on a site with so many films, filmmakers, and actors.

And the whole production was marred by frequent changes of direction, and excessive secrecy that alienated many people who would have been its biggest fans.

The result was that neither the website nor the show really got any traction.

Yet it's a great loss. The concept was great, and had the execution been as good as the concept it would have been a blockbuster show. The website had an extremely rich collection of excellent films -- serious short stories by serious filmmakers -- and the forums, blogs, and industry information could have made this a very valuable website and a central hub for filmmakers and filmmaking.

I hope someone with a great vision, and an equally good production team, puts together a successful show about making films, with a companion website that becomes a central meeting place for filmmakers. And I hope this combination helps spur independent filmmaking and web video, and fosters communication between the world of emerging filmmakers and the professional film industry.

VLOGGING WITH EASE ON BLOGGER

Blogger has just introduced video blogging (VLOGging).

The Blogger edit form now has a button that allows you to directly upload a video to Blogger.

In the past it was a two step process. First you needed to upload a video to video Google or YouTube (or other video host). Then, second, you copied the embed code to the Blogger post.

So, this is not a totally new capability, but it does make it simpler and faster to put video in your posts!

THELOT.COM MAKEOVER

On the eve of the premiere, the website for On The Lot (OTL) has gotten a substantial makeover, with new features and a new home page. Happily, the old features have not been deleted and filmmakers and audience can (still) upload films and photos and communicate on boards and blogs.

Even before the show premieres, and while most of the world is watching the Idol finale, traffic OTL has multiplied five-fold from a usual web audience of about 11,000 to 56,131 as I'm writing this.

In addition to a casting section with headshots and resumes for actors which was added a few days ago, and the staples, which have been on the site from the beginning -- logs, boards, film uploads, photo uploads, private site e-mail, friends lists, and Hollywood film news -- some new features OTL are:

• a video creation tool from Verizon;
• a video challenge (coming soon) -- make films each week along with the contestants on the show -- also from Verizon;
• a section describing VCast downloads of show clips to your Verizon phone;
• something about "Film Critics Needed," which is not explained;
• and clips from the runup to the show.
  

0 - 0 - 0

I'm not on the show, but I do have...

My Own Film OTL:

FRAGILE (Sonnet 65) with Intro:
http://films.thelot.com/films/25479