The structure of documents and the difficulty of representing them in computing. How can electronic documents improve on paper, rather than how simply to imitate it.

The History of computing – three dumb downs and a betrayal, Fire in the Valley, Freiburger especially the last chapter (Citizen Nelson)

The betrayal of Personal Computing – should make things easier and keep track of your stuff. All built on the model of operating systems distilling the 1960s into the unix system with a hierarchical system of files – the simulation of hierarchy and the simulation of paper. Computer systems are hierarchical because techies think it should be. The idea that they’re that way intrinsically is a lie. The challenge is taking how the real universe – Parallel interpenetrating structures and representing it through computing.

Computing is a Rorsach test – peoples descriptions of what computers are tells you much about them and people have also created them in their own image.

GUI => PUI – the PARC User Interface is more than an interface it’s a cosmology. A vertical desktop, the wastebasket, clipboard (the vilest thing on the face of the earth), folders and icons.

WYSIWYG is just a way of selling paper.

Meanwhile Ted was working on links behind text and the back button. Then the Xanadu project (not the bit where they got funding…until 1992) Every quotation should be connected to its original source. You can’t do that on the WWW because it comes from the hierarchy and lump file and the imitation of paper.

Ted shows http://www.xanadu.com.au/transqouter sends an EDL (an edit decision list) ie a bunch of links to the original stuff – go look it up and use it..

Implications – Copyright -> transcopyright you get the right as long as everything is linked back to it’s original source.

Techies say – this is new. Ted says no this isn’t new we’ve had it before it’s called literature.

Nothing I believe in can be done on the web – the next step is transliterature – an entirely new structure. We need something like software X but simpler – as that catches on, it actually gets more ponderous and complex. Hofstadters law – everything takes longer than you think even when you take into account Hostadters law.

We want you to be able to create flying comments on any document. Thousands of comments should be possible. A collaborative system where everyones contribution is clear and rewarded. Pullacross editing. Is it possible? Of course, but it’s not possible within the constraints of the PUI. We should be able to fly documents in 3D space with all the links being shown – the problem then is aggregating and understanding them.

So we have a document structure that is content and clinks – the multitrack view of a document.

Terry Pratchett talks about octarine – can you visualis a completely new colour?

What Ted does for fun. Why are databases rectangular? Theodore Codd at IBM thought it had mathematical properties that would be useful, but under pressure he quit and SQL was a hasty mopping up which got mangled by people trying to make it work. Dirty secret 1 – it may take 10 years to merge two corporate databases. Dirty secret 2 – you have to stop it to modify a field. So Ted’s created ZigZag a multidimensional data structure.

Information is not rectangular though you might wish to give it rectangular properties. Interconnected cells – example the royal families of europe. Take hierarchical structure Dimension 1 is name, Dimension 2 is Title Dimension 3 – marriage Dimension 4 children etc etc etc. The assignment of dimensions is of course not trivial.

Floating world – the commercial version of ZigZag under the transliterature model.

Q: do you see a problem with spam – Yes of course because whatever you do gets gamed.

Q: Issue of binary and handling ambiguity – not to do with binary, it’s about how you come to tolerate ambiguity. What makes the web complicated, standardisation of browser. Acknowledge them not supress them.

Q: to what extent can we separate content and presentation? Imagine that you’re a movie producer going through scripts – no presentation at all except the descriptions within. But the producers are able to see through the script into the movie. You want both – the transliterature view we saw is without presentation but you can put all of this on top.

Q: Are there different types of Clinks? Yes and you can invent your own – it’s just a type and pointer (from: and to:)

Q: Realtime creation from the script – plus re-editing of Star Wars “just for fun” how does this fit with transcopyright and transliterature. They can sell snippets and get new ways in. Record industry allegedly seeing the benefit from this? IP law isn’t going away, Ted is trying to create something honest and within the law that doesn’t violate anything and reusable without negotiation.

Q: what happens to broken links. We promise not to – and there’s no need to because you always leave the original there.

Q: doesn’t it kill differential pricing? Yes, but we don’t have a payments system yet so maybe it will get fixed. The price is attached to it.

At the Science Museum’s Danacentre (nice space)for the Future Wireless event by Cybersalon & OpenSpectrumUK listening to Alexei Blinov and James Stevens talking about Hive Networks putting together a DIY infrastructure – an open backbone (sounds painful)

According to the Hive Networks wiki “Hive Networks” is a cross-disciplinary research and development project into embedded devices and ubiquitous networked computing, defined as ‘multi-faceted transformative devices’ – tools that enable users to manage space, time and the boundaries around the self in new and previously unthinkable ways

So Alexei is now talking about getting ordinary people connected, almost without them knowing, like his mother listening to the radio in the kitchen.

One of his favourite devices is this one which I’d love to understand better, but I’ve got to leave for lunch!

Each device is supposed to run a particular function, to provide a particular service on the network. This box runs lots of services. Trying to weave a network around human behaviour rather than making humans change to interact with the network. Errrr go read the wiki.

I’m at the Channel 4 HQ in Horseferry Road at a cafe style session on education policy. About 50 interesting and vociferous people have gathered to talk about Creativity, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, well at least that’s what Channel 4 wants them to talk about – we’ll see how that actually works out.

We’re just going into an Open Space session to pull out what people are really interested in.

As usual, pics and flicks later on.

Legal issues facing podcasters.

podcastpaul.com & podlawyer.com

Freedom of speech

There’s a lot to the legal side of podcasting than can I use the Blind Date theme tune. Legislation hasn’t caught up with what’s happening.

Is speech really free? You can say what you like until you tread on someone’s toes. We have a lot more than, say, China. We’re not allowed to say anything we want. It depends on where you say it and who you say it to.

Here in the UK, we are pretty liberal – you can’t take property or life belonging to another, they are policed by the state and we know we can’t do them. but civil actions are taken by the individual.

Defamation – two types – slander, the spoken word & libel, the ‘permanent’ form – in such a way as to ‘arouse feelings of pity’ Mere taunts (name-calling in the heat of the moment) are not enough.

What about podcasting? The law doesn’t move quickly with new technologies. Theatres Act 1968 – actionable if a theatrical production ridicules someone. Broadcasting Act 1990 applies to Radio and TV and treats defamation as a libel. Podcasting doesn’t fit yet.

There is no definitive answer, but if you defame somebody it would be actionable, but might take a lot more argument than in other media.

He’s had to deal with a defamation case already. Someone had talked to someone in a pub on a podcast and had interviewed someone else who referred to him as “that bloke who takes his clothes off down the arts centre”. Ended up not being defamation.

It’s not going to be a police matter, but individuals or corporations might sue.

Evidence needed – implying a criminal act punishable by imprisonment, implying sexual/contagious disease, imputation of sexual unchastity (for women), disparaging in office or profession (lowering their standing in the eyes of right-thinking people).

Innuendo – not just smutty eg Tolly vs JS Fry & Sons 1931. They used him in a chocolate ad which Tolly said prostituted his amateur status.

You can’t defame a class of people, I have to be able to draw an inference about an individual.

Defences – why do they go into such huge detail when reporting about people committing offences? It’s to avoid defaming other people who could be confused. If in trouble, take advice. Offers to make amends and limit damage, what you said might be justifiable or fair comment & in the public interest.

Don’t forget incitement or conspiracy (eg to corrupt public morals) So basically think before you open your gob and if you get a writ, take advice.

Q: jurisdiction? England & Wales applies to us. But it depends.

Q: Can you get legal aid for defamation. You are seen as guilty? Yes that’s right. That’s why we have no win, no fee. The burden of proof is on the other party.

Q:

tags: podcastcon uk & london & podcasting

A “live” version of the Richard Vobes show. weird, not really sure what’s going on or what the point is – except to show perhaps how doing a podcast looks. Right now Jimmy is pouring beer for someone to try. Like I say, weird.

tags: podcastcon uk & podcasting

Podcasts for Educational use

1 teacher and two university lecturers in the room. Mmmmmm..

Technologies challenge traditional ways of transmitting knowledge.

Last October, he’d just got into podcasting. A friend had a big contract with a south london borough for remedial education. The borough decided they had too many unemployed uneducated kids. So they got loads of hardware and software (even quarkexpress and adobe!) equipped a room with state of the art stuff. Big opening ceremony – everyone there. had a phone call saying kids didn’t turn up for the lectures in this hi-tech wonderland.

Looked again – it’s just another classroom – nice carpets & cool kit, but still a classroom and these kids are those who rebelled against classrooms. That model of encouraging people to learn doesn’t work for a significant minority of kids. Milverton said give ’em ipods so they can hang on the corners pretending to listen to music, but really listening to a maths lesson. Not taken seriously – now closed the facility. An illustration of how difficult it is to get established professionals to accept what’s new and experiment with stuff.

Took 5 years for department to take web-authoring seriously. The kids came and the rooms were full, because they saw the future, they’re smart, they know what’s coming. Now very few are even using blogs (x-warwick)

Getting in touch with community nurses – difficult to communicate with people who for some reason don’t want to turn on their phones. Aaaah podcasting. So much could be done with simple cheap technology in the NHS, but instead they pour money down the drain on ERP systems and the like.

Teaching children of refugees to speak English. Some kids aren’t so good at face to face learning. Podcasts great for re-inforcing. Big problem encouraging teachers to deal with children in the context of a culture that kids understand.

Delivering instructions to learners – it’s a one-way thing, so this is a bit of a barrier (or at least a weakness) You can’t have direct feedback and that needs to be dealt with.

What about people selling audio files of lectures? Nothing new. Same as when newspapers panicked about losing advertising revenue and just dumped same content onto the website. Didn’t excite anybody to just see a facsimile of newsprint. Important not to just reproduce in a different media – look at how to create something new and interesting out of it.

Podcasting the next big thing for training? A company saved 30% of training budget that was previously going on cd and dvd burning. But also the ability to encourage people to create their own space and feel included. Tagging as a form of knowledge management, allow people to create their own environment and subject area communities.

Large-scale experiment at Duke University – gave everyone an iPod (discounted from Apple) Review showed that it was used for recording lectures, but also sharing their own comments about lectures, students learn more from each other than from their lecturers! Learning also accelerated by creating their own learning environments, learning from each other, from their peers, using the technology for real purposes and learning much faster as a result.

Q: what’s your job? Journalism lecturer at City University for 10 years. Only has weblog. Ran Netmedia conference. Now creating a forum for people who innovate in digital media can move on and get financial support to build businesses, working with UCL. But also just a space to engage each other about innovation in the space and how we encourage it here.

Q: Any directories for this sort of content? No, but we’re working on it. (it will create itself, or the students will create it for themselves).

Q: Work with your local high-school

tags: podcastcon uk & podcasting & london

Podsafe Music Network

In the break, promo from Roger Smalls.

Mark does the tartanpodcast – what do you hang on a wall? Wallpaper & a picture – art (and tony blair) no doubt we’ll hear in a minute what that was all about.

4th out of 1800 music podcasts on podcastalley.com.

Listen to music podcasts and hear music that you wouldn’t have heard before. Start a music podcast. Use music in your podcast.

What’s more important, the wallpaper or the artwork? Obviously the art, that’s the bit you want people to focus on. Sadly music usually becomes the backdrop or wallpaper for what you’re doing, rather than the art.

Mark’s trying to reverse that trend. Soon after he started he got a cd in the post, gripped almost straight away. Wanted to tell as many people as possible about this great new sound. He’s lucky in that he has the tartanpodcast as an outlet for that.

Shows video (audio only!) of Alistair Bishop (who’s cd that was) talking about the huge response (including CD sales) he’s had from all over the world who’ve heard the podcast.

Shows podsafe music network. Search UI with Artist, Song, Keywords, Influences, Genre, State, Country (at least 10 pages of bands from UK) all of these people have already given you permission to play them in a podcast.

You get a playlist page from which you can download.

Q: anyone doing bespoke music for podcasts? Yes, they’d bite your hand off. Courteous to give credit

Q: will it always be free (it’s by podshow)? As far as we know, based on ad revenue.

Q: a market for professional podcasts who need to cut costs or don’t want to worry about permissions. Yes, often it’s better quality and more interesting (and happy for you)

Q: any protection for people who might not like how it’s used? See terms & conditions

Q: what happens if people get signed? don’t know yet

Q: can the music be used in other media? Should have read the terms & conditions.

Q: has anyone been signed as a result. no but some interest from labels and other side projects 3 have been offered film music contracts and one for a video game.

Q: do you like the name podsafe (paul doesn’t). Mark doesn’t like podcast – prefers independent.

Q: are you targeting a radio audience? No, music lovers who really listen to music – he doesn’t want to produce more wallpaper. heard from a commercial show in Glasgow – he said he wouldn’t be able to mention Mark’s name as he’s a competitor.

Q: Can Virgin use podsafe music? maybe.

Q: are you thinking of becoming a label? No. You could, but he’s not interested.

Q: how has becoming a member of podsquad affected you? I’m not an employee of podshow, but I have a contract with them. Very north american (no offense)

Q: how do you sustain it & earn a living? No avenue for it now, but opportunities coming. In the meantime I don’t watch telly!

tags: podcastcon uk & podcasting & london

Podcasting technologies

Can’t watch tv, can’t listen to radio x-NPR, no magazines. Doesn’t know what to do in the evenings. Got on internet, found blogs, found audio in blogs, video in blogs. Found a knitting blog and thought if there’s knitting there must be loads of cool stuff.

Created 49media (what’s on the web tonight, honey?) Really cool stuff that’s not on mainstream media. Browse around and see what’s new. So what is relevant? And how do we know? Each person knows what’s relevant for themselves so it’s not so much about what’s cool out there, but you can find out what’s relevant to you.

Shows most recent searches – on image, audio & video latest: Korean, ONR thing (?), Kelly Clarkson Because of You

Can go down to just image or just audio or just video.

Trying to do categorisation entertainment, tech, variety, arts, music, personal, news & politics, hobbies, food&drink, sports, society, places, business, other, adult.

Plus Popular, will give you most popular in each media group.

So he started going to SF meetup and asked if he should do a podcast so he started interviewing people who are making media that shows up in 49media.

tags: podcastcon uk & podcasting & london

Podcasting for Business

Neville has taken Hugh’s “was it good for you” cartoon and replaced “read my blog” with “listen to my podcast”

Most people in the room are podcasters – just a few have one’s that are business podcasts.

What is a podcast? Digital audio file, typically MP3, radio show format, time-shifted, delivered by rss, auto-sync with portable digital player, complemented by show notes.

Little bit of history – only a year old, but just about to really take off – partly iTunes driven. Mainstream media has embraced podcasting. In US all the major broadcasters are podcasting and so are newspapers.

For Immediate Release – Neville’s PR show with Shel Holz. Started 3rd January (3 days after me!) twice weekly show all over skype between Amsterdam and California, ie they make a free phone call – averaging 500 downloads of 60-80 minute chat show, stuff that listeners are interested in. Increasingly listeners are providing audio clips – now 4 international correspondents, 1 in Australia, 3 in USA.

Not about the numbers – 500 per show is really cool.

Great for pushing up the search engine rankings – which leads to interest from mainstream media. New Scientist for example were interested in how they used skype. Businesses want to know what kind of audiences you can reach and how you interact.

Who’s doing it? Mostly in the states – cisco oracle ibm disney virgin atlantic nasa jupiterresearch purina warnerbrothers macromedia gm (one of them does an embarrassingly bad one that sounds like it’s done in the toilet)

Anyone heard of GM podcast? Only a couple in the room. Podcast is an extension of the well-known blog – amateurly produced (clip coming) USAF two airmen talking about what they’re up to – an additional channel, not replacing something. They started the way we all do – laptop and a copy of audacity, but they tried it and they got feedback and improved what they were doing.

Who’s making money? How are they doing it? Someone’s going to do it sooner or later. If people like what they hear, they’ll listen. Maybe some people will pay for a subscription.

Why? It’s an easy & complementary extension of existing communication activities, an appropriate channel to market, can reach niche audiences otherwise unreachable, attract new, younger customers, create buzz, get people talking about you, be perceived to be at the leading edge, be the first to market with a cool new medium (eg Heineken).

The full spectrum: External – Markeing & Financial and Internal – Employee Engagement & Team Building. All a bit like the use of blogs – informality and using a different way to engage with customers. Plus it’s dead easy to do – not broadcast quality, but for 99% that’s good enough. Might be ignored by the majority, but could also get a small group of influencers.

A financial one – head of investor relations produces a weekly review. CEOs do a podcast – chitchat for employees – easier than him (!) doing a blog. Good for reaching out to new people in different ways. Sales director – occasional tips for a geographically dispersed sales team.

20 creative ideas from Kevin Dugan

Seeing dramatic growth. Feedburner: feeds with podcast enclosures groiwing by 1500 per month so over 16,000 by end 2005. Apple: 7 million subscriptions since June, 15,000 podcasts adding 1,000 new ones each week. 21 different languages.

Lots of ooohs and aaaahs at the guy (Phil in a blue t-shirt) with a black iPod nano.

Growth drivers: It’s easy; It’s inexpensive; It’s portable; It’s available (ie rich-content podcast directories and increasing availability of high-speed broadband).

It’s just the beginning (from a business point of view) Videocasting will be next – it has the same growth drivers

Q: how is Neville’s remix of Hugh’s card compatible with Hugh’s CC No Derivs licence?

Plays: GM Corvette, USAF around the air force (cheeeeeeeesy), Paris Hilton (pukecast), NASA from the Space Shuttle (geeks love this one), IBM (with crap music), Clive Anderson on Cuba (virgin atlantic travel podcasts)

Deirdre – how is videocasting different from video-blogging and points out need to pay attention (eg when driving). Neville, all probably the same thing, but they’re different too – different standrs emerging. It is the next big thing

Question about bandwidth particularly for vlogging – can be (the sponsor) say anything. Lots of new deals coming in, experiments with different models of hosting.

Q: will we generate our own revenue? Yes, but we don’t know how? Jupiterresearch or companies like them that already have clients who pay for information will also provide it in this format. Sooner or later.

Q: how much time does it take? Too much – prep time is 1hr, show 60-80, Neville does the show notes – twice as long as the show so about four to five hours per show, up to 10 hours a week.

tags: podcastcon uk & podcasting & london

I’m at the Berners Hotel in London’s West End. It’s full of podcasters, podcaster wannabes and podcasting newbies.

Chris Kimber Head of Interactive Media from BBC is just talking about the BBCs podcasting efforts. BBC doing well in charts like iTunes. Melvyn Bragg’s In Our Time is tops among beebs podcasts.

Why it’s important- media consumption is changing, people want more control, on demand and portable. People bother less with live TV, everything is portable, commuters watching DVDs on the way to work.

Is this a threat to radio? It could have been because you can’t control radio, it’s live unless you record it and you can only take live stuff on the road with you. The player changed that, but you still had to be online – podcasting had a big effect. Now, you choose it’s pull not push. On demand means you’re in control of scheduling. Lots of effort has gone in historically which podcasting wipes away. Also full navigation within a programme, you only have to listen to the bit you want and you can listen over and over. But most importantly, it’s portable – you decide where, you can take it with you. These are all simple things, but they are very big changes for tranditional radio.

18 months ago, most people were not listening to radio on their iPod – it was excluded, there was only recorded music, so there were people who used to listen to the radio who left it behind, they are starting to come back. Now associated radio with one of the coolest, sexiest brands there is (iPod).

Interesting by-product is that radio’s become more tangible, less ephemeral. Podcasting makes radio something you can pick up and touch (huh?) Well files anyway.

So what? Increased competition for listeners ears. In the podcast world it’s more of a level playing field, the BBC no longer owns the gateways and commercial radio can no longer control what’s out there.

Podcasting focuses attention on the quality of the programme. so radio station brand is much less important in this space. People stay subscribed if the quality is high enough. So BBC as professional broadcaster is in competition with everyone out there. Chris thinks this is a good thing – competition is good for the beeb. Radio 4 never had any real competition. So as a medium this competition is good for listeners.

Disaggregation of content from brand – Chris Moyles is the brand, not Radio 1. Threat and an opportunity (do we care?) but can offer stuff to people that they might not try in linear space. BBC has had feedback from people saying they would never have listened to a particular programme, but because they’d heard it in a podcast (found in some directory), they have listened and enjoyed.

Now introduced idents. But Chris is struggling with getting the audio working (huge titters in audience) Moving swiftly on…..

In the shorter term the impact is on content in existing programmes and on commissioning of new progs. Knowing that part of a prog is going to be podcast they are doing things differently – taking account that people might not be listening in real time – ie not using commercial music under it or time checks in the middle.

Big Toe Radio Show- speech highlights package (oh dear, the gremlins have got him by the goolies). Aaaaah found that something had become unplugged.

Only a matter of time before a podcaster gets picked up.

How has BBC popularised podcasting – we would have had Melvyn talking about the podcast trial, but the audio still isn’t working – obviously Melvyn gets a few things wrong, and it’s very amusing apparrently.

Chris Moyles reaches millions, pushing people to BBC site and from there to other directories.

Helping to keep radio relevant and regenerated, vibrant, exciting. Could have been a threat, but turned into great opportunity.

tags: podcastcon uk & podcasting & london