Author Archives: Steve Mays

Rediscovering high school football

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Cover story on Broadcasting & Cable looks at how some local TV stations are “rediscovering” high school football:

“Vital to high school football’s rise in popularity is the fact that technology has finally reached a point where the typical teen, raised on YouTube, can easily upload video and share highlights from that night’s game. Station managers say the interactive nature of new media — whether it’s user-generated video, scores or trash-talking — is a critical component of their school content.

Hearst-Argyle Television has taken the interactive concept a step further, training students in seven markets to be “sideline reporters” for its social-networking platform High School Playbook. A total of 60 students shoot high-def cameras, edit and post their work on the Web site.”

The good news –and the bad news– is this is no longer the turf of any medium. I know TV, cable and newspapers are jumping in. I hope there are radio stations doing them same. How hard would it be?

Let’s say there are 10 HS football teams within the range of my station’s signal. I recruit and train 10 reporters (and 10 back-up’s) on how to shoot/edit game highlights. They upload same to the station YouTube channel (sponsored, of course) and we promote like mad. Incentive? Maybe some pocket money. Best video of the season wins a video iPod (others get iPod Shuffles and iTunes gift cards).

HaltinG StatE by Charles Stross

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“This brilliantly conceived techno-crime thriller spreads a black humor frosting over the grim prospect of the year 2012, when China, India and the European System are struggling for world economic domination in an infowar, and the U.S. faces bankruptcy over its failing infrastructure. Sgt. Sue Smith of Edinburgh’s finest, London insurance accountant Elaine Barnaby and hapless secret-ridden programmer Jack Reed peel back layer after layer of a scheme to siphon vast assets from Hayek Associates, a firm whose tentacles spread into international economies. The theft is routed through Avalon Four, a virtual reality world complete with supposedly robbery-proof banks. As an electronic intelligence agency trains innocent gamers to do its dirty work, Elaine sets Jack to catch the poacher.”

— Publishers Weekly

Scott Adams: The future of newspapers

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“…I see printed newspapers lasting until you upgrade your phone two more times. But the newspaper business can thrive online if it changes how it gathers and edits content. And clearly there will be massive amounts of consolidation. There won’t be 3,000 newspapers online. There might be a dozen. And local news will come from hometown bloggers who self-syndicate to all of the newspapers.”

It’s a brilliant post and I encourage you to read it.

Why I don’t listen to talk radio

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Mark Ramsey observes that broadcasters have given listeners the talk radio they want… but do a crappy job of giving them the non-music radio they might want:

“Wandering amidst the posters at NAB promoting radio’s prime Talk properties, it’s hard not to be struck by the fact that these talents are overwhelmingly Male, late-middle-aged, conservative, politically-charged white guys in suits. Sure, there are the exceptions, but for every Dave Ramsey there are a dozen Michael Savages.”

Ramsey goes on to point out that younger folk are not listening to these guys. You think?

OK on XM

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Radio Iowa News Director O. Kay Henderson will be doing a weekly shot on XM Radio’s POTUS’08 channel (XM 130). Few details yet, but looks like her bit will be around 1:10 p.m. Central time. I’ll try to remember to record and share snippet here.

Update 8-Oct-07: And here’s the snippet. Kay gives the low down on the campaign in Iowa to XM host Rebecca Roberts. Runs about 10 min and my apologies for the audio quality. I recorded on the nano, holding the wee microphone up to the car speaker. But this clearly illustrates why the Big Kids can’t get enough of Her Kayness.

Online Block Party

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Just had a nice chat with Brad Olsen and Amy Laughlin. They’re involved with Revolworks.com. They’ve got a really nice looking site, packed with ideas, mostly of a “spiritual” nature. They’re ready to move on to “phase two,” in terms of what they’re doing online and wanted my thoughts on blogging. I talked until their eyes glazed (Amy was on speaker phone, so her head was probably on her desk) over.

The point of this post is to illustrate how well blogs do in terms of Google search results ranking. I predicted this post would –within a week– show up on the first page of results of a Google search on “RevolWorks.”

This is happening hundreds (thousands?) of times a day. Companies and organizations jumping into the online conversational pool. RevelWorks.com looks great and the information found there is rich and deep. It’s like walking into a beautiful, well-furnished home… but you can’t find the people who live there. You can tell they’ve been there… but they don’t seem to be home a the moment.

A good blog would be like throwing a party on the front lawn.

Top traits for hiring new people

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“I just returned from a three-day seminar with Paradigm, a highly-respected sales training firm, and they recommend that managers ensure that new account executives are “adaptable” and “resilient” before hiring them. In fact, these two traits should be at the top of the list in the hiring process because the media world is changing so quickly.

Wouldn’t it be interesting to apply this same thinking when hiring for new journalists? That adaptability and resiliency are just as important as storytelling skills, for example? Of course, those traits not as easy to identify as watching a resume tape and looking at online writing examples (both of which should be required for reporters, by the way), but it means we need to ask job candidates to explain specific examples of how they’ve flexed with change and bounced back from failure.”

— Cory Bergman, Lost Remote

My first three-way

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Ichat_conf2Been doing more and more iChatting since getting the MacBook. Starting to take it for granted. Today we did our first three-way chat, just to see a) if we could and b) how it works. [a: yes, b: easy]

David works from his home in Springfield, MO. Roger’s office is on the other side of our building. I selected both of them in my “buddies list” and hit the video button. As they accepted the invite, they showed up in facing windows on my desktop. And that’s it. We chatted for a few minutes, marveling at how falling-off-a-log simple it was.

I mean, this is how shit is supposed to work, folks. I remember oohing about this to one of our IT folks last year, who responded: “You can video conference on the PC, too. You just have to get the ports configured correctly.”

ABC News forming one-man bureaus

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“Taking the one-man band news crews a step further, ABC News President David Westin announced today that they will open seven new bureaus around the world with only one person per bureau. According to TVWeek, the reporters will write, shoot, edit and feed their material digitally from DV cameras and laptops wherever they are in the field. Assignments so far put people in South Korea; Jakarta, Indonesia; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Nairobi, Kenya; Mumbai, India; New Delhi, India; and Dubai, United Arab Emirates.” — Lost Remote

Sorry, I’m a radio reporter. I do interviews, cut up the sound, write the wrap and anchor a three minute newscast. You’re just gonna have to hire some more people do to that other stuff.

Order of the Fez #9: Phil Powell

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Phil100_2We’ve had something of a member explosion this week over at the Order of the Fez. Hmm, let’s make that “membership” explosion. Phil Powell is Fez #9 (Last of the Single Digits) and hails from the UK. Like Howlin’ Hobbit (Fez #8), Phil is a ukuleleist, and shares my appreciation for the Laurel and Hardy. Welcome, Phil.