The response has been tremendous. The early videos - so cool. So we decided to get a jump start and start posting the video now.

You can see what's happening at the Bicycling Web Site or if you want to jump right to to the videos - start HERE.

The project is part of Magnify Media's overall belief that readers/consumers/viewers will quickly become a significant part of the content creation universe.

Bicycling is part of the Rodale Publishing group - a really terrific collection of magazines on subjects like health, fitness, lifestyle, and wellness. Among their titles - Prevention, Men's Health and Runner's World, which are published in 36 countries, as well as Organic Style, Organic Gardening, Backpacker, BestLife, Bicycling and Mountain Bike.

Our vision is that engaged and respected content consumers are likely to be the early adopters in area of consumer content creation.

And if the fast start at Bicycling is any indication - we're on the right track.

There's a terrific new post up from Chris Anderson (of Long Tail fame) about television and it's particular appropriateness to long tail economics.

He's right on many points, including the disposable nature of current offerings and the huge amount of TV that is missed and gone forever.

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From The Long Tail "Thus the ratio of produced content to available content is the highest of any industry I've looked at. Other industries may produce more content--print, for instance--but it's far more available (see Google). Only television treats its premium content as disposable. True, a lot of it actually is. But not all, and not as much as is effectively thrown away after a brief moment in the sun."
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What he doesn't say - but i suspect he an many other literate folks know - is that most of what is now distributed via TV deserves to be missed.

Content that is created under the current system conforms to it's shape and limitations.

That means that all content is biased in favor of scale (large audience sell TV ads).

But the power of the promise of the Long Tail isn't that we want to have all 500+ channel content on a server in an on demand world - what a pile of junk. Rather it is that evolutionary economics could actually create an entirely NEW kind of media.

Think of current 'television' as mass market entertainment, and the future of 'motion media' as having a whole series of other species. File content under:

a. Knowledge b. Debate and Discussion c. Exploration and Ideas d. Art

Overall, far more detailed - valuable, and necessary. Not a pastime, but the evolving center of a marketplace of ideas and information - created with new media tools.

So, I would suggest that TV shouldn't be saved. It shouldn't be Exploded. It should Evolve.

This is the tricky part. A number of years ago I was at conf. with lots of smart people. It was one of those 'everyone participates' think tanks. And when it came to me - the question was "didn't I agree that TV was the source of much evil in the world, in education, in our lives." Rather than answer - I asked everyone in the audience who watches TV to raise their hands. Out of 100 people - 8 did.

My point is - there is a cycle we have to break. TV programs to lowest common denominator audiences. Intelligent viewers don't use video for knowledge, or understanding. And the people who make programs for smaller, but more discerning viewers find they can't reach their intended recipients.

Companies like Brightcove (as Chris rightly points out) are key to the puzzle. But then we need to go the next step, and challenge great thinkers to attempt to translate their ideas into moving media. Not 'Sundance' films. Something entirely new.

Because we'll need an entire generation of new media ideas before we can ask people to evolve from passive consumers of junk media into thoughtful creators and remixers of participatory television.

When a phrase works, it works. Now it seems like "The Long Tail" has been around forever. And companies are referring to it as if everyone knows the concept and agrees that it's basic reasoning is sound.

It is.

And now the latest to jump on the bandwaggon is Google LINK

And Chris Anderson continues to blog with terrific passion and conviction about the impact of the Long Tail (his phrase) on tv, books, music, and advertising LINK

This may all seem somewhat circular, but in fact part of the cool thing about watching an idea evolve in blogs is that you get to see many points of view as the concept crystallizes. Ross Mayfield reviews Chris Anderson's presentation at the Media Center seminar: LINK

It's all taking shape - creating value in small audiences, empowering small advertisers to actually reach appropriate audiences. Very exciting stuff.

I've been thinking a lot about CES and NATPE and the extraordinary disconnect between what is happening on the technology side, and what is happening on the programming/advertising side.

Really it can be argued that from the moment Tivo arrived on the planet, our business had a running start at understanding/evolving it's relationship with viewers and advertisers.

But the truth is - it hasn't happened.

Tv is pretty much the same as it was 5 years ago. And all the denials aside, the projection of Tivo like devices in the home suggests that we continue to ignore this evolution at our peril.

First of all - consumers want the freedom to watch what they want when they want it.

Second - broadband is a fat pipe. It's being laid into virtually every living room in American.

Third. People don't hate all advertising - just the stuff that clearly has no need to reach them (I don't like ads for Women's makeup, call me crazy!).

It seems to me that our customers have been promised new services for a very long time... And we've continued to say that this media evolution is right around the corner. Well now the Consumer Electronics folks aren't going to wait any longer - they're going to build a new highway into America's living rooms (and cars, and handheld devices, and phones, and wrist watches... You get the idea).

And once it's built - there's no telling what will travel on that highway. It may be network TV shows, it maybe Hollywood movies, but it won't discriminate... So competition is very much on the horizon.

The one thing I found in comparing CES to NATPE is that advertisers had pulled their head out of the sand, and were actively thinking about new ways to have relationships with their customers.

There are plenty of brands that I'd enjoy watching on my TV. I'd watch Sharper Image. I'd watch BMW (I already do). I'd watch a whole bunch of fashion info if it were tied to catalogs I like (lands end, LL Bean, Brooks Brothers, Banana Republic).

Maybe I'm rambling, but it seems to me that folks are using Bittorrnet and such, not because they want to - but because they're forced to. And advertisers will figure that our long before TV networks do. If advertiser find a way to do business directly with viewers - then the model is really exploded.

Once the smoke clears - there will be something entirely new in it's place. And that's worth thinking about.

More from this great Business Week article:
Next: TV Meets IP
Internet technologies promise to soon take couch potatoes to worlds far beyond TiVo. Even phone companies could benefit big-time

Just a few years ago, the fine art of watching TV seemed unlikely to change much. You watched programs when the networks told you to watch them. Maybe you taped them on a videocassette recorder. Either way, your choices were limited. Then along came the TiVo (TIVO ) digital video recorder, which as its 2 million loyal customers will tell you, added more than a little convenience to the coach potato's world.

Turns out, TiVo was just the start. A new wave of TV-related innovation called IP-TV is just starting to reach consumers. Just as the service known as voice over Internet protocol is poised to revolutionize the phone business by offering a low-cost Internet alternative to traditional phone service, IP-TV could bring Internet-style interactivity and flexibility to your TV set.

It won't happen overnight, of course. But over the next decade, the long-hyped notion of "video-on-demand" could become commonplace, allowing consumers to watch what they want, when they want to. They'll be able to control their IP-TV service remotely through a PC or a cell phone. And they'll be able to personalize their content, whether they want to watch the local high school football game or home movies.

THE ARTICLE CONTINUES: LINK

->From business week:

Digital technologies mean more than just sharper pictures. Here's a look at three major trends they'll make possible

The 1977 fight between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier was more than a colossal battle between two legendary heavyweights. "The Thrilla in Manila," shown on HBO, was the first live satellite broadcast over cable TV. It heralded the beginning of cable as a new standard that could one day replace the broadcast model.

Twenty-seven years later, analog cable will finally make way for a new champ -- digital TV. Though only 13% of homes will have digital TV by the end of 2004, according to the Consumer Electronics Assn., which expects that number to reach 65% by 2008. Three major tech trends will fuel this adoption: broadband Internet, wireless home networking, and high-definition broadcasting -- all of which will pave the way for entirely new possibilities in TV

Article continues: LINK

I've been avoiding this post. First I thought, we're just busy (I've been traveling). Then I thought, it'll happen. but it hasn't. Which isn't to say I don't love having it in my rack of cool gizmo's.

But this is going to be the challenge of all Future TV devices and services. If a tree falls in the forest (or a new show is available for download) how do I know.

My son - who's got his own ideas about media to be sure - says Akimbo "sucks". I'm not nearly that harsh. My wife and younger son have abandoned it... 'nothing on'.

And I think it's pretty early to write it off. The technology works - and content will follow.

But Akimbo's navigation makes it hard - almost impossible in fact - to enjoy browsing, exploring, looking for new things. There's no search. No web enabled portal that can program my box, no email each week alerting me to new things I might like...

In sort - no attempt to welcome me to the service, make me feel I'm part of a grand new thing. BTW - Tivo was able to do that. Capitalize on that - no, but at least get the juices flowing.

It may be that I'm just way too early. I'm clearly an alpha customer (are there 12,000 boxes out yet, I don't think so).

But when I find my self wondering if I'll keep it 'because it looks cool' or send it back - the bottom line is, I've given up using it. And that's just sad.

So IPTV entrepreneurs, Exploding TV fans, and Citizen Journalists alike - worth taking not. Getting your content to the box in someone's home isn't worth a damn if you can't get them to click on the link that downloads it.

Fred Wilson continues his thread on Exploding TV - and seems to be one of the few out there who understands that all this technology and choice don't simply mean that we'll have more ways to slice and dice network produced media.
LINK

Having now digested CES, NATPE, and a billion pages of text, blogs, business plans, VC broadband offerings, and Akimbo - the one thing that is clear is that no one on the mainstream media side of the fence is taking the 'citizen media' trend seriously.

There are a few reasons for that. One is that it all sounds too much like CB Radio or Public Access cable TV.

But what Fred gets right - and mainstream media folks get wrong - is that there is a critical connection coming between IPTV and digital production tools. And once the playing field is level, or at least open, some portion of both my time and my money that i spend on media will begin to move from mass-market sources to nich/focused sources.

By way of example - i watched both the 're-cap' show on The Sundance Channel, and read Jason Calacanis' daily blogs from Sundance. Jason's was far more detailed, and more nuanced. So where do both of these media properties fall? The Sundance Channel is 'professional' but biased (it's their film fest after all). Jason isn't a professional film critic, but he's active and honest about both his likes and dislikes and his personal relationships with some of the filmmakers. Jason was shooting video at CES, and i watched that as well. He's the kind of content entrepreneur that the networks should be concerned about - because i'd watch his take on Sundance over Entertainment Tonight any day of the week.

It's not professional vs. amateur that will be the dividing line. It will be content entrepreneurs nibbling away at mass-market media with nich, unique, compelling content. Both for entertainment -and more significantly for information. Because data oriented media has been all but ignored, but it won't be going forward.

In today's Sunday New York Times, a two thousand word feature by Lorne Manly and John Markoff takes the gloves off. Link - login requried

EXCERPT: "Not surprisingly, the repercussions - particularly the rapidly growing number of shows available for the plucking online - terrify industry executives, who remember only too well what Napster and other file-sharing programs did to the music industry. They fret that if unchecked, rampant trading of files will threaten the riches of the relatively new and surprisingly lucrative television DVD business. It could endanger sales of television shows to international markets and into syndication. And it could further endanger what for the past 50 years has been television's economic linchpin: the 30-second commercial.

"We have to try as an industry to get ahead of this and give the audience an attractive model before the illegal file-sharer providers meet their needs," said David F. Poltrack, CBS Television's executive vice president for research and planning.

The the phrase 'terrify industry executives' may be true - but you'd never be able to tell it from the way networks interact with both new technology partners and content creators. It seems like TV is going down the same track as Music - ignore, lobby washington (broadcast flag) and then sue. But as the times accuratly points out - people aren't pirating video because they want to break the law, it's because the clear demand for flexible (non-linear) viewing, and new platforms (phones, portable devices, etc) are being put on the back burner.

In many ways TV networks aren't nearly as concerned about the trends as advertisers - the talk about the end of the :30 commerical is a major topic of conversation at both clients and agencies.

Perhaps most interesting in the Times piece is the CBS research that says that viewers would gladly pay $1 to view a show they like - when they want to see it. Let's say it out loud: Networks exist to provide access to audience. They sell that audience to advertisers - who interupt programs with commericals. Now - audiences are abandoning networks and think of programs as distinct and purchasable on demand. But once we're paying for shows - we'll be a whole less likely to be willing to have them interupted. So the whole economy of TV is under attack. And the Tivo numbers (actually DVR numbers) bear that out.

- from the Times article:
"It all started with the digital video recorder. First popularized by TiVo and ReplayTV about five years ago, the DVR gave consumers a new degree of control: instead of being at the mercy of the broadcast schedule or VCR's, they could now be their own television programmers, scheduling shows at their convenience, pausing live television and skipping easily past commercials. Smith Barney estimates that though only a little more than 6 million Americans now use DVR's, by 2010 nearly half of American television households, or 58 million homes, will have them."

Worth noting that post CES, the blinders seem to have come off. The moment to re-invent television has arrived. Now it's time to place some bets on who wins:

1. Cable
2. Phone Companies
3. IPTV (broadband)
4. Tivo
5. Microsoft
6. Apple
7. Real Networks
8. Linux / open sources
9. Some combo of above

Anyone?