Unexpected Media

Channel 4 supports Crossover to fast track a multimedia future

July 3, 2009 – 6:52 pm
A press release from Channel 4: Channel 4 is delighted to announce a new partnership with Crossover, the cutting-edge media training organisation that specialises in preparing  producers to embrace the cross-platform future and new opportunities in emerging digital media. Channel 4 is leading the way by being the first broadcaster in the UK to put their commissioning team through immersive 5 day Crossover Labs to equip them for a 'platform agnostic' media future. Crossover is fast becoming one of the world’s most respected training programmes in innovation and digital media. It brings together people from across the creative spectrum, from the worlds of TV, film, gaming, web design, theatre and science, and through a process of careful workshopping and mentoring, gets them to generate ideas for new types of media. 4Talent, will contribute financial support to Crossover to expand its portfolio of activities for 2009/2010 – beyond the Labs - to provide a ...

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Copyright: framing government policy

May 14, 2009 – 11:47 am
I’ve been doing some work with the UK Government’s Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property (SABIP) which was established around a year ago to advise ministers on creating frameworks for regulation.  I was invited to help design and facilitate an idea generation session involving representatives of industry and consumer organisations looking at consumer attitudes and behaviours in the online world. As preparation for the workshop SABIP commissioned a research team at University College, London to undertake a literature review of publicly available research into what people are actually doing and their attitudes to copyright.  This included this report, commissioned by Marrakesh Records from media consultancy Human Capital which makes chilling reading for businesses which generate revenue by selling recorded music: "we find that the majority would even sacrifice sex for music. And yet music is increasingly becoming a commodity for which young people do not expect to pay." One of their major ...

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Concept - Construct - Connect: a new template for Creative Industries?

March 13, 2009 – 4:27 pm
Some thoughts on what the creative media industries are: http://bit.ly/Ud1Xh from Triston Wallace at the UK's lead body for training in the audiovisual industries. "Traditionally the creative media industry is split into different categories - Film, TV, Radio, Photo Imaging, Publishing, Computer Games, Advertising, etc. The boundaries and divisions of these seemingly stand-alone sectors are based output; the final format or product. They have historically had their own supply chains, their own workforce, and their own audiences." "The merging of these sectors is often called “convergence”.  But the true impact of the digital technology is much deeper and more profound than the meshing of content or platforms. The increasing ubiquity and shrinking cost of this technology is leading to a rapid merging of the processes, products and profits of these sectors." In this article Triston propposes a different way of looking at and describing the creative media industry to examine, explain and foresee these changes currently happening. He's inviting ...

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Crossover 4iP

March 5, 2009 – 5:34 pm
We've just completed our first lab specifically to explore Channel 4's programme for new kinds of public service media, 4iP. It was commissioned by Northern Film and Media and held in the spectacular Turbine Hall of Newcastle's CastleGate Centre. As part of the preparation for it, I asked one of the 4iP Commissioning Managers to give me a list of projects or websites which he thought would meet the programme's criteria. Here is what he sent me: 1) Just Giving: Brilliant example of where the web allows for more effective charity fund raising. Simple to use, clear public service application, makes people's life's better, has revolutionised the fundraising ecosystem. Revenue generating and sustainable business model too. 2) Gym Fu: Innovative use of technology that turns users into movers. An example of small, lightweight software that has the potential to have a disproportionate impact on peoples' lives. It's hard to tackle the obesity problem ...

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Crossover Play

January 6, 2009 – 4:13 pm
We’re now able to invite applications the first UK Crossover in 2009. Crossover Play will explore new forms of entertainment for digital media: the relationship between play and narrative, formats dependent on user contributions, mobile or location based entertainment with a broadcast component. And of course, games: social and casual games, games that involve live events and performance, augmented or alternate reality games, games with emotional depth, games that appeal to non-gamers. The Lab will comprise a blend of masterclass, presentations, workshop, screenings and, naturally, play. Participants will have a unique opportunity to explore and experiment with game forms and digitally mediated play; working as individuals and in teams they will also brainstorm, develop and prototype ideas for new ones. Crossover Play will foster new collaborations between talented and experienced producers across different silos in the audio-visual industries, sparking innovative projects that push the boundaries on existing and new platforms. Crossover is supported by ...

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Draft Teaming Agreements for Cross-Platform Collaborations

August 15, 2008 – 12:27 pm
Pact, the trade association for UK independent producers, and NESTA today released a range of tools designed to make it easy for TV and Film producers to work with digital producers on convergent or “multi-platform” projects. The tools include legal templates that make it easy for producers to kick off multi-platform development, as well as a ‘how to’ guide for exploring joint ventures. Pact is making the tools freely available to producers across the industry. The templates provide a simple legal framework for producers to work together when developing intellectual property. It is hoped that this initiative will improve the quality and number of multi-platform proposals going to UK broadcasters such as the BBC and Channel 4. John McVay, Chief Executive of Pact says: “Producers from both the TV and new media sectors have told us that they need a simple framework to help them to develop their multi-platform ideas. With the ...

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2008 Crossover Programme is recruiting…

August 5, 2008 – 3:06 pm
We're now looking for participants for this year's Crossover programme. Crossover is an extraordinary series of ‘innovation labs’ for creative professionals from a diverse range of backgrounds: game developers, tv and film producers, web designers, animators, theatre practitioners and others. Each Crossover lab is an immersive, five day incubator fostering new collaborations and original ideas for cross platform media content and services. We are now looking for people to take part in Crossover Docs and Crossover Kids. Crossover Docs (October 5 - 10) Social media, social networks, alternate reality games, serious games, user generated content and participatory story-telling: are there new ways to engage audiences with factual topics and documentary subjects? In Crossover Docs, factual and documentary film and television producers will work with games developers, web and interaction designers to invent innovative projects for cross-platform delivery. A focus of the five day, residential lab will be on interactive projects which address big ideas and ...

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Crossover C4

July 22, 2008 – 12:39 pm
It’s been a bit quiet here in the last couple of months partly because it’s been a very busy period.  Mostly because I’ve been neglectful. I’ll try to catch up with reports and observations from some of the work we’ve done with Channel 4,  the BBC, Nesta and Crossover over the next few days. At the beginning of June we delivered the first of three Crossover Labs for Channel 4 at Buxted Park Hotel in Sussex. The primary purpose of this sequence of four-day workshops is to persuade the channel’s tv commissioners to engage with the challenge and opportunity of new media. Channel 4 has not until recently seen its online activity as part of its public service remit and, as a consequence, its websites are not paid for or creatively owned by  the people who commission the shows they are intended to support. Television commissioning editors are only interested in ...

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Cinema’s punk era?

May 30, 2008 – 8:08 am
In Göteborg for the launch of Crossover Nordic at Lindholmen Science Park, my presentation was preceded by a talk from Michael Gubbins, Editor of Screen International. His theme was the inevitable shift from theatres and DVD to digital download as the primary means of distribution of feature films.  To date, Hollywood’s solution to the bottleneck caused by too many movies competing for space on a limited number of screens has been to make fewer, bigger films. But this is a short-term fix which will inevitably give way to more profitable distribution models based, in part, on less costly product reaching smaller audiences. Gubbins didn’t see the move to sales direct to the home as a threat to cinema ticket sales, citing the example of football where the live, social experience still beats the more comfortable and, in many ways, superior experience of viewing a match on TV. He suggested that an economic ...

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“hard work and deep thought”

April 22, 2008 – 8:09 pm
The third of this year's BBC Innovation Labs finished on Friday with Jason Daponte, the BBC's Managing Editor for mobile applications, saying it was the best set of presentations he had seen in the three years they've been running. I tend to agree, although the southern lab last year was also very strong. Four of the ten teams got the funding they had asked for and two more were told that their projects would go forward subject to further discussion. The lab has been covered in blogs by Noam Sohachevsky of Mint Digital (here), Stuart Varrall of Fluid Pixel (here) and Tom Evans from Numiko (here). Visitors for the pitching day included, for the first time, a senior manager from BBC Vision. I had to introduce him to the commissioners from Future Media and Technology: while the BBC is better adapted to multi-platform publishing than many broadcasters, it has some ...

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