At the beginning of this year, one of my major initiatives when starting my new company is to offer high-quality video content for my customers and not be restricted specifically with Flash Video codecs. Why…well, it is heavy, takes for ever to encode, and does not maximize the high definition image my clients pay me so dearly to deliver.

First stop, go mobile. I did tons of research on companies providing solutions for mobile video delivery. From Brightcove, Kaltura, Sorenson and host of others were on my choping block to sift through and see what fits me best. Right now, 360 by Sorenson has worked well providing rich media delivery to not only web interfaces but also to iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch. They have more to come and waiting on the HTML5 release.

But one of the major places I have been watching is the HTML5 discussion. I am currently using an HTML5 player on my homepage for video delivery. This allows different browsers select with video codec to use whether it may be Flash, Quicktime, or even OGG.

So…today was a big day in the video delivery arena. Google announced it’s acquisition of On2 Media and the release of the VP8 codec as an open source codec. As a part of this they announced the WebM Project as a part of the release of the VP8 codec as an open source codec.
***FYI, below are some links that explain all this stuff like HTML5, VP8, etc.

Now…what the hell does this mean for the end consumer. Web video delivery is changing faster than I can find a new gadget to buy. Also, Flash video is not the main gig anymore and I am thankful. With VP8 and other codecs that can be wrapped by an HTML5 player, high quality video will be delivered faster and to more browsers including mobile platforms. The big boys are openly acknowledging that offering video to the standard desktop is the wave of yesterday and the consumer demand to watch video over any mobile device is crucial.

So…when you are thinking about working with a video production group or a video technology group to distribute your video content, the game is changing fast. It is more than just burning a DVD and compressing to play on your website. It is now outputting the right flavors of your project and getting them to your audience. Seriously, audience and wear they watch the video content is the crucial equation to this game. If you are trying to reach people on an Android or and iPad, you better be able to distribute that message to that technology! Audience and Distribution is the crucial question!

A year ago, it was all Flash Video or some Quicktime for web. Becuase of that, you could not access this content on most mobile devices and some browsers. Now, with all the new mobile devices whether be in your pocket or on the door of your refrigerator…the next generation codecs and players like VP8, H264, HTML5 will allow you to get a message to a targeted audience regardless of the technology! Are you working with just cool video producers or are you working with peeps that can create the message and understand how and where it needs to be delivered?

OK…cool links:

Today’s Google Annoucement from the Google I/O 2010 Conference
Mashable’s 5 Tools for Integrating HTML5 Video into your Website
What is HTML5 Video from Wikipedia
What is VP8 from Wikipedia
The WebM Project
The Digital Media Update from Sorenson’s CEO Peter Csathy on VP8

I have been really enjoying the conversations lately on #blogchat, hosted by Mack Collier (@mackcollier) on Twitter. The weekly Sunday night chat is wrapped around blogging, and this past week was specifically geared towards monetizing your blog. Why do we blog? Seriously.

Businesses and organizations use blogs for many reasons, but I think it is specifically to position themselves as thought leaders in a specific discipline or arena. It is a great way to have an immediate position on a topic or ideal and generate traffic when audiences are looking to consume information. The ulitmate goal, drive traffic to your “mothership” in the hopes to gain some monetary goal or position a viewpoint to raise some awareness.

My wife has been blogging for over two years. She has no reason what-so-ever to gain any type of moentary position from her posts. She used it as an outlet when dealing with the loss of her mother and our two children. It has become her outlet to articulate thoughts, connect with others, and theraputically sooth the soul.

So why do we blog? I honestly think…we as humans just want to be heard and we want to connect with like minded individuals. Whether it be gaining business from our thoughts or connecting with loved ones, we use it as an outlet to organize thoughts.

So why do we as business owners blog? This is why I am writing this post. It is more than just the SEO perspective. It is more than gaining business from blog posts…even though we will not admit it. Blogs are a place to articulate our thoughts and help us keep focused in our business. This iterative process requires time and thought to critically think, “why are we dedicating time to an outlet in the hopes to generate cash?”

Blogging takes focus! It requires us as business leaders to write a mission statement for the blog. The blog is our sounding board for business, our credibility platform to justify to the world we know what the hell we are talking about. It requires us to define a goal for each post and justify whether it warrants a post, then focus it to specific key words that closely align with our business objectives.

Blogging is our creative outlet to work through creative ideas. Through this online discourse, we find ourselves creating an argument for a great project, a great proposal, a great business plan, or even just get some responses on an idea.

Some of the smartest marketing gurus and most successful business people have successfully found a focused voice in their blog. They have a community of followers, a one stop focus group (or usability testing facility) for ideas and thoughts. They have used their blog as a platform to successfully write their business plan. We should learn from them…because it has probably taken them lots of time and diligence to refine their blog, their online business plan.

Big-box business have a hard time wrapping their heads around how to “monetize” a blog because the voice is way to big. They are having to go micro and use individuals within the organization to focus the objectives. But…they use other marketing platforms to generate their own equitable “SEO”.

Our thoughts are our voice, if focused they will engage those with like minds. When you hear the heavy blogging gurus talk about focus…it is more that just focusing the blog, it is focusing the business of writing the blog.

Times are changing faster and faster everyday. As technology evolves faster  than we can breathe…and as it evolves, we need people to help us with it, understand it, and sell us a strategy to implement.

Web strategy of 2010 has evolved into business communication strategy. Creating and monitoring revenue streams as we create and monitor conversations…well actually the technology that distributes these conversations and messages.

I think back to when I was in undergrad at Clemson. My freshman year (1992), no email and the only knowledge of the World Wide Web was this thing called Gopher. I remember I could use it to find my girlfriend’s class buildings at Appalachian State University. By my sophomore year, I had email and the WWW became a new idea on Clemson’s campus. By my junior year, Clemson was teaching web design and development classes. While I was in college, major AD & PR agencies were building strategic communication strategies and the computer geeks were creating webpages.

Now…here we sit in 2010, the new age AD Firm is the web/new media agency: building business models around web strategy as a communication plan that drives revenue. It started out as going paperless to save money, but now communication strategies are sold to drive revenue not only for the organizations that buy the plan but for the firms that are selling the strategy.

Why the discussion…I have been studying and trying to understand the evolution of the new media business models. Watching and researching the retainer models for web and new media firms that are not only creating an updated web presence but also building relationships with C-Level executives for long term ROI.

I have been talking and visiting with companies everyday who are caught in similar positions. They are staffed with creative professionals that handle all the graphic design and communication planning for their communication strategies. These companies are staffed with “traditional” media execution but scrambling to create and implement web and new media strategies. Many companies staffed with seasoned professionals trying desperately to get up-to-date with these web, social, and new media concepts. These same companies are staffed with interns that are training professionals how to evolve and adapt practitioner concepts into new technology.

Web strategy companies come in with big retainers and big ideas…visions of solving problems capitalizing on the current deficits in knowledge in many mid to large size organizations…”how can we make our web presence better and drive traffic to our message.” The new age AD Firm is today’s Web Firm….staffed with Presidents/CEOs, project managers, business development professionals, designers, developers and a board of directors. These board of directors made up of investors and visionaries capitalizing on the new wave of messaging.

It is a new world order…we are buying iPad’s and Androids as fast as we consume information. We sit and watch HDTV on our couches while we sit and surf the Internet with our Mac Book Pros and posh laptops. We are texting as we drive down the road while answering phone calls and listening to Pandora. Information velocity has a new derivative…information velocity. It is a new world order. And what is the next evolution? Hmm…Mobile Media Firms will take over and create the new strategies as business communication strategies with brick and mortar offices in every city.

How will we as practitioners stay relevant though this accelerated evolution of business and technology strategies. Hmm…maybe just keep on telling stories. BTW…I realize I might be one of these groups I am talking about…taking part in the new world order.

What stories are you going to tell this week? What stories are you going to encounter? Are you listening to your clients, your constituency bases? Are listening as the stories that need to be told are unfolding right in front of you? How can we be aware enough to look deep into the organizations and find rich stories that attract those listening ears?

1. Look within the “funding” sources and marketing goals for real people.
2. Define the mission of the organization and let the mission provide a frame work  for the stories.
3. Understand the target audiences and allow them to guide you to the palatable stories.
4. Look past subject matter as a story position, find people with stories that can be told through their eyes and not with a “narrator.”
5. Use the 180 degree rule…when you find a good story that is in the midst of happening, turn 180 degrees and look at who is watching the story unfold, tell it through their lens.
6. Find stories that are in the midst of the action, let the action and reaction paint the picture…stay away from stories that have to be re-told after the fact.
7. Go into the story idea with a loose outline but be willing to let the storytelling process create the final outline and story-line!
8. Do not let technology restrict your ability to tell a good story! Use it as a means to capture and distribute the story to the appropriate audiences. I have captured and told Emmy Award winning stories using a $300.00 video camera. No matter if you have an $80K video camera, a $200 laptop, or even a $50.00 recording device…let it enable you not detract you.

Be passionate! Find those stories…find rich content that your audiences are craving to connect with on a daily basis.

Here is a funny little story I found one day in Arizona when all I was asked to do is get a few shots of the Renaissance Festival….this guy cracks me up. Proof, if we open our ears, the stories can pop out of nowhere and it can replace the pointless copy that could be written about the festival.

OK…so I got the nod from the CFO, yes…my CFO is the wife and she gave the nod that it is cool to drop the dough on a glorified gadget that can be justified as a business expense! After a month of deliberating, hemming and hawing about the idea of purchasing it…I pushed the “Pre-Order” button on the Apple website.

I did spend sometime thinking, researching, and wondering if this was a good decision. Here were some of my initial thoughts:

1. If I was going to purchase the iPad, it had to be the 3G version. Simply because there are so many times I am in a non-wifi zone and will need to send emails, download something, or just be online. I have contemplated getting a AT&T card for my MacBook Pro, but this makes sense. I know I have my iPhone, but need something a little more to finger scale.
2. Tired of carrying around my 17″ MacBook Pro to meetings in a big ole bag. I have a “Producer” bag that I can throw the strap around my shoulder yet I spend so much time avoiding knocking something over with the bag and the contents.
3. Want something small and mobile that is not another laptop.
4. Price compared the iPad to purchasing a MacBook and the pricing was similar. But then I thought, why do I want another laptop for just searching the web, answering email, and other related web related items.
5. Liked the idea of a “bigger” iPhone concept…seriously! So many times I have my iPhone as I lay in beg catching up on email or searching the web for stuff…and would like something bigger yet not the size of a laptop. Opening a laptop is a process.
6. Excited about the opportunity to download books via the iPad…this will be new and cool experience!

So after weighing these thoughts…I pulled the trigger. So this is what I purchased:

• iPad with 64GB of memory with Wifi & 3G Capabilities
• iPad Keyboard Dock (so I can type on a real keyboard, if I so choose)
• iPad Case (I am clumsy so figured I needed to protect my investment)
• iPad Camera Kit (so I can upload pictures straight from a SD card)
• iPad VGA Adapter (so I can connect to a screen or projector to show presentations, pictures, and videos)
• Apple Care for iPad (once again, I am clumsy and this protects me from me)

All in all…I am pumped, the only thing now is that I have to sit back and wait. The expected shipping date for my iPad 3G/Wifi is late April! I am hoping it gets here before my vacation trip where Wifi is non-existent.

Now, once again my gadget life is complete with one more gizmo. Yes…now I can go over to my grandfathers house and wow him with a cool new gadget!

Well…it has officially happened and now nine days after the big event ( tons of local, regional, and national press) and finally with a big wrap-up party at the Warehouse Theater, it is time to say…what is next? First off…it needs to be noted that Aaron von Frank and all those who made this event a success should be proud. But now, what is next and what happens after the hype. Well, for starters…sit back and wait to here what Google is planning on doing.

The whole purpose of this event was to publicly solicit the opportunity to be one of the chosen cities for Google to invest billions of dollars into a fiber infrastructure. Now, while they are still doing their due diligence, Greenville, SC is sitting back and wanting more. This little idea that turned into a big idea has now built a community of innovators into a community of believers…”We can get the attention of a big group like Google.” Now is not quitting time….it is actually time to keep on pushing forward and taking the nicely branded idea “We Are Feeling Lucky” (nice job btw by Spike Jones) to the next level…continue building on this momentum and grow the community at large around an idea of innovation.

Thinking back as I was flying in the helicopter over the event, I was not only looking down and capturing an image of 2200 hundred people forming the words “Google,” but actually capturing the image of 2200 stories, 2200 ideas, 2200 reasons why Google should consider Greenville, SC. There is not just one story for Google to hear, it is more than “We Are Feeling Lucky,” it is 2200 different stories why each person thinks Google should come to Greenville, SC.  Define through each of the 2200 individual stories as 2200 supporting arguments why Greenville, SC could use such an innovative pipeline of technology.

Imagine of the next several months (through the rest of the year), each of those 2200 people that formed the human wave of Google could articulate their story, their reason why they personally could benefit from this technology.  Each one would be a different perspective ranging from small business owner, family member, large organization, government leader, entrepreneur, etc…all with a vested interest to make Greenville, SC a hot bed for innovation and thought leadership. Imagine if we could capture each story, and funnel them through the WeAreFeelingLucky.com website using video, text, audio, images, etc…capturing the hearts and minds of a community, building a larger case supporting a technology initiative.

I would image that many of the cities have stopped campaigning for Google’s attention, feeling that they have met their burden and thinking “now it lies in the hands of the organization to hand down a decision.” But the energy felt tonight in the Warehouse Theater auditorium showcased the desire to keep on campaigning, not just for Google technology but for a bigger cause…bringing a community together with a common goal, to build a bigger and brighter Greenville, SC. What a tremendous case that could be made if we could continue this mission, capture those stories, display them everyday on WeAreFeelingLucky.com and show the world that Greenville, SC has more in store…not just a one time event that happened on March 20, 2010.

***Photo courtesy of Michael Bergen of AidJoy.org

Over the last few months I have been thinking about how the educational system here is South Carolina  is changing and being forced to change. For the past few years, state funding for higher education has continued to drop substantially, each year forcing institutions of higher learning (that depend on state funds to operate) redefine how they support the demand. Well, there are two scenarios to this business proposition, raise the cost of a public education and/or seek more and more private funding. But before going down that thought process, I want to back up a few minutes.

Currently, my wife and I have been put in a position to support (both financially and parentally) my wife’s younger sister Susanna. She is a rising junior at the College of Charleston studying history. For the past two years, after Sarah and Susanna’s mother died of breast cancer, we have been helping Susanna navigate this convoluted financial-aid maze. From applying for expensive and inexpensive student loans to finally being eligible for grant monies, there is a serious conversation concerning “return on investment,” picking a educational path that is going to yield a direction post graduation that provides either a job paying a good wage or moving on to a graduate level education. But what is the ROI on a history degree? That conversation is soon to come.

We are just one of many families having this conversation right now, educational dollars spent should be taken just as seriously as a house purchase. When it is all said and done, one family can spend or borrow close to $7K – $10K per semester. These dollars add up and can come close to a $50K-$80K investment for a four year education. There is a serious business model behind providing loans for those to get a “quality” education. Think about it for a second…it is a like a revolving door behind the rising costs of education and the educational tracks being offered, but…are those tracks market driven?

As a side note, this blog post comes after a Saturday morning conversation with John Warner, he made me think more about market driven education.

More and more degrees are being offered, more and more dollars are being borrowed, more and more institutions are getting fatter, and now we have educational institutions moving away from market driven education. Each day I walk into another Panera Bread where the cashier working is a recent college graduate with a marketing degree and no job. Take a look at my wife’s MA in Professional Communications, she has yet to find a job using that degree. She worked in Manufacturing for close to five years becoming a strategic buyer and then became burned out and now teaching pre-schoolers. She was sold this degree track right out of undergrad at Lander on the fact she would find a high paying job, yet no one helped her in finding that job. It was not market driven…at the time. Side note, she and I graduated with our MA’s right after 911, the market was rock bottom.

So what are we seeing, educational institutions are starting to get back to basics. They will begin doing a couple of things. Identifying market driven degree programs that make sense and begin cutting programs that basically have no funding. As funds continue to decrease from the state, institutions like Clemson, USC, and other state supported schools will begin moving closer and closer to privatization. Now they will not become “Private” but they will be supported by private sources that have a vested interest in the types of programs that will be offered, supported with a pipeline of talent educated to fit that market need.

Clemson University was founded to provided the “Common Man” of South Carolina a technology and mechanical education to solve the agricultural problem in the state.

From Thomas Green Clemson’s Will
“My purpose is to establish an agricultural college which will afford useful information to the farmers and mechanics, therefore it should afford thorough instruction in agriculture and the natural sciences connected therewith — it should combine, if practicable, physical and intellectual education, and should be a high seminary of learning in which the graduate of the common schools can commence, pursue and finish the course of studies terminating in thorough theoretic and practical instruction in those sciences and arts which bear directly upon agriculture, but I desire to state plainly that I wish the trustees of said institution to have full authority and power to regulate all matters pertaining to said institution — to fix the course of studies, to make rules for the government of the same, and to change them, as in their judgment, experience may prove necessary, but to always bear in mind that the benefits herein sought to be bestowed are intended to benefit agricultural and mechanical industries.”

What type of education is necessary for the “Common Man” of South Carolina today? One of the “new technologies” is automotive innovation as seen with the creation ICAR. What other innovative, market driven, educational tracks will be created and be supported through private funds? This will be decided because in 2011, the federal stimulus money provided to subsidize the short fall for the 2010 academic year will be gone, and the fat will have to be trimmed and the deficit will have to be managed. You can read about the impact on Clemson in President Barker’s Blog.

Over the past 50 years, especially during the rising and falling economies, their has been an upward trend in expansion of higher education degree tracks. More and more diverse educational opportunities were created either by the market or a vision. More and more dollars were spent by families in a competitive battle between educational institutions. Now, we will be getting back to basics. Degree programs that have a path. General education requirements will be re-evaluated and the new professors will be ones of innovation, entrepreneurship, and educational economics (bring true business value to the classroom).

There was at one time in this great nation the opportunity to get a law degree or a medical degree without a four year bachelorate education…why not today. Is it time to reconsider the four year track for a BA or BS and combine with graduate level education? How can we put value back in the education we pay dearly for and work hard to obtain. Right now, some of it is not worth the piece of paper that it is printed upon, but rather the interest it is accruing for those student loan payments we pay each month. We are paying ours each month as Sarah walks into the daycare classroom each day.

What about my sister-in-law working on a BA in History? It is our hope she will keep on studying to become a librarian after getting a Masters from University of South Carolina. That separate degree was not created for the job market but for the institution’s margin. They are in that cyclic process of creating new degrees just to make money.

The higher education system in South Carolina is fat and needs some trimming, not only from a degree offering stand point, but also from a market position. There is a need to critically examine the type of high dollar education that is being taught and figure out what is really necessary to provide a market bearing education.

So on this line of conversation, there are groups that are wanting to capitalize educationally with this current market. Take Blue Cross Blue Shield of South Carolina. Here is a group that makes money off of transactions. They are a company of IT professionals and they build their systems on COBOL. They are in a position to aggressively seek the next wave innovators to fill positions that are being vacated through attrition. The problem, it is not cool to go into “IT” anymore and the educational systems are not teaching COBOL. So Blue Cross Blue Shield of South Carolina has teamed up with educational institutions like University of South Carolina, Clemson, and others along with IBM to re-shape the perception and educational tracks for the world of “IT”. There is a market need and there is value in teaming up with high education to shape curriculum so that the Blue Cross Blue Shields of the world can capitalize on the new emerging talent. This entity is know as the Consortium for Enterprise Systems Management and is based in Columbia, SC. This group is a marketing engine working with groups to change the face of “IT” and educate and recruit the new talent but educate and reshape our educational system from K-12 to higher education.

So ask yourself, if you had to do it all over again…what would you study? Would you study your passion or what the market would bear. Maybe it is a combination of both, but it is time to shift that conversation back to where there is a need in the market for job opportunity and growth. Or…is a higher education truly standardized just for jobs or theoretical education? The pendulum is swinging back and it is time to figure out what is up next for our new leadership. That leadership are those students, our children, our future, our legacy. Remember, it is up to us to help shape our future…the decisions we make now will shape how we, our children, and our children’s children will live one day.

So on Tuesday, March, 23, 2010…President Obama signed into law the new health care reform bill. In the months, days, and hours leading up to this bill becoming a law, there are LOTS of voices in complete opposition to this piece of legislation. There are even people in agreement there is need for reform, but this is not the best piece of legislation to achieve the goal at hand. There are states currently working overtime trying to pass legislation to block this federal law.

So here is the context, I am a thirty-six year old husband who owns a house, small business owner, helping a 23 year old pay her way through college, shopping to afford healthcare. This piece of legislation speaks to me…provides me some sense of hope. But, there are so many that believe this is not the correct path. But I have not heard one time, one suggestion that would be an alternative to this plan. Seriously, for all those who do not like this legislation, who are screaming out loud against this new law, what is your plan? What is your recommendation? What is your alternative?

So…here is your chance to let me know what you would propose. I want to be educated. I want to know what you think is the alternative? The current system is not working…I want reform. What is your reform. I want you to use the comment section to sound off with your alternative. I will approve all who write legitimate ideas, not party bashing ideas…real, legitimate ideas that provide people like me an opportunity for healthcare. I want to see if you can live up to the screaming and articulate a proposed solution. No foul language, no party bashing, no slanderous accusations….a real idea with real vision. Prove it…back it up.

Let’s see what you have!

With the awareness and interest raised for location based Social Media platforms/technologies like Foursquare and Gowalla, I have jotted down and exploration of thoughts. These thoughts and questions I have to think through myself; I have to answer these questions critically before moving forward with the use of these new location based platforms.

Some Thoughts I have been pondering and synthesizing:

• Social Media outlets added to the “open source” movement that gives “small” people and organizations a voice.
• Social Media transformed us (small people/organizations) as “thought leaders” to drive Internet traffic to our “motherships” for information.
• Social Media platforms provided the “small” people/organizations an opportunity to create robust web properties competing with “big box” organizations.
• Social Media platforms provided the awareness necessary to create a “mothership” portal where the majority of the marketing messages “flow” through driving traffic to engage with a consistent message.
• Social Media technology and open source platforms allowed and empowered “small” people/organizations to compete in the messaging landscape with “big box” organizations.
• Social Media has allowed those to use technologies to build “Tribes” creating movements to distribute a message around a community.

Some questions in my head personally and professionally:

1. Why must “small” people/organizations be willing to use Social Media technologies to disclose locations?
2. Does Social Media technologies disclosing locations hurt/degrade the value of the brand of the “small” people and organizations…or reinforce the brand of the “big box” organizations.
3. Does location based Social Media technologies reinforce the “small” people/organizations as “thought leaders” empowering the reinforcement of the “big box” organization?
4. Does location based Social Media technology reinforce the small individual people and organization “thought leaders” as “thought leaders” since they are proportionally the influencers for “bog box” brands?
5. Have small people and organizations using Social Media platforms and location based technologies created a paradigm shift in perception transitioning those “small” people/organizations onto the same platform as “big box” organizations. Where does the influence lie and where will it lie in 10 years?

Who are the thought leaders?
Who really maximizes the true benefit of these location based platforms? Is it the groups publishing where they are located or is the organizations that are being recognized where this constituency base has chosen to locate and ultimately publicize? Some organizations are providing “rewards” for those soliciting their location using these technologies, but who is the thought leader here? Or do we care? Or is it just fun to say we are going to a movie and then to another place for a milkshake?

Organizations like hospitals might frame the benefit from these platforms with their marketing support staff providing their location especially for small doctors offices that lie under the umbrella of services. This is where organizations, “big box” organizations could benefit from internal staff providing location based advertising and raise awareness both from a public (business to consumer) and internal (business to business) position, informing other internal groups where and what is offered internally.

So what is the story behind these location based platforms? How are you using them? Are you doing more that just adding to the fad of saying what you are doing and where? Have you thought about the true marketing implications of these technologies and platforms? Are you telling your story or helping others with a bigger message? What are your thoughts? And will this become another place like Twitter where people get excited and then the honeymoon stage drops off like a bad relationship?

So it is my goal this year to look beyond the my current universe and begin to find other avenues beyond Flash video. Yes….for the past two and half years, I have been using Flash Video (FLV) to compress and distribute video content. Why did I start using it?

Well, at one time we were using WMV (Windows Media) as the primary platform, our current Director of IT had us on a windows platform and it made sense. It was clean, flexible yet we were missing a major target audience, the Mac World. From a user standpoint, Flash Video had a bigger penetration rate plus it looked real clean with HDV content. So off we moved to Flash video. The downside, the compression time TAKES FOREVER! WOW! But, it was flexible and had many robust player options, and every developer under the sun was creating so many options for Flash Video.

With the advent of the iPhone and other mobile computing devices (including the upcoming release of the iPad), Flash video is barely supported. It is funny, I moved to Flash to reach the Apple users, now those same Apple users are going to force me away from Flash video. So, now it is my goal to deliver high-quality video outside of  Flash Video…for the sole reason of reaching mobile audiences.

How are we currently reaching mobile audiences, well there is this great new place called YouTube. Yes, god bless these souls. They are the work around. Upload the video content to your YouTube channel, then grab the readily available embed code for your web page, and SHIZAM….you can have most of the mobile devices access your video content. Yes it is a Flash player, but since they have contracts with major mobile platforms like the iPhone, you can play video embedded into your website if it is hosted on YouTube. The problem, once you upload the content…it is no longer your content, it is owned and operated by YouTube. Yes, this free distribution channel doesn’t want to be liable if their servers take a big ole hiccup and your audience can’t watch your favorite video of Uncle Al busting his ass coming down the stairs or your corporate video that needs to play in front of investors.

So really, this year is dedicated to more than just moving away from my technological dependency of Flash video, but also my hosting/contract dependency of YouTube. I want to find a place to store my content, distribute it to the targeted audiences, and maximize the quality my clients pay me dearly to provide. Now, thanks to H264 codecs…this is possible.

So far, I have only found one place that makes sense….I think, Sorenson360. I have looked at Brightcove, Ooyala, Veeple, and Kaltura….but Sorenson360 has my vote right now. This is why…pretty simple. I set-up a trial account, uploaded an H264 Quicktime (.mov), it asked me if I wanted to distribute to the web and mobile (I said yes), it gave me a simple embed code, I dropped it into my blog, pulled out my iPhone, and behold…my video play instantly on my iPhone. ***Side note, Brightcove and Ooyala have harassed the snot out of me since i signed up to check out their trial area. Actually Brightcove was very nice, but not Ooyala.***

I am looking forward to HTML5 and the opportunities it will bring. But I am a one man type of show. I can hire some developers to create a platform to upload, compress, and distribute content for my clients…but Sorenson360 did this within a matter of minutes.

Video distribution should not be what limits us to provide a message to an audience, it should enable us to reach larger audiences. It should provide a pathway to reach groups of individuals regardless of the “technology” they use to access information. It is my goal to embrace technologies to reach these groups. The same is true for Social Media technologies, they are a tool and it is up to us as practitioners to use them if it meets the needs of the audience.  We have a story to tell!

BTW…I already know how to host, compress, and distribute video content on dedicated or virtual servers. I understand the ROI for the use CDN’s and the Amazon’s Cloud to encode and distribute video content. But, I am one man that likes to focus on telling stories, not managing a server network. It is time focus on my core competency…telling rich stories.