Vidize.com

Nicolas Kayser-Bril has done a review of the Vidize beta (in French).
You can read it here although if French isn’t your first language, you can read a loose translation from Google.

Tags: journalism, recording, review, video, vidize, web cam

Adobe has scheduled the beta test of the new Flash player 10 (codename Astro) for today.
There doesn’t seem to be any substantial improvements in the video department but here’s the feature list:
3D Effects - Easily transform and animate any display object through 3D space while retaining full interactivity. Fast, lightweight, and native 3D effects […]

I just stumbled upon an article marking the 75th anniversary of the BBC. About one third of it is based on Jeffrey Sachs’ Reith Lectures.
Here’s a few important points:
A terrorist shot in Sarajevo provided the pretext for German aggression which started World War I. 9/11 was used by the Bush Administration to launch the […]

With the writers’ strike over, a real question emerges - how much did the strike cost?
According to an article on E!, the strike cost an amazing 2.5 billion USD.
A report released Wednesday by Jack Kyser, the chief economist for the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp., has revealed that the three-month walkout by film and […]

Another special delivery from Ask a Ninja:

Tags: special, writers strike, youtube

According to Associated Press (as of a few hours ago):
Hollywood directors (DGA) reached a tentative contract deal Thursday with studios, a development that could turn up the pressure on striking writers to settle their 2-month-old walkout that has crippled the entertainment industry.
“Two words describe this agreement — groundbreaking and substantial,” said Gil Cates, chair of […]

With the deal between News Corp and Dow Jones finally over, Rupert Murdoch is focusing on the Wall Street Journal. To this end, he has already “outsourced” the European and Asian operations to his son and heir.
In addition to all the changes to the Journal’s print edition, Murdoch plans to make the online edition free. […]

Here’s a few tips from Cinetech on how to get better results from Youtube’s encoder.
1. Learn to shoot better quality videos for the Web.
2. Your source video needs to be ideally high resolution. For instance: MOV or AVI file, NTSC 720×480 or VGA 640×480.
3. You need to get a high quality video encoder. Keep in […]

“The killer of dissident reporter Anna Politkovskaya is known to Russian authorities but has not yet been charged…”. That’s the statement of the chief investigator on the case that appeared in an interview on Monday. Here’s a bit more from Reuters:
“We have so far not charged the killer but we know who he is,” […]

Ira Glass is creator, host and executive producer of This American Life. Here’s a segment of his interview where he talks about the common pitfalls when doing a talk show for broadcast.

Update: You can view more videos on storytelling at current.tv

Tags: advice, broadcast, dialog, interview, Ira Glass, radio, storytelling