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November 17, 2005

Kenyatta Returns

Kenyatta Cheese is coming back to town for another Portable Video Workshop!

He'll be screening a number of portable video works, showcasing the best of this emerging genre, and then we'll have another chance to format videos and upload them online. In the last few weeks since our last meeting, a number of devices were released (including the video iPod) and services launched (like revver.com). So there's ever more to talk about and look at in this medium.

We're meeting this coming Monday, November 21, 6-9pm. Same place as last time - the Interactive Media Lab, in the Zemeckis Center for the Digital Arts at USC. RSVP in the comments here, if you like!

Announcing the Portable Video Class

This coming Spring 2006, students at USC will have a chance to spend a semester exploring Portable Video. We will make short videos, screen them and critique them - developing our understanding of the aesthetics of this new medium. We will share videos online, experimenting with internet distribution. We will talk about Intellectual Property, Citizen Journalism, Sampling and other issues in this lively field.

There's a preview syllabus posted online. Sign up for CTIN 499 - Special Topics: Portable Video Production and Internet Distribution, through the USC OASIS system. Todd Richmond is the lead professor, and Kenyatta Cheese will be visiting from New York, with Justin Hall assisting.

Here are the flyers promoting the class and workshop.

November 16, 2005

the undocumented informal portable video economy.

I ran into two high school kids watching 50 Cent and old Jay-Z music videos on a PSP last night. I told them I could never find any good video for my PSP and asked them where they got theirs. "On a bulletin board," they said. They get a lot of video that way. Music videos, TV shows, viral video... not a lot of movies, though. Why's that? Because DVDs are better on a big screen.

How do the music videos end up on PSPs? Other people take them off of television, transcode them to PSP-compatible (MP4) format, zip them up and post them to file hosting sites, then link to it on the bulletin boards they hang out on. Anyone who doesn't know how to get the video onto their PSP can search the board or read the FAQ. Nice.