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The Super Stars of New Social Media 48

Posted by Zonk from the better-than-a-summer-job dept.
sanspeak writes "The Wall Street Journal profiles the Moguls of New Media. It's not about the entrepreneurs who have created these new media islands like MySpace, YouTube and such, but people who participate in it and make it successful." From the article: "As videos, blogs and Web pages created by amateurs remake the entertainment landscape, unknown directors, writers and producers are being catapulted into positions of enormous influence. Each week, about a half-million people download a comedic video podcast featuring a former paralegal. A video by a 30-year-old comedian from Cleveland has now been watched by almost 30 million people, roughly the audience for an average "American Idol" episode. The most popular contributor to the photo site Flickr.com just got a contract to shoot a Toyota ad campaign."
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The Super Stars of New Social Media More

The Super Stars of New Social Media

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  • Of course (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Threni ( 635302 ) on Monday July 31, 2006 @07:48AM (#15816177)
    when TV companies stop showing their stuff in one region and sell it on the net, they'll have a global marketplace which'll make 30,000,000 people look pretty small.

    Oh, and while I'm posting, I was thinking about social sites and privacy. If people are worried about people posting too much info on the net, and they're also worried about big brother style data mining of their details, why don't the sites respond by turning the typed text into graphics, displaying it as bitmaps, so that it can't be cut and pasted etc. You could use a subtle form of CAPCHA (or whatever it's called) encryption perhaps - nothing too hard to read - but even without it it would thwart casual searchability.

    • Re:Of course (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SCPRedMage ( 838040 ) on Monday July 31, 2006 @07:55AM (#15816201)
      If people are worried about people posting too much info on the net, and they're also worried about big brother style data mining of their details, why don't the sites respond by turning the typed text into graphics, displaying it as bitmaps, so that it can't be cut and pasted etc.
      Probably has something to do with image files taking up a lot more space than text.
      • And unless they used some kind of obfusication, the images of text could easily be read using OCR.
      • All we need to do in that case is to create some kind of encoding schema to store references to bitmaps of text characters, and call them in sequence to replicate an actual string of text. Then the image of a page can be generated on the fly.

    • Re:Of course (Score:2, Insightful)

      by utnapistim ( 931738 )

      If people are worried about people posting too much info on the net, and they're also worried about big brother style data mining of their details, why don't the sites respond by turning the typed text into graphics, displaying it as bitmaps, so that it can't be cut and pasted etc. You could use a subtle form of CAPCHA (or whatever it's called) encryption perhaps - nothing too hard to read - but even without it it would thwart casual searchability.

      Turning the typed text into graphics is not a solution.

    • Hehe... I know this probably isn't the right forum to suggest this BUT... if you want to avoid data-mining, just use flash!!!!! Apparently it's the most search unfriendly format there is ;-p

    • Re:Of course (Score:2, Interesting)

      by camryl ( 949061 )
      Displaying text as graphics will make the web far less friendly for the vision-impaired (such as myself), while still leaving the information vulnerable to any data mining software that incorporates OCR.

  • I have another question (Score:5, Funny)

    by pimpimpim ( 811140 ) on Monday July 31, 2006 @08:02AM (#15816227)
    concerning youtube [joyoftech.com]
    • Simple answer: they don't afford it. They just hope to be acquired soon by someone who will monetise their user base and apply a business plan to it. Either that or they've perfected the first major implementation of multicast without telling anyone.
  • ...if companies started publishing really creative material (and by this, I'm talking about +5 insightful, interesting, and funny all at the same time), does anyone think there might be a market for the ADS themselves (let alone the product). If ads were more often than not the quality that movies (used to be) are like, perhaps there would be another method for money-making, and not only that, but economic Darwinism could then spare us the really stupid ones. Anyone care to sare an opinion?
    • There was one ad i found extremely hilarious, of course I cant find it ANYWHERE...

      Does anyone remember that snickers commercial where the hunters pelt a deer with candy bars, then look dumbfound when it just runs away?.. then a caption "it's only sastifying if you eat it"..

      I just wish I used my VCR more often =/
  • If I watch 3 seconds of a dancing comedian from Cleveland before hitting my attention span limit for wacky online videos, do I still count as one of those 30 million?

    • Yes. Just as much as if you watch 10 seconds of American Idols and think "What a piece of shit".

    • If I watch 3 seconds of a dancing comedian from Cleveland before hitting my attention span limit for wacky online videos, do I still count as one of those 30 million?

      Many thousands of people rated that video 3 stars or higher (out of 5). I watched the video and it is not funny. At all. The comedian is somewhat talented and he provokes quite a bit of nostalgia but I don't think I even giggled once. He's a no one rehashing has-beens.

      What struck me was the audience whose reaction can be heard in the vide

  • good luck ! (Score:3, Funny)

    by __aahlyu4518 ( 74832 ) on Monday July 31, 2006 @08:37AM (#15816383)
    "The most popular contributor to the photo site Flickr.com just got a contract to shoot a Toyota ad campaign."

    I hope that those ad campaigns aren't as tough as at Toyota car. Those are nearly indestructible. Would be hard to shoot them....

  • Hollywood (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31, 2006 @08:39AM (#15816392)
    I recently came across http://www.famousonthenet.com/ [famousonthenet.com] From their site: "We are a group of experienced Hollywood agents, marketers and entrepreneurs that have teamed up to create the world's first agency for "Internet famous" individuals. Our goal is represent these people, and provide them with the resources they need to further their Internet endeavors. Are people addicted to reading your blog? Do you have hundreds of friends on MySpace? Do your videos on YouTube get downloaded thousands of times? If so, we are very interested in working with you. " Looks like the greedy Hollywood folks aren't letting these 'amateur celebrities' slip under their radar.
    • sorry about this, but there's even another fitting joyoftech [joyoftech.com] page.

      Ah, I love that site, I actually knew about them because a local laundry shop had posted cartoons of luke and leia buying a father's day card with darth vader on it (something like: you're an evil bastard, but you're still our father) on their windows, and I accidentally found these later on the joyoftech site.

  • Websites are famous when they are unique and have a lot of word of mouth advertising. Period.

  • Open letter to Myspace Tom (Score:3, Funny)

    by Rob T Firefly ( 844560 ) on Monday July 31, 2006 @09:12AM (#15816567) Homepage Journal
    Dear Myspace Tom,

    No, you are not my "friend."

    You're not even in my "extended network."

    Get bent, you creepy mutant.

    Sincerely,

    Random Myspace User.

  • Game Over (Score:2, Interesting)

    by scotbot ( 906561 )

    ... for free speech, amongst other things.

    Apparently, one US Congressman wants public access to social networking sites banned, all under the guise of protecting kiddies from molesters. If you're not sure what I'm wittering on about, then read about the "Deleting Online Predators Act" [bbc.co.uk]. Banning access to these sites in public places is only the start of further restrictions to your rights online or otherwise. Act now, or pay later. You choose, whilst you've still got freedom of choice anyway.

  • I'm thrilled to see that the internet really is a World of Ends [worldofends.com]. As a blogger and a Slashdot whiner (er, commentor) I feel empowered when my fellow netizens reap the fruits of their labour on the world stage. I'm just concerned that if net neutrality isn't preserved these people will be muscled out of their needed accessibility by the Disneys and Microsofts of the world.

  • A long time coming... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Gadgetfreak ( 97865 ) on Monday July 31, 2006 @10:07AM (#15816899)
    as more people are directly connected with one another, there's no need to go through the classic "get myself on TV" or "get myself a movie role" avenues to get popular attention.

    In college, which is now between 3.5 and 8 years ago for me, my computer itself was far more popular than I was. I hosted all kinds of fun stuff (some legal, some illegal) but the popular things were videos I made with my laptop and webcam of amusing college exploits. I had microwave tricks with eggs blowing the door open, and stable plasmoids, as well as videos of driving an electric go-kart through the halls and up the elevator of the engineering building.

    They were popular videos, and I had thousands of hits, but I was behind the camera.

    Point is, when everyone has the ability to connect directly to one another through computers, the new "word of mouth" popularity is replaced and amplified by the email forward with a URL in it. The problem is that you can become famous in a matter of a week or 2, but you can be forgotten just as quickly if you don't keep it rolling.

  • The next generation of media theorists/journalists are currently in training. To rise to the titular "superstar" status, one will need to meet these two criteria: 1- Have mastery over the (presumably) English language. This is usually accomplished by studying English Lit, Creative Writing, or some related field. 2- Have a rigorous background in the relation between old/new media and society (Film Studies, Art History, or New Media concentration helpful) AND/OR have a broad understanding of the way technolo
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Which Flickr user is it? I look forward to seeing macro shots of flowers or Photoshop'd photos of sunsets and arty depth-of-field shots.

  • famous for five minutes in Internet time ... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by rs232 ( 849320 ) on Monday July 31, 2006 @10:59AM (#15817267)
    "As videos, blogs and Web pages created by amateurs remake the entertainment landscape, unknown directors, writers and producers are being catapulted into positions of enormous influence"

    I wonder how many of these people of enormous influence will be around in a year never mind six months. A quick perusal of Forbidden [myspace.com] illustrates exactly what it is famous for. Nothing wrong in viewing tottie [britishcouncil.org] but does everything have to be reduced to the level of the Sun's tit page [page3.com].
  • I can't wait til Brandon Hardesty makes it big.

    And Brookers, too!!! Go Brookers.
  • We the authors of the new media rejoice, for this is our time to reign.
  • ...everyone will be famous for fifteen seconds.

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