After a long period going back over accounts without reporting, we are finally going to be able to get an insight into how Avid’s financial position is looking. With the revised plan to publish restated accounts for 2011, accounts for 2012, and 2013. Within 40 days of that, the figures to June 2014 will be published.
I look forward to having a detailed look at the company’s financial position.
An article in Forbes this week asserts that Netflix’s eventual world-wide reach will prevent funding via pre-sales through traditional territory-by-territory strategy. While a shift is this necessarily a bad thing?
Indeed, Netflix will likely expand from creating original series to creating its own large budget films, with the initial premiere on-line. Netflix may be a vibrant, important source of new financing that disrupts the studio system and bypasses standard distribution channels.
Over the weekend, Chris Fenwick interviewed me for his FCPX Grill podcast about the importance of logging, metadata and Lumberjack System. The podcast is available now and it is a good conversation.
What makes it meta though is that Alex Gollner logged the conversation and put it up on his website: metadata (logging) about a conversation on metadata. It doesn’t get much more meta than that!
I’m very happy to announce that Lumberjack System now has an iOS Logger – an app for logging without an Internet connection. To celebrate we’re offering the next 50 (well, less now) people who sign up for a year of Lumberjack System a free copy of Intelligent Assistance’s Producer’s Best Friend.
Yesterday I had to pleasure of being invited to USC for Avid’s Avid Everywhere presentation. Shortly thereafter I attempted to share what I learnt with Larry Jordan and Michael Horton on the Digital Production BuZZ. Avid friends, I hope I got it close to right!
Here’s the link to my segment on the BuZZ. http://www.digitalproductionbuzz.com/BuZZ_Audio/Buzz_140731_Hodgetts.mp3
I have to say that there is a lot of difference in the experience delivered by Amazon Instant Video and Apple’s iTunes.
According to a recent webinar, “Metadata is the New Gold,†a Webinar produced by the Media & Entertainment Services Alliance and the Hollywood IT Society, metadata is more important than ever. Each of the presenters had specific takeaways.
It seems that every content distribution company has decided that original content is the way forward. Amazon’s recent announcement that they would spend $100 million on original production adds to Apple’s UK music festival, Netflix and Google’s original programming. Google are spending on YouTube production as well.
In context though… $100 million would buy you two seasons of Mad Men.
We’ve seen all the new media giants start creating their own exclusive content: Netflix, Amazon, Microsoft (although that’s being closed down) and of course, Apple. Apple??? That’s right, Apple. Most people don’t realize that Apple is also in the content creation business, but the iTunes Music Festival is really about creating exclusive content for Apple’s ecosystem. Given this is the 8th year of the festival, Apple have been creating original content for their ecosystem longer than anyone else.
This news item caught my eye.
“DJI has expanded the feature set of the Phantom 2 Quadcopter line by giving it the ability to map out a route and automatically fly it. Using Ground Station, shooters will be able to create a route full of way points in order to let the quadcopter fly automatically from one point to another, and allow the shooter to concentrate on getting the shot. And it’s just what the pilot ordered.”
It reminded me of some of my thoughts on – what I was then calling a quadcopter but would now be a drone – how these flying camera platforms were going to evolve.