Long old day yesterday, starting off for me at 4am, driving over to Tunbridge Wells for around 6, then up to Bolton for Lunchtime (thankfully I didn't have to drive that bit), do some filming and then back to Tunbridge Wells and drive home by about midnight. Wake up far too early this morning feeling like I'd been out on the piss all night and doss about all day bar typing up an invoice.
Another momentous landmark appeared yesterday, apart from being my first corporate gig, it was also the first time in my life I'd ever stepped foot inside a football stadium (Wembley Stadium not included as it's pretty much multi purpose and was kitted out for a gig at the time), the one in question being the Reebok Stadium, home of the Bolton Wanderers.
It's smaller than it looked from the outside.
Web 2.0 is all the rage, and I'm registered on various Web 2.0 sites, Facebook, MySpaz, Digg and for a short while now Pownce.
Pownce is apparently like "Twitter on steroids", Twitter is basically the "Status Update" bit of Facebook, it's called 'micro-blogging'.
Now Twitter I've not touched, I update my status on FB a fair bit, from serious to ridiculous statements, and for actual blogging, well.. you're reading it, so I'm still a bit in the dark as to whether Pownce is filling a useful niche in my life, so the features, or the different things you can send:-
Messages:- As I said, like Twitter or the Status Updates on FB. I rarely use the status updates for any real serious application, more that I feel the need to change it on an ongoing basis. I can kinda see an advantage to this aspect of Pownce in that, you can use it seriously and targeted, whereas your status on Facebook simply crops up in the news feed to everyone of your friends. How does this apply? Not sure, it's not as immediate as an IM or text (SMS), is it more immediate than sending an email?? Hmm.
Links:- Looks pretty much like a message except it's got an http tag attached. There are times when you need to bung a link over to someone, I can do that on email, in a Facebook message (which are basically my two main forms of online communication now) or if the person's online in an IM. Hmm.
Events:- Facebook has an events section, allowing you to create an 'Event', say a gig or a party, send that event to your friends, who can then RSVP to said event online. Handy. There are various levels of privacy available, so if you're having a party at your house you can keep the Event hidden from the rest of Facebook, or if it's a gig, advertise it to the world, then, post event, people can upload pics, videos, discuss, all within the event's page. Cheers.
Pownce is a lot simpler, allowing you to simply post the event details publicly or to select friends. Quicker, so for a informal get together a lot less hassle, but for bigger events, more a reminder tool??? Hmm.
Files:- Pownce allows you to send files to other users, a standard account can send up to 10MB and a Pro account ($20/yr) can send up to 100MB files.
Now this for me could be the hidden gem, or not so hidden as the case may be. Email is the usual method for me to send a file over to someone, but a lot of email systems, especially company (corporate if you prefer) ones have poxy 2MB ceiling on their attachment sizes either in or out, not the best as I work in film/video/broadcast and files can be a tad bigger than that! And even some other email providers will start to quake under larger file sizes. Ok what about IMing the file? Well, MSN Messenger is what most people I currently know currently use and file transfer on that it bigshite, sending a sub 100k JPEG is painful enough at times! FTP? Yea there's FTP, I could upload the file to my web-space, send people a link to the file to download it, but then if I'm in a situation where I'm bunging files around, that'll probably rape my bandwidth, plus it's a bit of a hassle.
So the whole File side of Pownce is intriguing, send (potentially) up to 100Mb files, people either pick them up immediately (I think) or next time the log on and it's there.
There are other file options out there, which I've yet to fully explore, there's one called Tubes or something that sounded interesting, but at the time I looked was Windows only, cross platform is better thanks. Then there's the issue of my MySpz headline "How many sites does one man need?"
If you're on Pownce add me, plus if you actually know me I've still got my 6 invites if you wanna have a lookie.
http://www.pownce.com/MattGrover/
Just been pondering as i commented on the lack of British TV stuff in the iTS, as to what shows i'd actually buy (from wherever) from the store.
By the way, it seems the British offering currently consists of:
Genie In The House (Nickelodeon) - Disturbing kids tv offering
Jongleurs Unleashed (Paramount Comedy) - Stand-Up stuff
Comedy Blue (Paramount Comedy) - possibly British
The World Stands Up (P.... C....) - some Brits in it.
Oh yay.
Anyway...
What would I buy...
Lost
Battlestar Galactica (not gonna happen)
Heroes (nor this)
possibly The 4400 as I'm getting into that now.
also The Night Stalker sounds intriguing but dunno what it's like.
My Name Is Earl (dunno what network)
Jericho
Bionic Woman - maybe, but again i think it's NBC and I'm not entirely sure if it's good yet.
Yes I am a geek.
Anything British if it were to appear?
Lead Balloon - Bloody good, but it's more of an impulse watch thing as are..
The IT Crowd, The Mighty Boosh, and other similar ones.
Dramas???
Wire in The Blood - but my girlfriend watches it as well, so I'm quite likely to see it broadcast, I have been tempted with the DVD's if I get them cheap enough.
There's nothing else that I can think of that I actually WANT to follow over "watch it if it's on".
There's no way I'd buy any sort of reality or "talent"
Well the BBC are ditching production on various dramas, I'm hoping we're gonna see a decent 16-24 episode series that can compete with the Yanks, I've a feeling it's gonna be more expensive one offs and 6 episode blips and maybe another Dr. Wo spin off :/
...finally!!!
iTunes wouldn't give me the stats on their one :(
Now for the screen caps (iTunes on the left, DivX on the right and hopefully clicking on them will take you to the relevant page on my Flickr account)...
Now I don't think there's a lot in it, I think the iTunes one's a bit over saturated, but at first glance, it could be ok. BTW it may be worth noting that currently I'm either watching this stuff on my 19" CRT or my 13" MacBook, not a 40" HD LCD ;)
Anyway, I'm gonna ponder some more in a bit as I have to go out now, but would be interested in people's thoughts on this...