In another recent interview with Alec Shankman, the CEO of Hollywood interactive community GotCast, he told us that technology and the entertainment industry were “merging quickly.” Sites such as Hulu, Netflix, and, of course, YouTube are creating many new opportunities for both known talent and budding talent.

While there are many opportunities, there are also challenges in bringing these two industries together. After being an agent for several years, Shankman realized that there was a gap in connecting fresh talent to agents, producers, and casting directors. He and his business partner Wil Schroter took this problem and developed a platform for bridging this gap called GotCast.com.

“We’re actually merging the way talent is discovered and the way that talent finds work with technology,” said Shankman.

They wanted to create options beyond American Idol, The Voice, and other talent oriented shows.

He went on to explain that the service has both a free and premium model and anyone that wants can sign up. The service also has a social-based component called MediaBlastr that allows family and friends to vote for their loved ones on various social sites. Brands such as MySpace, Dove, and Sony Playstation have created contests that have gone viral through this element.

“It’s really difficult for a brand to get talent to, or anybody for that matter, to speak about the brand across Facebook and Twitter without getting paid for it or without having a really specific reason,” Shankman said.

“But, in this case, when you’re saying, ‘Hey, I wanna be the new face of Dove, come vote for me,’ and you’re posting it on Twitter and Facebook and Google+, and then your friends go to vote for you and they sign up and they post the same thing, it gets really viral really quickly; and it’s incredible for brands,” he added.

The other challenge with this intersection of technology and entertainment is monetization. The entertainment industry is accustomed to having tried and true business models, but this new space is different. Shankman told us that GotCast, and the others that are embracing the two, are still experimenting with revenue models.

“Technology is growing like crazy everyday, so it’s gonna be in the entertainment space whether entertainment’s ready or not,” he said.

Despite these challenges, Shankman said that Hollywood was motivated to integrate technology because it didn’t want to “miss the boat” like the recording industry did.

The latest attempt to move to the next level, according to TechCrunch, is the hiring of Feedburner co-founder and CEO Dick Costolo as the new COO of Twitter. Costolo left Google in July after spending enough time with Feedburner’s new owners to watch them drop the ball. What makes this hire significant (aside from Costolo being an early investor in Twitter) according to TC’s Michael Arrington is

Costolo, who is also an early Twitter investor, is someone who has actual experience building scalable infrastructures, which Twitter sorely needs. The company hasn’t launched any new features in recent memory, and continues to have regular downtime. In fact, Twitter’s inability to build features and keep the service live is a serious competitive disadvantage. Costolo can presumably fix all that.

So here we are living out another day in the never ending soap opera of hope and flame-outs that is Twitter. From the confusion of “How does thing work for business?” to the predictions that the service is woefully undervalued and underhyped and all stops in between, everyone wants in on the Twitter phenomenon. Fortunately, it looks like Twitter is taking notice as well by hiring the likes of Costolo. They recently hired Google’s top legal ace as well.

So Twitter is still busy in the background trying to get the right people on the bus. Stay tuned as something is likely to change or be predicted in the next 15 seconds or so that will keep everyone busy for another short period of time.

Comments

Google’s poor understanding of Chinese culture has been pinpointed as a reason for its failures in that country; an old Baidu commercial even portrayed Google as a Westerner with embarrassingly poor Chinese-language skills.  Hiring Chinese citizens might be an ideal way to overcome this image.

Furthermore, the practice could be beneficial to Google in many other areas.  “[T]he nation has such a huge talent potential,” Kai-Fu Lee, the president of Google China, told the AP.  “I think there will undoubtedly be innovation in China.”

Innovation is exactly what Google needs – the company’s search market share is approximately one-third of Baidu’s, and has shown little improvement over the past six months.  Also, Google’s a bit weak in the mobile department, and cell phones and texting are absolutely taking off in China.

Of course, nothing’s guaranteed to work – it’s not like Google hasn’t tried to reverse its fall in China before.  Eric Schmidt has given the division a pretty long leash, however, so no heads are likely to roll in the near future.

Joost has taken an ultra-legal approach to Internet TV – no user-generated or unauthorized copyrighted content here – and it has been extremely successful thus far.  Still in beta, Joost nonetheless “features more than 150 channels with programming across all genres, including: cartoons and animation; entertainment and film; sports; comedy; lifestyle and documentaries,” according to the company.

The CAA should be able to help Joost expand even more.  Yvette Alberdingk Thijm, Joost’s executive vice president of content strategy and acquisition, said in a statement, “Through our partnership with CAA, we are able to bring more high-quality, professionally-produced programming to audiences around the world.”

That’s not bad.  And the Red Herring’s Alexandra Berzon also notes that Joost “recently announced a $45 million investment from a group that includes Silicon Valley heavyweight Sequoia Capital and Hollywood bigwigs CBS and Viacom.”  But it would be really interesting – and give everyone a much better idea of Joost’s potential – if the company would break out of its invitation-only shell.

In the meantime, most of the world is left to wonder what this Joost thing is all about.  That’s okay, though – knowing that the company is now rubbing shoulders with the likes of Tom Hanks and Michael J. Fox may be quite enough.

That doesn’t seem quite fair, does it? Haven’t all of us said or done something at least a little untoward? Is the googler calling the googlee a sinner? What of the googler’s past? Spotless?

Yes, the job market is competitive. Yes, I’m heavy on the throw the first stone philosophy. Yes, a candidate should shine their shoes and practice their handshaking and eye contact. But is it too presumptive, too hasty to toss out a candidate based on their googlability?

(Google’s going to love me for using their brand name with such license, but lets get real – it is a word now.)

I wonder this because I’m starting to see a trend, at least as I am perceiving it from the piecemeal coverage I see. We already know quite well that Bill Gates didn’t finish his degree – and that would have hurt him in the job market if he hadn’t made brilliant strides of his own.

Alarm:clock reports that Craig Newmark, the founder of the wildly successful Craigslist, was "too odd" to land an engineering job. "Too odd" meant the head engineer didn’t like his "anti-capitalist ideas."

The raging success of Craigslist has to have Newmark sitting back in his chair and chuckling at a statement like that.

Just before that little nugget, Valleywag asks "Is 30 too old to start a company?" The question arises because, according to Valleywag, venture capitalists assume tech entrepreneurs "peak" at about 26.

As a 30-year-old, I think that just plain sucks. Admittedly, rounding that corner hasn’t been exactly fun – spicy foods are quickly becoming the enemy and my knees and back just aren’t what they used to be – but my mind is sharper than ever.

What was I saying?

Oh yeah, it seems employers (and investors) would be wise to take a second look at the talent they’re throwing off the table for some rather arbitrary reasons. And to borrow from an overused corporate buzz phrase, that’s not exactly "thinking outside the box."

Genius rarely comes in conventional packages. Just ask Einstein, who I hear had trouble just tying his shoes (but that could be an urban legend).  

Reaching the customer means coordinating an entire marketing campaign so that it persists in its relevancy whenever the customer makes contact with a brand. That’s integrated marketing communications, at least as Wikipedia has it recorded.

ANA blogger Will Waugh discussed his organization’s survey of over a hundred senior marketers at their Marketing Maestros blog. While the formal presentation of the survey’s results won’t happen until an October conference, Waugh listed the top ten issues weighing on the shoulders of the marketing influential.

"Integrated marketing being number 1 does not surprise me, nor should it anyone else in this space as the marketing landscape continues to transform," Waugh said.

The top four results shuffled around from the 2006 list, with accountability dropping from first to second. It could be that marketers are more comfortable with their ability to handle a potential crisis in 2007, enough to concentrate on the more visionary aspects of integrated communications.

The top ten looked like this:

1. Integrated marketing communications
2. Accountability
3. Aligning marketing organization with innovation
4. Building strong brands
5. Media proliferation
6. Consumer control over what and how they view advertising
7. Globalization of marketing efforts
8. Growth of multicultural consumer segments
9. Advertising creative that achieves business results
10. Attracting and retaining top talent

That last result grabbed Waugh’s attention; he asked, "The real question for those of us marketers out there is, should we be concerned that ‘attracting and retaining top talent’ is the least of their worries?"

There are a couple of people the WebProNews writers keep a virtual eye on, out of the many who comprise the search industry niche and the greater world of tech. Danny Sullivan requires no introduction to our readership, while former Valleywag writer turned contributor Nick Douglas and his nine-month run on that site may have been under the radar to many.

Both guys are immensely talented writers, and have hit the ground running with their new endeavors. One might be inclined to think their former sites, Search Engine Watch and Valleywag, may have suffered from their departures.

Looking at a Compete Snapshot for each tells a different story. Both sites have blossomed in traffic without their best-known talent; it must be cautioned that Compete does not track international visitors, which could impact either of them negatively.

Search Engine Watch dipped as November 2006 ended and Danny left the site. The next month saw traffic begin an increase that continued to rise through February 2007. Valleywag’s unceremonious dumping of Douglas in early November 2006, in favor of a "more money, less sex" edict from Gawker publisher Nick Denton, has seen traffic rise from then until January, when it began to decline.

A site can continue without its signature talent. The marketing executives who serve as movers and shakers feel the same way about their initiatives. Talent matters, but maybe not as much as some may think, especially in the corner offices of senior ad people.

Yahoo! announced that Hermogino had been voted the winner of the Talent Show contest by online voters and judges Tom Green, Maria Sansone, and the Ninja from Ask a Ninja.com.

The Yahoo! Talent Show is a contest that is new to the site, and searches for the hottest original talent on the Internet. Judges of the show said they found what they were looking for in San Diego resident Rex Hermogino’s singing, songwriting and video making talents.

Controversial funny man and judge Tom Green said “All five of our finalists were very talented individuals, but Rex just had a particular presence and ability to capture the audience that could easily translate into an ongoing show on Yahoo!.”

Hermogino, who had been writing music in his native Guam since middle school, faced stiff competition from the other four finalists, including Stanley Sowa, Jr. of Chicago, Ben Grinnell of West Hollywood, Calif., Justine Ezarik of Pittsburgh, Pa., and Renzhe Parkour of Orlando, Fla.

But ultimately it was the graphic designer’s love-seeking themed online music videos that helped to secure Hermogino’s place in online history. The most popular of the videos, “Love on the Internet,” spread virally and was viewed over 100,000 times.

Hermogino maintained the dorky love theme throughout the rest of the competition with videos including interviews on the streets of New York City inquiring as to what people’s favorite pick-up lines were.

The daily Yahoo! Talent Show was viewed by over 4 million people, and users submitted over 500, 000 videos. Users provided over 200, 000 ratings for the videos and narrowed the field to five finalists who competed in three online video challenges.

Judge Tom Green reflected on the importance of the voters, saying, “The viewing and voting public really helped us narrow the field, so hats off to them. Nice job, people.”

Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl

Autmn Davis is a staff writer for WebProNews covering ebusiness and technology.

It is costly to hire wrong, if you hire right, the world is great for the company.

In summation, a blog about technology, there is an article called “Why big high tech companies are loosing the talent war“. In this article they state:

“Big companies are losing their “A” players and they’re struggling to attract “B” players. In an industry where everything is about people, large tech companies are in trouble because they are losing the talent war. And keep in mind, an “A” player in an organization can usually produce the same results as three “B” players.

Joining a big company is irrational in today’s market

Why would you want to join a big high tech company (Yahoo, Microsoft, eBay, HP, Oracle, or Cisco) when you can join a cool startup? [Disclosure: Auren is NOT a shareholder in any public high-tech company] At a big company you’re stuck with corporate politics, paralysis decision making, and a lack of getting things done. At a small company you’re having fun, pursuing your dream, and actually getting things done.

Job security is about a wash. While start-ups tend to go under, big companies are always doing lay-offs and good people are often getting fired due to corporate politics and purges. Thinking about cash compensation, if you make $130K at a big company, you’ll likely make $110K at a funded start-up – a significant difference ($11K after taxes), but not astronomical. Also let’s not forget the stock compensation which has no comparison.” (summation)

I have worked in big, small, and middle-sized companies, and all of them really were about doing as many good things as possible, within the confines of the company. While agreed that in a smaller start up there are not the intervening layers of bureaucracy, even a small start up run by a Type A personality on a bender can be difficult, and you might not be pursuing your dream in that environment so much as dealing with management induced stress related issues.

Really, security is no longer a reason to try to hold onto a job, you may be secure, but when the cuts come, they come. That is a reality of the job market that I think we have all accepted is part of the game. I have been in startups, they can be fun under the right management with the right vision, if they lack both, being in a start up is no fun. I don’t agree with the premise that startups are somehow better than a big company, both suffer from the same root cause issues and results if they are not doing well.

For me this article harkens back to the good old days of the dot com boom where everyone wanted to do the most innovative thing that they can do and get fabulously wealthy doing it. I don’t buy the argument, but it does remind me of a bumper sticker I saw in Bellevue Washington on a ratted out old jeep

“Oh Lord, please let there be another dot com boom, and I promise not to piss it away this time”.

Summation might be right, but then with what I have seen, or my friends have seen, people choose a company based on what they are comfortable with. There is safety in the anonymity of a large company, while it can be dangerous being on the bleeding edge. Many people will choose the start up for the general excitement and adrenalin junkie things they need to do, while others need the static day-to-day autonomic functions of a big company to stay happy.

Why won’t I go work for a startup? No reason, why won’t I go to a big company, no reason. It is really about the job and the people, both have to be exceptional.

Comments

Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl

Bookmark WebProNews:

Dan Morrill has been in the information security field for 18 years, both
civilian and military, and is currently working on his Doctor of Management.
Dan shares his insights on the important security issues of today through
his blog, Managing
Intellectual Property & IT Security, and is an active participant in the
ITtoolbox blogging community.

Can you sing the alphabet backwards while hula-hooping and painting a replica of Vincent van Gogh’s “Starry Night”? If you so, you can put your random talents to good use with a talent contest being hosted by Yahoo!.

Yahoo! is hosting an interesting new contest that showcases the talents of the Internet search engine’s users. The Yahoo! Talent Show is a “nationwide search to find the next great Internet celebrity”, according to Yahoo! representatives.

To enter the contest Yahoo! users must simply upload their original videos using any of the following formats: ASF, AVI, MOV, MPEG, QT, or WMV.

But do not attempt to dance to Kelis’s “Milkshake” or impersonate a character from your favorite movie; all material that is submitted must be completely original and contained nothing that has been copyrighted.

Currently some of the most popular categories for user videos are acting, dancing, crazy, spoof, scary, silly, and rock.

The purpose of the talent contest is for judges to find the next great American Internet star and contestants will be judged accordingly on web charisma, talent, and creativity, say representatives.

Entrants to the contest must be entertaining and relatable to the online audience, as Yahoo! is looking for a genuinely talented person to have his or her own Internet show.

If you think you are a truly talented and entertaining person, Yahoo! allows you to submit up to 50 videos and say that the more videos you post, the better chance you will have of winning the cash prize of $50, 000 and a deal to star in or produce your own show on Yahoo!.

Even if you do not wish to enter the contest yourself, you can still play an important role in the final decision of the judges by visiting the site and commenting on your favorite videos.

The last day for video submission is November 27th and the five finalists will be announced on December 4th. With the announcement of the five finalists comes a series of creative challenges to be completed in both the finalist’s homes as well as the Yahoo! New York City office.

America must then vote December 12-13 to crown the grand prize winner of the talent show and Yahoo! will announce their identity on December 14th.

Think you have what it takes to be the next big Yahoo! star? Prove it to the rest of the world by submitting your videos.

Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl

Autmn Davis is a staff writer for WebProNews covering ebusiness and technology.

Well we got our guitars and we got thumb picks
And we go on after some lip-synch chicks
We're feelin' good from the pills we took
Oh, baby, don't gimme that look
-- obligatory lyrics from The Replacements' song, 'Talent Show'

We have to wonder if LonelyGirl15 will show up for Yahoo’s open call for Yahoo! Talent Show. The latest promotion from Yahoo seeks a talented “web celeb” to, in the words of Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang, “Save The Web From Bad Videos.”

Oh, and it’s Ninja-approved too.

People looking for fame (some), and fortune ($50,000) can upload videos through November 27th. Starting November 13th and running through December 4th, visitors to the Talent Show site can vote and comment on videos selected for attention from show host Mayleen Ramey.

The voting will narrow the field down to a group of five finalists. Yahoo said these lucky finalists will compete in a series of creative video challenges that people will be able to watch at the Talent Show website.

Those viewers will vote for the grand prize winner, who will get the grand prize of starring in or producing an online show on Yahoo, along with the $50,000. Yahoo will run the grand prize winner’s video on December 14th.

—
Tag:

Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Yahoo! My Web | Furl

Bookmark WebProNews:

David Utter is a staff writer for WebProNews covering technology and business.