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In the wake of Al Jazeera, The Young Turks declares its Current independence

Liz Shannon Miller — Sat, 05 Jan 2013 08:02:01 +0000

This week, news broke that Al Jazeera had acquired Current TV, the left-leaning cable news network founded by Al Gore and Joel Hyatt that’s seemed to change its mission statement once every two years or so.

Plans for the soon-to-be-rebranded Al Jazeera America include a fresh slate of content which may not have room for previously-existing Current programming — but you know who doesn’t seem that worried about it? One of Current’s biggest personalities.

Cenk Uygur, of the nightly live series The Young Turks, came to Current after his relationship with MSNBC went south last year; since then, the opinionated host has become one of Current’s most-watched anchors.

But that’s not why Uygur seems extremely confident about his show’s potentially uncertain fate. See, The Young Turks was born initially as a radio series in 2002, then expanded to YouTube in December 2005. Currently, TYT has nearly 500,000 YouTube subscribers and over 900,000,000 views on its primary channel. Or, as Uygur puts it on Twitter:

For knucklehead conservatives making jokes about @theyoungturks because of @current sale, TYT has over 40 million views a month online.

— Cenk Uygur (@cenkuygur) January 3, 2013

Facts: @theyoungturks network has over a billion views online, 40 mil views, 15.5 million unique viewers and 100 mil min. viewed per month.

— Cenk Uygur (@cenkuygur) January 3, 2013

With our 15.5 million unique viewers a month online, @theyoungturks is much bigger than Rush Limbaugh and almost any cable news show on TV.

— Cenk Uygur (@cenkuygur) January 3, 2013

These stats refer to The Young Turks‘s YouTube channel, not the Current series of the same name, which will continue for at least the next three months before the conclusion of the Al Jazeera takeover.

However, there’s been some confusion about the difference between TYT the YouTube channel and TYT the live Current show. This lead to questions about whether or not The Young Turks had been sold to Al Jazeera along with Current — questions which Uygur addressed in a video released on Thursday, frankly entitled “TYT Is Independent, Not Owned by Current or Al Jazeera.”

In the video, Uygur refers to the connection between the two iterations of the TYT brand as “a mutually beneficial relationship and we hope to continue that.” He then showed off a little bit of Arabic.

According to the New York Times, the Al Jazeera acquisition does mean that layoffs are coming for at least some Current staffers. But Uygur will still have a platform for getting his voice out — and more importantly, an audience.

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The Young Turks–MSNBC dispute is a cautionary tale

Liz Shannon Miller — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 07:01:50 +0000

It’s never easy to shift from working as an independent creator to entering the employ of a multinational corporation — and it’s even tougher if you’ve made your name as an independent political pundit, one whose reputation was based on an ability to speak freely and fiercely. This week’s drama between The Young Turks creator and host Cenk Uygur and MSNBC, therefore, has a sad tinge of inevitability to it, with the major twist being just how loudly Uygur is raging against his former employer.

Since the creation of the Young Turks radio show in 2002, Uygur has been a vocal left-wing voice in political commentary, especially after coming to the online video world and becoming one of YouTube’s most prominent political commentary channels. That success lead him to appear as a commentator on numerous mainstream news programs, with Uygur eventually taking over the hosting of MSNBC Live.

However, this week it was announced that Uygur would not be returning to the show — for reasons Uygur and MSNBC can’t agree on, and been publicly disputing. That dispute has raged on from the New York Times to Keith Olbermann’s new Current-based Countdown show to the Young Turks YouTube channel.

Uygur’s primary point of contention is that after six months of hosting MSNBC Live, and significantly improving the ratings (including beating CNN’s The Situation Room in the 18-34 year old demographic), he was brought in for a meeting with MSNBC president Phil Griffin. There he was told that he would no longer be hosting Live, and instead would be given a new contract that involved hosting a weekend show. That would have be considered a demotion, even though Uygur was reportedly offered double the paycheck, according to his report on YouTube. Instead of taking the money, Uygur walked away from the deal.

According to the Times, Uygur believed that the reason for this change came from political pressure from the Obama administration, which Uygur has been very vocal in criticizing. This is something Griffin denied in the same article, claiming that “the people in Washington” he had mentioned being unhappy with Uygur’s hosting were not White House officials but MSNBC producers.

Uygur’s most recent meeting with Griffin was a follow-up to an earlier conversation in April, in which Griffin told the host he was not booking enough Republican guests — an assessment Uygur disagreed with — and that he “used his arms too much when he talked.” However, the most notable statement reported coming out of that conversation, in both the Times and Uygur’s comments on YouTube and Countdown, was Griffin’s statement that the channel was part of the “establishment,” and that Uygur needed to “act like it.”

This appears to be the real crux of Uygur’s complaint: the idea of being forced to fit into the mainstream, when so much of his past commentary work had been based on criticizing the way mainstream media covers politics. As he told Olbermann during Countdown, his prior perceptions about how mainstream news works were confirmed as a result of his experience working with MSNBC.

“Are we [the mainstream media] going to be honest with our audience? Or are we going to trade information and truth we’re supposed to be gathering for access?,” was how Uygur summed up the debate for Olbermann. “Now that I’ve been inside that machine, it turns out that we were totally right about our outside perception of it. They are obsessed with access.”

There’s a cautionary tale here, because for many people working on the web, getting the kind of opportunities Uygur has gotten are the ultimate goal. But leaving behind the web’s independence for a larger platform can require compromises. And depending on the personalities involved, those compromises might be impossible.

Uygur, let’s be clear, will probably be just fine. Even if a potential deal with Current doesn’t work out, The Young Turks is still a notable independent web presence with a devoted audience. As Uygur concluded on YouTube:

I was able to take that tough stance [about MSNBC], and why? For the same reason I was able to get onto MSNBC in the first place — you guys. I’ve got the TYT army behind me. I’ve got a show that’s sitting here at half a billion views — up to a million views a day. So I can come back here and do exactly the kind of show I want to do, and kick ass and give you the actual truth and take it to power… Power is very very strong, and has so much influence in our media. But here at the Young Turks we’re going to fight against that.

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Ugandan Anti-Gay Speech, Star Wars Kid and the Importance of Context

Liz Shannon Miller — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 22:00:01 +0000

Whenever I watch a weird or funny viral video, I always want to know the full story behind it — even though, sometimes, the big picture makes the video a lot less amusing. Take, for example, how on May 24, a clip from the season four premiere of the Current series Vanguard was uploaded to YouTube by user dudeuter. The excerpt features a Ugandan anti-gay activist graphically describing sexual acts between two men, albeit without much accuracy. Dudeuter subtly titled the clip Eat Da Poo Poo (as you might guess, the clip is fairly NSFW).

The clip went viral and in the last two days has been picked up by Videogum, Perez Hilton and other sites — it now currently has over 525,000 views on YouTube, and has led to a wide range of online mockery, including dance remixes, the first of which was created by DJ Horsey Horse.

What this raises for me, though, is the intriguing question of context, and how it affects our enjoyment of these sorts of “found” virals. Take for example one of the first Interweb stars, the Star Wars kid. Watching this young man goof around with a lightsaber is fun and funny, but it is less fun and funny when you learn that the star, 15-year-old Ghyslain Raza, dropped out of school and ended up in a psychiatric hospital after it spread like crazy.

Raza’s doing just fine now — according to Cinematical, he’s completed his law degree and is now the president of a society preserving the cultural heritage of his Canadian hometown. But it still casts a pallor over one’s enjoyment of this video.

Meanwhile, Eat Da Poo Poo in its original posting contained no context from where it came from, thus making it easy to giggle at — because, sure, it’s hard to take a grown man saying “The poo poo comes out and then they eat the poo poo” seriously.

But the full Vanguard episode from which it comes, Missionaries of Hate, is a serious look at the anti-gay movement spreading across Africa, especially in Uganda — where being gay may become a crime punishable by life in prison or death, if legislation currently in play passes. The Eat Da Poo Poo clip, which can be seen in context below beginning around 16:18, comes from a press conference held by Pastor Martin Ssempa to encourage support for that legislation. Funny, right?

Current’s response to its content being spread around without its consent has NOT been to issue takedown notices. Instead, it’s asked those who have uploaded the clip or written about it to add a link back to the full episode (yes, even the dance remixes).

So far, most of them have done so (Perez Hilton being an exception), thus meaning that the organic popularity of Eat Da Poo Poo is helping to spread Missionaries of Hate in full. Which serves both sides of the equation — Current and the creators — and allows those watching to get additional context along with their chuckles. In the long run, that’s a good thing. Even if it does kill the joke.

Related GigaOM Pro Content (subscription required): The State of Social TV

Vid-Biz: Apple and Adobe, Electus, Disney

Ryan Lawler — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 19:00:59 +0000

iPad Puts Focus on Apple’s Flash Feud; Apple and Adobe, which used to be cozy partners, have become increasingly estranged since the computer maker unveiled its iPad tablet late last month. (Wall Street Journal)

Electus Hires Starcom Entertainment Vet Caraccioli-Davis; entertainment marketing specialist Laura Caraccioli-Davis is leaving her job at Publicis Groupe’s Starcom USA to join Electus, the entertainment joint venture of Barry Diller’s IAC and former NBC Entertainment executive Ben Silverman. (AdAge)

Disney to Break Windows; Disney has boldly told U.S. exhibs it wants to break the theatrical-to-DVD window on at least two titles a year, shortening the gap to just over 12 weeks vs. the usual 16. (Variety)

Hulu Could Still Launch on the iPad; one industry insider says Hulu is working on an iPad-friendly version of its site that should be ready by the time the iPad hits the market. (TechCrunch)

Current TV Taps SnapStream; Current TV will use SnapStream’s TV search server for its half-hour satirical news show, InfoMania, enabling it to search online and grab TV clips for use in the program. (Multichannel News)

AT&T Brings Fans Interactive Coverage With Olympic Games Multiview App; AT&T launched the U-verse NBC Olympics Application, a new TV app that lets subscribers watch up to four different channels featuring Olympic content on a screen at any one time. (press release)

New on Clicker: “Search Within” Everywhere!; the startup has expanded its “Search Within” capability to let users search for more types of information in more places, from categories like Comedy to media pages like TV or Movies. (Clicker blog)

Reelzchannel Steps Up VOD Content Frequency; Reelzchannel said it will increase the frequency of its video-on-demand and pay-per-view movie promotional content to a biweekly basis to keep it as current and relevant as possible. (Multichannel News)

TV Genius Joins NDS Recommendations Engine Partner Program; Through the deal, NDS will offer the services of video recommendations service TV Genius to its customers. (press release)

La Blogotheque’s Take Away Series a Treat for Music Fans

Liz Shannon Miller — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 23:30:27 +0000

To be a music fan who doesn’t attend or enjoy live shows is an impossible thing, due to the magic that can occur during an unedited performance. A spontaneous cover, a new segue between songs — not to mention watching the joy of playing music wash over an artist’s face — are all reasons to push beyond the recorded tracks of one’s favorite artists and see what they might do in a less conventional environment.

And that’s the cornerstone of French music blog La Blogotheque‘s Take Away shows, which have been capturing artists performing live in random locations since April 2006, anywhere from street corners to abandoned buildings to the Grand Palais in Paris. The emphasis is definitely on indie bands that the cool kids listen to — Bon Iver, Fleet Foxes, Plants and Animals — but don’t worry, there’s something for all ages. Well, I mean, there’s stuff for the cool kids, and there’s Tom Jones, performing in a New York hotel room.

The range of artists overall is varied, including well-known performers like Amanda Palmer and Sigur Ros, as well as those you might not be as familiar with — one highlight is Tender Forever (the moniker for ukulele-rocking Melanie Valera) wandering through a building under construction with her instrument and playing some pop covers.

The cinematography for these videos puts a heavy emphasis on intimate close-ups over wider shots, which can sometimes feel overly claustrophobic, but the sound recording is top-notch, which is impressive given some of the locations at which they shoot. A rudimentary knowledge of French is helpful for navigating La Blogotheque’s archives, for even though an English version of the site is available, there are a few bugs and broken links.

While a Crackle distribution deal seems to have fizzled out after 15 episodes were released in 2007-2008, the site is still going strong; Current’s Embedded recently partnered with the team to produce the Impromptu end-of-show segments, and Current also has broadcast other Take Away installments on TV.

However, music fans are the real winners — a recent standout example being Phoenix performing 1901 live in front of the Eiffel Tower (Tour Eiffel, if you’re feeling snooty today). It’s a joyful performance in an amazing location, but what makes it so remarkable is watching the faces of those who happened to be passing by. Some of them stop to watch, some walk on — but they do so with just a little more bounce in their step.

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Digeo Caters to Multi-TV Households With Moxi Update

Ryan Lawler — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 05:00:58 +0000

After being acquired for a song by Arris in Sept., Digeo released the latest in a string of improvements to its product portfolio today, starting with an HD DVR that can stream live or recorded video to up to three rooms in a user’s home.

In the latest update to the Moxi brand of products, Digeo added a new three-tuner HD DVR, which will allow consumers to record up to three programs at once, while having the ability to watch a fourth recorded program. Or, when combined with the company’s Moxi Mate products, users can now watch up to three live or recorded shows from different rooms in the house.

The ability to stream live programming to the Moxi Mate is also a new addition, correcting one of the biggest things missing from the product. Prior to the latest release, users could only watch pre-recorded programs through their Moxi Mates.

With the addition of new products and functionality, Digeo is lowering the price of its two-tuner Moxi HD DVR to $499, from its previous $799 price point. The company also reduced the cost of the Moxi Mate digital video player from $399 to $299.

However, the three-tuner HD DVR can only be purchased as part of a two-room or three-room bundle. For $799, consumers can purchase a three-tuner Moxi HD DVR and a Moxi Mate that will extend live or recorded programming to a second room in the house. Or they can spend $999 for a three-tuner HD DVR and two Moxi Mates.

This is the third update that Digeo has announced for the product line this year, after adding support for Internet video from sites like Hulu and YouTube in the spring, and announcing the availability of multiroom DVR viewing with the Moxi Mate line over the summer.

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Vid-Biz: Clinton, TiVo, Weird Al

Chris Albrecht — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 17:30:36 +0000

Bill Clinton Met with Kim Jong-Il Over Current TV Journalists; former president spoke with North Korean leader today about the release of Laura Ling and Euna Lee. (CNN)

RCN Partners with TiVo; the cable operator will make TiVo its primary DVR platform in 2010, will integrate RCN’s VOD as well as TiVo’s broadband services. (Broadcasting & Cable)

Star in a JibJab Weird Al Video; putting your mug in the song about Charles Nelson Reilly available only if you’re a paid JibJab member. (TechCrunch)

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

Roughly 200 Million Set-Top Boxes to Be Shipped in 2013; growth spurred by high definition adoption, and by homes in areas like rural India getting TVs. Video Business)

ESPN Using Web Series for High School Quarterback Competition; webisodes follow real-life QBs as they prepare for the Elite 11. (paidContent)

DivX Signs Studios, Storefronts; Lionsgate and Paramount to release films on the format while three European storefronts ERG, FilmOn.com and Play4Film agree to sell films playable on DivX devices. (releases)

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Current Replaces CEO With MTV and Ad Industry Vet

Liz Gannes — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 16:39:29 +0000

Multiplatform video company Current Media said today that Mark Rosenthal, the former president and COO of MTV Networks and CEO of Interpublic Media, will replace co-founder Joel Hyatt as CEO.

Rosenthal had been a Current board member since the inception of the company. Hyatt will now serve as vice chairman.

Rosenthal had most recently been vice chairman and president of media platforms at the troubled ad startup Spot Runner, which he joined a little over a year ago from Interpublic.

Current says its cable channel is available in more than 60 million households and its web site has more than 7 million unique visitors per month. Chairmain Al Gore said in a recent speech that the site now receives more than 10 million video views per month.

The most notable news out of Current in recent months is something it hasn’t actually covered — the imprisonment of two of its journalists. Laura Ling and Euna Lee are being held in North Korea after being convicted for trespassing there while they were on assignment from the network.

With no disrespect to that terrible situation, Current still has some really fantastic talent — we love the folks at InfoMania (recent coverage) — and some great opportunities to make the web and TV work together. But it hasn’t always been smooth sailing, and the network scrapped IPO plans earlier this year, citing the bad economy. In the run-up to the IPO we had also challenged the company’s claims that it was profitable.

Current’s most recent management hire was Paul Levine, president of new media, who had previously been with AdBrite.

Sorry about the poor quality pic; Current hasn’t updated its management files yet.

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Boxee (Officially!) Partners to Bring MLB to TV

Chris Albrecht — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 02:30:34 +0000

Boxee made a slew of announcements at its App Developer Challenge in San Francisco this evening, and key among them was the news that MLB.tv was added to the open-source media platform. Starting tonight, MLB.tv Premium subscribers will be able to watch games piped over the Internet on their big screen TVs (or just on their PCs) through the Boxee browser.

What’s interesting about this announcement is that the addition of baseball to Boxee was done in an official partnership with Major League Baseball Advanced Media (MLBAM). This wasn’t just some hack that Boxee put together, so presumably the company will avoid the troubles it got into with Hulu.

But it’s also nice to see the MLB is still forward thinking when it comes to web video. Sports leagues get very particular about where, when and how games reach consumers. But the MLB has proven itself very tech-savvy as an early adopter of online video, and this season added HD capabilities and DVR functionality to its service. MLB also offers an iPhone app to allow fans to watch games on the go.

Boxee CEO Avner Ronen said his team has been working with MLB.tv to ensure that the player looks good on TV and created a 10-foot UI to control the experience. Users are just accessing their MLB.tv accounts through the Boxee browser, so all blackout rules still apply. This is Boxee’s first official partnership with a live content provider.

If I was an infomercial announcer, this is the part where I’d say, “But wait! There’s more!”

Boxee also released the public alpha for Windows, so those non-Mac-or-Ubuntu heads can now play along.

The company also cleaned up its browser, better designating what’s local content and what’s from the Internet, and added new discovery functionality from Digg. Through “Digg for TV,” users will be able to see what videos are popular on the social news service as well as what’s up and coming. Users can’t “Digg” items through Boxee right now, but Ronen said that is coming.

Also in the discovery vein, Boxee users stream music and view slideshows from the people they follow on Tumblr.

And in addition to MLB.tv, Boxee has added Current as a content partner.

As we said earlier, all of these announcements (and more, check out the boxee blog for the full rundown) were made at the company’s Dev Challenge, a contest to spur development of applications for the Boxee platform. Ronen says there are now 100 applications for the platform, including the web video DVR app Boxqueue.

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Smart Grid DSL: Current and Qwest Team Up

Katie Fehrenbacher — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:42:44 +0000

Companies are building out the smart grid with various broadband technologies — cellular, WiFi, WiMAX — so why not good ol’ DSL? For non-network geeks, that’s the high-speed broadband that your phone company offers over copper wire. This morning, smart grid sensor and software maker Current is touting a new smart grid partnership with DSL provider Qwest.

Current largely provides the sensors that monitor different conditions on the electrical network, like voltage and current, as well as the software that processes the sensor information for the utility customer. While Current is mostly focused on the distribution portion of the grid, it can also provide communication gear and sensors for smart meters and in-home gateways, which it is doing for Colorado utility Xcel Energy for its SmartGridCity rollout. Because Current needs to get its information back to the utility, it works with a number of companies that provide that network connection. The latest is Qwest, which Current started partnering with, and is currently working with, for Xcel Energy’s SmartGridCity plan (Qwest provides phone and broadband service in Colorado). The buildout of SmartGridCity is supposed to be completed soon, followed by an assessment of the network’s benefits.

What are the benefits of using DSL? Current’s senior vice president of business solutions, Mae Squier-Dow, says that because DSL is already widely available, using it speeds up the ability to deploy smart grid technology. And because the networks have already been built, she says, the option is more affordable for a utility than building out its own communications network. (Other companies argue that in the long run it’s cheaper to build and own the network). Since DSL is a proven technology, it can help smart grid projects gain access to stimulus funds meant for “shovel-ready” projects, Squier-Dow says.

DSL is also high-speed, so if utilities want to use the networks for more bandwidth-intensive services, they can. And DSL is based on Internet Protocol, so it can more easily connect with other IP-based networks and systems, which are ubiquitous. Ultimately DSL is a standard that’s been used for years, so utilities can be rest assured that the technology is highly reliable.

Anywhere that Qwest has DSL built out, Current can work with the network to connect to the utility. But Current also works with cellular, could work with cable (though Squier-Dow says it hasn’t yet done so) and even has its own broadband over powerline technology (BPL). At one point, Current was the poster child for BPL, but has more recently repositioned itself so that BPL is just one of its communication offerings.

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