InterWeb TV - Experience the Experience

LIVE! Backstage 2011 VMA - MTV Video Music Awards

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 01:10:00 +0000

VMA 2011 | Pick Your Own Camera View Here

Hello to you all... I am surprised this blog is still up.

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 16:36:00 +0000

Now... what to do with it. I said I didn't just abandon it, but I haven't posted in forever.

Truth is... It has actually become quite obsolite. What, with all the new internet television technology. You can buy many TV's these days that have wi-fi and already connect to the web. These sets have apps for different services we have all became familiar with.

Services such as HuluPlus, YouTube, Google Video, Pandora (for music), Netflix, StarzPlay, and many many MANY more.. Even XBOX 360 and Sony PS3 are capable of serving you the highest quality 1080p HD movies and High Definition surround sound streamed right to your game system, then to your HDTV via HDMI.

Now we have even smaller devices that allow you to watch movies and streaming television, and surf the multiple streaming video sites amongst the web. Hell... even phones have these capabilities.

So... I think if I decide to bring this site back to what little life it once had. I will have to diversify. I will have to consume enough knowledge about these devices, apps and services that are now availabe. Not to mention with this technology moving so fast, I will have to consume some knowledge on where the market is today and what it will become in the future.

That is a lot to deal with, but it will definately make my little abandoned site grow.

Leave a comment and tell me what you think, should I move along with the technology or delete this blog?

Good day!
Regards,
Arthur Crooks

Interweb TV Update

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 15:18:00 +0000

Don't worry folks. I have not abandoned the InterWeb TV Blog. I have just been kind of sick lately and haven't felt well enough to work on the site. I will be having lots of new posts coming soon. I just needed some time to recover. I hope you all understand.

Thanks for being such loyal readers.

Art

Busty Heart on Hulu - America's got Talent

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 21:43:00 +0000

It's nice to see people from your area on TV. However, Busty Heart was famous long before I ever met her. She got her start as an exotic dancer, with incredibly HUGE breast implants. Now she owns a strip joint of her own in a small town only miles from me. She performs the beer can crushing act all the time in the club. I remember when she first moved into my county, she was having trouble with the folks in that town accepting her club. She struggled to make a few changes to the club so neighbors would be more welcoming. Her club, Busty Hearts Place, was finally accepted in the small town shortly after Busty donated a nice sum of money to building a playground across the street for the small children.

I lived right around the corner, maybe only 450 people in the whole town. The closest nearby town had 1 grocery store, 4 pubs, several gas stations and an Arby's that has been out of business for about 15 years now. The building is still empty. The only merchant in the same town as Busty Hearts Place, is a general store which only sells common household goods and farm supplies.

Busty Heart was on The Man Show several years ago, with the same act... crushing beer cans with her breasts. She has been featured on several other shows as well. Even though she has gotten up there in her age, she still hammers them cans. I figure since she doesn't dance anymore, she gets her moneys worth by flaunting her famous JUGGS.

I had the oppurtunity to visit her club a few months ago, and I must say I enjoyed myself. I ran into a friend there who took a picture of my head between her boobs(NSFW, sorry). This is also another act she performs for her patrons. At one point in the evening she made her way around the club bouncing every guys (and girls) heads between them monsters. My girlfriend was with me and she thought it was hilarious. I didn't expect it. But it was a joyful experience.

Here is a clip of Busty Heart on America's got Talent, from hulu.com

Huge Gap - Where has InterWeb TV gone?

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 15:57:00 +0000

Nowhere.

That's right, and I know I should have told you all before the break. I am sorry but InterWeb TV has not been updated in more than a week. I had just moved my family to a larger apartment recently. The move was rushed so when everything was out of the old house and into the new one, there was tons of cleaning and seperating that needed done. The cable company said the move would have us without InterWeb TV for only a day, but when we called to have our sevice changed over, that day suddenly became a week.

We have all just been so busy with everything. Hopefully we will have it all back on track soon.

Thanks for reading.

Week in review - Todays TV on the internet

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:44:00 +0000

Babelgum opens their US offices on 5th avenue in NYC and announce Ethan Podell as their President and Michael Rosen as Executive VP - read more

Move Networks launches Move Monetize for producers and advertisers to target their audience more effectively - read more

ABC.com delivers upwards of 815,000,000 minutes of internet TV in the month of May - read more

Vogue.tv launched and said to syndicate to Hulu and VeOh - read more

Watch SkyTV on your Sony PSP and other portable devices - read more

Stay Tuned In - Subscribe to the InterWeb TV RSS Feed

Entrecard: The biggest thing to hit the blogosphere

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 22:20:00 +0000

In an effort to drive more traffic to blogs in the Entrecard network, Entrecard has teamed up with SezWho. Sezwho is a social networking community that allows users to vote for everyone elses comments and posts, then the ratings are tallied up and follow the user across the blogosphere. Entrecard users that take advantage of this feature will be rewarded for their participation. The more you comment the better you get rated in the SezWho system and the more Entrecard credits you earn.

Poeple are beginning to ask questions regarding load times, and how the addition of the SezWho code will effect their blogs. I myself noticed a significant decrease in load time right after I implemented the SezWho code. At this point it isn't so bad that I will revert back to normal, but if it starts hanging up on me I most certainly will remove the code. I wasn't sure if it was my site or my computer at first, but while dropping my card on EntreCard users blogs today, I noticed the blogs using the new service are a bit sluggish as well.

We will have to see how this pans out. I will try commenting on some blogs in the next week and see how it will effect my traffic. For more on this partnership and details on how it works, visit the announcement on the EntreCard Blog.

What have you been watching!

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 11:20:00 +0000

Internet Television has been out for several years now. Even though it has grown in popularity and everyone and their momma is broadcasting these days, there are still many people that don't know you can watch TV shows online. I started this blog for these types of people. I started this blog for people who wanted to watch their old favorites in full screen, full episodes, with high quality audio and video. I try to keep clear of the viral sites (youtube, revver, spike formerly ifilm, network2) when I post, however there is a lot more viral video sites in the news lately. Some of it is quite interesting. For the most part, when this blog is larger and has 100 or even 1,000+ posts, most will be about Networks (ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX) and Software (joost, veoh, babelgum, graboid) that broadcast full episodes in full screen view.

When I tell people what it is I do, they often ask me how to watch tv online. I don't exactly know how to answer this question, but yes, it seems the whole world around me is rather stupid. You simply go online and visit your favorite television network, click the video link that seems like most of them have adopted, and watch. Hulu has made this task probably the simplest of all sites and with quite the selection of titles adding up as well. So I am going to share with you what I have been watching online.

Ok, I have been staying away from NBC because their player seems to have the most problems with not locating videos and when it does, it still won't play. I used to watch ABC all the time for they worked nicely and use Move Networks streaming technology (no buffering). ABC has always been hit and miss for me, depending on my computer upgrades and whatnot. I have recently changed to Vista Ultimate and bought a 22" widescreen monitor from Dell. ABC has been doing better for me, but the new screen makes it a bit slow. I have a new GPU on the way. :)

I love Hulu... Period. I only find myself NOT going there when I have become bored with their selections but they have been updating rather frequently, so I check in about every other day or two. Joost has become rather short on updates lately, maybe because of all the online based viewing the software apps are falling behind or people are just not apt to run the app. I turn it on from time to time to check the new shows or catch up on some music videos... oh music videos? MTV has been on my list lately to catch up on all the new music that is coming out.

So you see... I stay with what I am used to. I gave up on regular cable tv because it is summer and we simply do not sit in front of the tube that often. I work on my computer and this is my favorite seat in the house. I tend to just watch what I want when I want and choose anything anytime (within availability). Networks are adding their aired content to the web a lot faster than they used to, so I can always catch up on missed episodes. The advertising is increasing but they are still much less than conventional cable tv. Not to mention I can pause it to pee.

Leave us a comment and tell us what you have been watching online. I would love to add some new links to the blog when I get them all together (already over 50 networks).

I think I finally found a 3 column theme I like

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 13:40:00 +0000

I kind of overshot the July 4th launch date, but who the hell cares... the blog has been technically up over a month now. However I did finally settle on a template I think will work. I have tweaked it up a bit, but there is surely some more tweaking that needs done. I had to remove my widgets, but I will be adding them back a little at a time. I still need to get the new widgets organized, afterall, that was the whole purpose of using a 3 column theme in the first place.

Leave a comment and let me know how you like it, anything that might need changed to help you read better, or whatever you like.

Stay tuned for even more changes coming in the next few days.

British Broadcaster Channel Bee choses Move Networks for a No Buffer experience

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 00:16:00 +0000

I have recieved a message from one of the guys over at Move Networks today announcing they have been selected by the new British Broadcasters known as Channel Bee. Channel Bee launched only 4 days ago and with great news... no buffering. Of course this is made possible with the technologies that as far as I know is only possible using Move Networks streaming technologies.

Whats more is that starting tomorrow July 10th Channel Bee is launching a 10 day LIVE broadcast of music concerts from the Somerset House in London. If you are a fan of popular British rock n' roll music then this is a real treat. There will be several great bands playing and the house is sure to be packed.

In addition to Channel Bee announcing their recent hookup with Move Networks, Tim Lovejoy has created a video short that pretty much explains why they chose Move as their Internet Streaming Software... no buffering. Below I have embedded the YouTube version of the video, but if you would like to watch it in full quality, and again, no buffering, then tune into http://www.channelbee.com/move/gags and select the video titled "Tim Lovejoy gets pulled".

Enjoy the show...

Hulu showing support for recovering Veteran Soldiers

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 18:31:00 +0000

The Department of Defense apparently asked Hulu to add more military themed movies to their archives recently. With the help of Twentieth Century Fox they added several films for recovering Veterans. Here is what a hulu spokesman said about the request.

I have to admit that I was a little confused by the Department of Defense's request: If I were an injured soldier, would I want to watch a bunch of war movies in my recovery?

So if you are interested in watching some war nostalgia check out the Collection of Classic War Movies at Hulu.com

YouTube may be adding Full Length Video as well.

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 17:09:00 +0000

YouTube CEO Eric Schmidt has said several times recently that Google doesn't know how it will monetize the popular video sharing site they bought for $1.65 billion two years ago. One move they are considering, is to follow the leaders... while YouTube may seem like a leader of video sharing sites, it is not the leader in Internet TV. YouTube is planning to try what other online television networks and sites that broadcast these networks such as Hulu.com are doing. They will be allowing full length movies and television episodes to be uploaded to the site by independent directors/producers as well as the networks that own rights to these videos.

The main concern here is that advertisers are rather reluctant to advertise next to user generated videos for which they never know what types of content their ads will be placed next to. With the full length videos they know what the producers and networks are uploading, so not only will they feel safer placing ads, but this advertising model can or should allow for more targeted demographics.

We will have to wait and see just how this pans out for YouTube.

For more on this topic click here.

Full Length Disney Movies - Now Available Online

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 19:30:00 +0000

This week Disney.com announced that they will begin streaming their summer 2008 weekly film presentations of the popular Wonderful World Of Disney features we have all grown up watching. This summers titles will include Finding Nemo, Monsters Inc., Haunted Mansion and several other popular favorites.

They are partnering with ABC to bring the movies, in high quality formats, to the internet so that us viewers may watch them for free. In addition to the Wonderful World Of Disney, The Disney Channel will be streaming their Original Movie "Camp Rock", with interactive online activities like trivia, games and even chat, so that fans can communicate with each other during the film.

I for one will be sure to share this online experience with my 9 year old son. So I am sure you and your family will enjoy it as well.

Read the full story at BusinessWire.

InterWeb TV - Official launch set for July 4th

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 16:01:00 +0000

As some of you folks may have guessed, We have not officially launched InterWeb TV. We have been adding content and getting our site working properly. You may have noticed that at times I may go a couple days without a new post. This is because I am still researching the best sites and softwares used for watching TV on the web. I am also researching good SEO techniques to get my word out to a broader audience.

Some of the things to look out for before the official launch date...

A nicer theme with easier navigation, inluding categories. This will be a three column blog theme so I dont have to cram everything in the right sidebar. This may take some testing. So if you happen upon the InterWeb TV blog one day and it is all fucked up, don't fret, it will be fixed shortly after. It is just testing.

More posts. Once we launch you will start to see me posting more often as well as some guest posts from other folks who dig the internet TV scene. Some of the things we will be posting about is the quality and/or bugs we experience while viewing different internet TV rersources. Monthly reviews on what we watched and what we avoided watching and why. This will save you folks time in searching for the perfect viewing experience.

Additional tools and resources. I have a list of different television networks that I have yet to examine and post about. The list is long so it will take some time to visit each and every network. Also you may have noticed I added an RSS feed to the sidebar of Hulu.com recently added shows. There will be similar content added in the future as well.

So please hang in there and feel free to comment on what you would like to see added before the official launch of the InterWeb TV blog.

Testing... Testing one, two - TheWB.com beta - Accepted!

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 14:54:00 +0000

Well, I recieved my acceptance email today from TheWB.com beta that I signed up for just about two weeks ago. I was pretty certain that it was going to happen, but I never signed up to be a beta tester before. This means I will be watching TheWB a little bit more than the other networks for the next few weeks. I won't leave you folks hangin' in the wind though. I will keep you all posted on my experiences over there. Don't forget, you can see first hand also, you don't have to take my word for it. Go to TheWB.com and sign up too. Here is the email I recieved.

We want to build a site that reflects you and your interests so
input is crucial. We look forward to hearing from you (we really
do). Please feel free to play around the site, watch your
favorite shows, and send us your thoughts and comments using the
site's Talk Back feature. Welcome to TheWB.com.

Best,
Brent & TheWB.com Team

I actually recieved the email about 1am this morning so I decided to login right away and watch a couple episodes to see what they had going on over there. So far I can see about a dozen or so different shows offering full episodes of high quality video. They do offer embed codes and an option to add your videos to Facebook. The full screen was skippy with a low frame rate, but that may just be me and my damned graphics card I just won't shut up about. I am really not sure. One particular thing that gained my attention was a feature they call WBlender. It seems to be some kind of video mixer that WB fans can use to make a video collage of their favorite clips from episodes. I am not sure because it hasn't been launched yet, it still says "coming soon" so we will wait.

Here is some OC bitch!

Remember, I am going to let you all know what is on the inside, so subscribe to my RSS feed to stay updated.

Fixed the video Lost the sound - Vista Ultimate Upgrade

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 03:45:00 +0000

Since my last post, I found it rather important to get the video problem fixed. I thought for sure it was fine after the last format and the drivers that I found for XP, but after posting about my graphics being fixed, the next morning it started all over again... talk about wanting to rip out your hair. It really must have been some sort of SP3 incompatibility issues, as I upgraded back to Vista and the video has been working fine these last few days. This time I upgraded to the Vista Ultimate thanks to the University of Pittsburgh. As some of you may or may not know Vista Ultimate comes with Windows Media Center, yet another way to watch TV online. I will be testing that out a bit later, I really just want to get things on my machine back in order so I can continue bringing you the latest tests and tweaks with todays online television networks and the software that makes it all possible.

With reformatting comes reinstallation of all my common apps, as well as the various online television software you see me writing about here on this blog, like VeOh, Joost and Babelum. Amongst those I will be writing about a few others I have been using, like Vuze, TVUplayer, Graboid, and of course the new Adobe Media Player which you can view some interesting online channels from both independent and national networks, it also serves as a .flv player and library. More on that later as well.

Lets talk about Vista...
As I mentioned in my last post on the graphics issue, I had used Vista in the past and reverted back to XP because my graphics card drivers were not supported by Vista. That was around 6 months ago or so. I was offered the chance to obtain my very own licensed copy of Vista Ultimate from the University of Pittsburgh for use on this blog. I was reluctant, but didn't want to turn down free software, so I accepted. To my surprise, it turns out that nVidia finally released a driver for my card that was supported by Windows Driver Display Model (WDDM). Here is what they say over at Microsoft.com.

The Windows Vista desktop is being drawn in a completely different way from all previous versions. Every window will have its own, full window-sized surface to draw to. The desktop will be dynamically composed many times a second from the contents of each window. The goal for desktop composition is to enable compelling new visual effects for both the Windows user interface and for applications created by third-party developers, all shown on increasingly affordable, high-density displays.

To achieve this enhanced desktop experience, a new display driver model has been designed to radically advance functionality, stability, and reliability. Coupled with acceleration provided by current and future graphics hardware, this new graphics driver model enables Windows Vista to deliver a higher level of performance and quality, and a new desktop experience.

The Windows Vista Display Driver Model (WDDM) allows for the visual effects seen on a user's desktop to scale relative to the available graphics hardware. For example, the experience of viewing Windows Vista on hardware with capabilities equivalent to a high-end Microsoft DirectX 9-compliant graphics chip will be much richer than Windows Vista displayed on baseline legacy graphics hardware.

So I got the graphics drivers fixed and it hit me... I didn't downgrade back to XP solely because of the graphics drvers. Oh no... I also had troubles with my sound driver as well. And sure enough, all the searching and reading about others tragedies in trying to get their sound to work with Vista turned up no workable fix in my favor. Even those that found the solutions to their problems didn't seem to work for me.
Not only do I feel that both Audio and Video is important for this blog, but I also really love my surround sound while watching online television, as many of you already know.

I have the Realtek AC97 - with 6 channel surround so if you know of any drivers that fix this, please feel free to comment.

My current System Specifications - OS Platform, Graphics and RAM

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 02:43:00 +0000

Ok, so the last few days have been pretty hectic for me when it comes to watching my TV on the web. My graphics card was acting crazy, the screen was flashing at random times, and even freezing on occasion. I thought my GeForceFX 5200 was overheating or just about to croak or something. After some troubleshooting and ripping my computer apart a dozen times I decided to Google the situation. I had a hunch from the very beginning, turns out I may have been right... drivers.

Here are my current system specs:

3.0Ghz Intel Celeron D Chipset
1.5GB DDR RAM
256MB nVidia GeForceFX 5200 Graphics
Realtek 6 channel surround sound
Windows XP Home SP3

I know it's not very impressive in todays market, but hey, it works... sometimes.

It all started when I decided to build this blog. I figured I would give my system a full on cleaning, reformat, and reinstall Windows. I aquired a copy of the Windows XP Home SP3 and used the key that is glued to the side of my tower, worked like a charm. Sure beats the "system restore" that comes with premade systems containing all that bloatware. A fresh XP install with nothing else, JUST XP!

It is truly awesome.

The cool thing about me having XP Home, and a mediocre system (if you can call it that) is that I can experience and report on Internet TV sites and software using what my average readers may be watching on. Not some tweaked out techie box that cost upwards of $4k.

So back to the drivers...
I tried several drivers from nVidia to no avail. I tried using Windows XP Repair utilities, nothing. I took the card out, uninstalled all the old drivers and reinstalled everything, nada. So I said screw it, it has only been 2 weeks since I did my format, I haven't got everything reinstalled yet and my C:\ drive is still pretty clean, so I decided to do a whole new format and install Windows XP yet again. Afterwards I searched through some old nVidia drivers and got one that seems to work ok, but not great. I am still having problems watching ABC.com Full Episodes. I had the same problems when I was running Vista last year, in fact that is why I switched back to XP, because of crappy Vista driver support.

I am not sure if this is a driver issue with the new service pack or what, but I am getting frustrated. The flashing of the screen has stopped, so I can still watch and report on most internet TV sites and software, but I will be busy looking for a solution, or maybe it is time to upgrade from the GeForceFX 5200 to something better... but can my mediocre computer handle it?

PluggedIn - Tried and Denied

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Sat, 31 May 2008 14:25:00 +0000

There was a new music video channel launched not too long ago called PluggedIn. They use the same Media Player as ABC, FOX, Discovery from Move Networks. This is so far my favorite online video player, aside from Hulu. However, I tried to view the site in IE7 which loaded, but pretty much didn't do anything else. So... I tried viewing it in my Opera browser (the latest version) and the video says:

We're sorry, but only the following browsers are supported on your operating system at this time:

Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.5 or later
Mozilla Firefox 1.5 or later

Please check back later for support for other browsers.

So I was unable to check the site out. I don't have Firefox installed on this computer at this time. I was rather happy with the IE7 and Opera combo. I guess I will install Firefox eventually, but wtf.

So anyway, it does look like a pretty cool site, if you can check it out without any problems please let us all know what you think, leave a comment.

Bloggin-ads.com Contest - 2 Macbook Airs and $1k cash!

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Thu, 29 May 2008 00:44:00 +0000

I was strolling through the blogosphere just now and bumped into a contest post at bloggin-ads.com. Bloggin-ads does blog reviews for many bloggers all around the bloggin world. This is a really innovative contest because they have put up such expensive prizes. Yes, there are many sites out there giving away cool stuff, but half of them can't even afford a Macbook Air for themselves, much less give one away.... much less give TWO away! So I was intrigued. I wanted in on this contest. I want a Macbook Air.

So take my advice... join the contest, or just read some kickass blog reviews.

Beta testing of TheWB.com and their Internet TV solution

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Tue, 27 May 2008 14:19:00 +0000

So, as I was wandering through the InterWeb, I was checking out some network TV sites to share with my readers (that would be you). I came across TheWB.com and to my surprise they are way behind the other networks, at least in the Internet TV world. That is OK, why? Because I believe that since they have had time to reflect on themselves and come up with something really cool. At least I hope they do. I mean, they should, what with all the time it has taken. And they want ME... and YOU to beta test.

Being a beta tester means I will be able to watch full episodes of All Of Us, Blue Water High, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dangerous, Friends, Gilmore Girls, One Tree Hill, Smallville, The OC and Veronica Mars.

So I signed up, yes I decided I would be part of their beta testing team and report my findings here. Let all my loyal readers know how the whole TV watching experience on TheWB.com turns out. It will give me something new to watch and something new and cool to write about. I recieved an email when I signed up and I figured for starters I would share what it said.

We can't thank you enough for your interest and support of
TheWB.com and we're psyched that you'd like to join
our beta test group.

Your info has been received by our account managers and once
your account is approved, you'll receive an email from us
confirming your application. This may take up to a week. Please
know that we haven't forgotten about you, we just have a lot of
names to sift through. The response has been a little
overwhelming!

Thanks again for applying to our test group. The WB is back.

Best,

Brent & The WB Team

Now I am not sure if they base this testing on any certain criteria. I did mention that I had a blog about Internet TV, hoping that will help convince them some. Who knows, maybe they just want regular folks, not someone that works in the industry. Also, I am not sure if any of the personal info determines eligibility. If you would like to apply and give it a shot, goto TheWB.com. They will get you taken care of.

Come on back and leave a comment telling us all how it goes.

Spike Lee announces the winners of Babelgum Online Film Festival

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Mon, 26 May 2008 18:21:00 +0000

It actually took me several days to post this, sorry. The reason behind the delay is simply that my Babelgum Player will not launch. It just sits there in "initializing" mode. I will post the winners below with their trailers embedded, but if you want to watch the whole films then you must download Babelgum Player here first. Good luck getting it to work.

So Spike Lee was the leader of the panel and made the final decisions on who won. I respect the opinion of Spike Lee, he has had some rather controversial eye opening films that had won many awards as well.

Here is what was posted on the Babelgum Blog.

Last night, chairman of the jury Spike Lee announced the winners of the first Babelgum Online Film Festival at a gala ceremony in Cannes, and presented them with their well-deserved prizes. Click here to see the list of winning films.

After the exciting awards ceremony, the filmmakers (and jurors!) celebrated into the small hours at chic nightspot Le Baoli. The winners of the audience contest - Jennifer Shorr and Jimmy Philémond-Montout - were also there to join in the celebrations.

Congratulations to all the winners! Interviews with each of them and footage from the ceremony will be coming very soon on Babelgum so watch this space.

And now the winners, their trailers, and a little info.

Andrea Lodovichetti
Category: Looking For Genius
Experimental Centre of Cinematography (2004-2006). He has been assistant director of Paolo Sorrentino since 2005. He has been awarded several prizes at national and international competitions.

SOTTO IL MIO GIARDINO (UNDER MY GARDEN) (Italy)
Marco, a 10-year old boy with a passion for insects, is convinced that his neighbour has killed his wife and has buried her under his garden, the evidence being a large ant-nest he has been carefully examining for a while. He decides to carry out some investigations but only reveals his thoughts to his little friend, Sara.

Credits:
Director and Writer - Andrea Lodovichetti
Writers - Luca Caprara, Roberto Santini
Actors - Stefano Bottone, Alessandra Pellegrino, Max Amato, Katia Nani, Dino Spinella, Kasia Zurakowska, Gisella Spinelli
Producer - Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia
Babelgum

Rémy Schaepman
Category: Animation
I was born in 1986 in the south of France, and I am currently studying animation art in Gobelins, l'Ecole de l'Image, in Paris.

QUIDAM DÉGOMME (A SHEEP ON A ROOF) (France)
A man is confronted with the change of his day-to-day existence following the landing of a sheep on the roof of the house opposite. A surreal sequence of events unfolds, set to a foot-tapping soundtrack. The grey Paris metro takes on a whole new lease of life… but how does our main character react?

Credits:
Director and Writer - Rémy Schaepman
Producer - Georges Nawrocki
Other - Daniel Capeille
Babelgum

De Bemels Antonin
Category: Music
Antonin is a video and audio artist from Brussels, Belgium. His main areas of interest are movement and the human body, and the dynamic relationship between sounds and images.

MOUTHFACE (Belgium)
And what if you had three mouths instead of one? MOUTHFACE is a music video from Michael Fakesch (Funkstorung). Music = weird funky electronica. Video = web-cam style freaky self-portrait.

Credits:
Director and actor - Antonin De Bemels
Other - Michael Fakesch
Babelgum

Brian Deane
Category: Social/Environment
Brian is a young Writer/Director from Cork in Ireland. Without Words is his first film and deals with a topic thats very important to him. He is a recent graduate from the Huston School of Film and ...

WITHOUT WORDS (Ireland)
We live in a world where technology has given us the tools to communicate but not the ability. Without Words is a very personal film about two close friends who have to pay a very high price for our failure, as a society, to connect.

Credits:
Director - Brian Deane
Writers - Brian Deane, Aine Young
Producer - Evelyn O’Reilly
Actors - Larry McGowran, Robert Kelly
Other - Katie Looney
Publisher - John Huston School of Film and Digital Media
Babelgum

Patrick Curd
Category: Short Film
Writer/Director Richard Recco on set of Officer Down. Richard Recco has been a professional semi- figurative abstract painter since the age of 22. He graduated from the New York Film Academy ...

OFFICER DOWN (USA)
For non-believers, this is a compelling story about a bad cop turned good. For believers, it’s about faith working miracles. Whatever their religious leanings, this film scored so highly with Babelgum audiences that you could hardly see it for all the positive posts popping up on the screen.

Credits:
Director - Richard Recco
Producer - Patrick Curd
Babelgum

Emmanuel Exitu
Category: Documentary
Emmanuel Exitu was born in Italy, in Bologna. He moved to Rome where he worked as a screen writer. He also worked as a cinematographer for the Teatro di Documenti founded by Luciano Damiani, Luca Ronconi and Giuseppe Sinopoli.

GREATER – DEFEATING AIDS (Italy)
This is billed as a non-documentary and watching the way it pulls together various stories about a group of Ugandan women who are HIV positive, we soon realise that we’re seeing life there in a way we might not in the mainstream. Inspiring characters who are full of a zest for life tell us their stories, show us their dances and it feels by the end as though the filmmaker has been the vehicle by which we enter this particular world, rather than the person telling us how to perceive it.

Credits:
Filmmaker, Writer and Producer - Emmanuel Exitu

[TRAILER NOT AVAILABLE]

Ambroise Becchio
Category: Spot Advertising
I was born in January 1981 in the suburbs of Paris (Saint Maurice), France. My father is half Italian and my mom was a Russian refugee. I am bilingual French-Russian. My love for the cinema and staging came when I was a young boy, I was amazed by Chaplin's movies and tried making people laugh by imitating him.

THE POCKET CROSSBORDER (France)
An ad for the quick and easy and probably quite fun way of crossing a border – be a human cannonball. But don’t try this at home or on a border you can legitimately get across because helmet and armour are not included, ok? This film rocketed in the Babelgum audience’s views.

Credits:
Director, Writer and Producer - Ambroise Becchio
Actor - Nicolas Russeil
Other - Linda Brisson, Laurent Gilli, Charlotte Graillat
Babelgum

Again, I am not sure why my Babelgum Player is whacked out, but if you have any suggestions on getting it to work again, please leave a comment. THANKS!

Testing Silverlight 2 beta - Microsoft Silverlight Showcase

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Sun, 25 May 2008 17:34:00 +0000

I have decided that with all the hype lately about Silverlight, that I would try it out again. The last time I tried Silverlight, I was on a Vista eqipped machine. I started having problems watching the Move Networks player on ABC.com. I uninstalled Silverlight thinking that is what was causing my problem. Apparently not, I guess the Move Networks video player wasn't Vista ready at the time. I was also very confused about what the Silverlight software was supposed to do.

Now Microsoft is in their beta stage for Silverlight 2. The newer version has many more features, mainly for developers to integrate more functionality into their Silverlight projects. In fact, today I thought I would install the beta Silverlight 2. I checked out the Silverlight Showcase, a rather large collection of games, video sites and photo slideshows that use the new technology. I really do like what Microsoft is trying to do with their new software, but I am still unsure if Silverlight does much more than Adobe Flash. From the outside it seems a little unique, but I bet it's whats under the hood that counts.

If you would like to check out Silverlight 1, the stable release, click here. Or Silverlight 2 beta, then click here. Or if you are a web developer looking for the tools and information to make use of Silverlight, then click here.

Then afterwards come check out the showcase filled with Silverlight projects.

Hulu gains some high profile partners as they grow

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Wed, 21 May 2008 20:44:00 +0000

Hulu.com has partnered up with some big names. They are being featured on some top priority websites as well as taking on more TV networks which means more great TV shows for us internet viewers. In addition to the web side of things, they have also picked up some larger advertisers. It looks like folks are really snuggling up to the idea of the hulu concept. As technology gets better, hulu will only get better... so it only makes sense that these companies jump in now while the water is still calm.

Hulu videos will now be distributed on entertainment and social network sites TV.com, TVGuide.com, BuddyTV.com, Flixster.com, MyYearbook.com, Break.com and Zap2it.com, said Hulu Chief Executive Jason Kilar at the Reuters Global Technology, Media and Telecoms Summit.

Read the FULL article at Reuters

Move Networks - Moving on up?

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Wed, 21 May 2008 12:50:00 +0000

Move networks pairs up with Microsoft to enhance their already popular streaming technology with Silverlight, Microsofts new competitor for Adobe's (formerly Macromedia) Flash Player. The new software is said to improve the magnificent quality we already experience. Move Networks is the technology behind popular web TV sites "full episode" players such as ABC, CW, FOX and The Discovery Channel.

I love the technology behind Move Networks streaming player. There is no buffering, the video plays almost instantaniously. The sound is excellent, and yes, it supports my love for surround sound. The best part about the streaming is that the quality is dependent on your download speed. If you are watching a TV program via the Move Media plugin while downloading in the background, the player adjusts the picture quality accordingly with the spike in bandwidth, as the downloads relieve some of that bandwidth, the player quality gets better. So if you watch your internet TV programs without anything stealing the bandwidth, you should experience high quality video.

What this really means, is that if you have a slower broadband connection you should still be able to view the videos, just at a lesser quality than that of the faster connections. All this without having to wait for a buffer or for half (or even all) of the video to finish downloading before you are able to watch. Nothing worse than waiting for a show to download just to find out you already seen it or that it is just really lame.

Entrecard releases NEW features for bloggers - WIN 75,000 EC!

noreply@blogger.com (Arthur Crooks) — Tue, 20 May 2008 11:10:00 +0000

Entrecard.com - Yesterday I bounced on over to entrecard to see how my EC advertising campaigns were going, when I noticed a message. A message for me? No. It seems that the virtual business card we have all grown to love has added some pretty exciting features, a step-by-step official entrecard e-book and a contest worth 75,000 EC credits. They got my attention, I am so excited I think I might wet myself. I can't wait to take advantage of some of the new features, like the ability to add multiple blogs. I mean I do have a few more blog ideas that have yet to be unleashed. I just hate having to login to several accounts, hell I have trouble thinking of so many passwords. Another new feature is a front page aggrigation system that posts your blogs most recent posts, driving even more traffic to your blogs. Campaign tabs that help you sort through all the awesome entrecard users sites. A top droppers feed so you can keep track of your entrecard fanclub and even give props to the folks who drop daily. The top droppers stats are in the form of an RSS feed, so with the right widgets or plug-ins you can post them in your sidebar or write a post about it. The oppurtunities are endless.

The e-book was put together rather well. It is pretty informative and should get a newbie up and running in no time. Teaches you the tricks of the trade, and opens up brand new oppurtunities you may have overlooked. Entrecard really put themselves out there to help you get the most out of their service. I did notice one problem with the e-book though. On like page 9 or so there is a section that talks about "multiple blogs" saying:

If you have multiple blogs that you would like to add Entrecard to, you are certainly allowed to do so. However, you must register a separate account for each blog. We are working hard on a feature that will let you merge all your accounts into one, but until the feature is complete you must open separate accounts.

Disregard that, as it was written before the new "linked blogs" feature was finished. That is the feature that allows you to switch between any of your blogs in entrecard with just a click, saving you time while dropping cards for your other blogs. Since they released the news about the e-book and the Multiple Blogging feature at the same time, there is going to be a clash or two. I read the e-book from beginning to end as soon as it finished downloading, and I plan on using some of the tips I recieved while I do my dropping today.

Download the official Entrecard e-book here.

And finally!!! The Contest!!! 75,000 EC!!!
That is right, entrecard.com is giving away a grand total of 75,000 EC And all you have to do is try out their multiple blogging system by adding another blog to your account today!

So Sign up or log in now and check out the new features.

Good Luck and Happy Dropping!