New Media 2012: Where are we going?

Whidbey Island's Fusionspark Media hosted a seminar this Saturday, September 20 titled "New Media 2012: Where are we going?". The event, hosted in Langley's historic Clyde Theater, served up a panel of 10 speakers who fired off in shotgun format with 5 minute presentations with two breakout Q&A sessions. Their intent?

"Whether you are a content creator or just a curious consumer, this is your chance to hear dispatches from the frontlines of New Media."

Although there were a number of interesting points of conversation, I will be sharing my basic walk-away points.

The presentation began with a fascinating conversation about future projections in human sustainability by Robert Gilman, Founder of the Context Institute, who discussed the population growth by 2045 and the needs for sustainability in the "succession of species." He noted these main distinctions in this period of development:

• efficiency will become key as complexity increases
  
• re-usability becomes a necessity as scarcity of resource increases
• the emphasis will be on diversity with many niches
• collaboration will become paramount to successful sustainment

Joe Pulizzi, Author of "Get Content, Get Customers" presented on the directional shift in marketing from brand to content. His main points:

• Companies must focus on a content strategy in order to maintain relevance
  
• Content must be valuable, relevant, and consistent

Tom Kennedy, former Director of Multimedia at the Washington Post (now consultant) made a significant point in the scarcity of time. He focused on the presenting of media in forms that are consistent with time and context. I really enjoyed one of his breakdowns which showed general media use throughout the day:

• Commute - podcast, radio, video
• Work - email tweets, sms
• Lunch - Websites
• Evening - websites, video, sms

Alexis Gerard, Founder of Future Image Report discussed the development of media capture devices, focusing on pic and video. He had an excellent graphic showing the correlation of skill/time/cost to the effectiveness and general adoption of media with the general population. Essentially, as the skill level, time to produce and cost to produce become smaller, the adoption by the general population increases. For example, pictures used to require chemicals, lots of time and lots of costs to produce. Now they can be created quickly and for free with no skill at all. All of this to say - if you want your media to be adopted by the masses, make it easy, make it fast, and make it cheap.

Russell Sparkman, founder of Fusionspark Media spoke on how they were using video and content collaboration (with other sites) to provide educational and promotional solutions for the Florida Key's (one of their clients). They found a remarkable increase in traffic with the addition of video and other multimedia based content on their clients' websites.

Brent Friendman, Partner in Electric Farm Entertainment discussed how they were using what he called "Fractal" marketing to disseminate their story and content in a number of different social media fronts. His main contention: an effective story must be told on a number of different fronts. Moreover, the content must build and be dependent on the other media fronts, rather than simply reproducing the same thing in each spot.

For example, Brent showed how they were working with a gaming client to "fractal" their story into a few different media. On MTV.com they were sharing episode clips. On facebook they had created a 'backstory' on one of the main game characters, etc.

I thought this was a fantastic methodology for utilizing the available and distinct media forms to create and build on brand, story, and to grow a user base.

Marcia Hofmann, Attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation gave a very informative and useful discussion on "Terms of Use", IP, and Copyright surrounding all of the popular and different forms of social media, including facebook, twitter, and youtube (well, I caught her later to ask about youtube).

Joseph M. Tringali, General Manager 5th Cell Media, discussed trends in gaming and the increase of users and importance in consideration of gaming for communication and promotion of content, branding, and message.

John du Pre Gauntt, Author, Consultant & Technologist discussed cloud computing and its impact into the future abilities of media growth and increasingly powerful solutions, noting the benefit of scalable solutions that cloud computing provides. He also made some very interesting points regarding the new economics of the future, changing from a supply chain model (like Microsoft) to a demand chain model (like Google). He used an interesting illustration: an individual taking all the orders of people entering a restaurant and the value of that "demand" to the chefs and restaurant, the "supply."

George Henny, Co-CEO of Whidbey Telecom and Fibercloud discussed the growth and demand of network and internet solutions and showed how they were working to expand solutions to provide the means for these media to reach the island population and user base.

In closing, I walked away re-energized to better target my audience on a number of different media, with a much more clear and efficient strategy of content, brand, and message. I would highly recommend the seminary (should they continue in it's format) to individuals who desire to rethink and creatively engage their utilization of today's quickly changing media.

The seminar was well worth the commute north and the ferry ride. And I must confess the scenary of Langley could easily be considered a further value add to the actual event.

D.a. Thompson Performs at Seattle First Baptist

D.a. Thompson shares his arrangement of Richard Smallwood's "I Love the Lord" at Seattle First Baptist, August 30th, 2009. The video features him, live, singing from the piano during Seattle First Baptist's morning worship service.

Working With Loren Weisman & the Freedom Solutions Recording Plan (FSRP)

It's hard to believe, but almost six months ago I sat down with Brain Grenade Entertainment CEO, Loren Weisman at Starbucks (when am I not there?) to talk about my music, speaking and writing. I told him how excited I was to get back to my music and to work on my book which I felt would be a truly controversial subject matter and an important dialogue regarding religion and social conflict.

Loren presented his Freedom Solutions Recording Plan (FSRP) and explained how he could use this system to help position me to be self-sustaining, debt-free, in-control, have full ownership of my work and career, and have an industry quality recording. Sounds like quite a feat to pull off, no? Well, after reviewing the numbers, the plan, and reading up on much of his own writings/blogs, I was convinced to jump on board.

So after a stimulating conversation and a couple cups of coffee we shook hands and decided to move forward. On Feb 9, 2009 I signed Loren on to guide me through the stages of pre-production, production, and post-production of my album and upcoming book.

On August 18th, 2009 I held my D.a. Thompson, "Disclaimer" CD Release Party (six months later).

So after the FSRP what do I have?

• A professional industry standard recording
• The masters of all my recordings
• The backup/source studio mixed ProTools files of my recordings
  
• A Website
• A clear post-production plan
• A duplication channel
• Consistent brand/message with print, audio, and web media collateral/materials for solicitation and marketing
• A tremendous debt of gratitude to the amazingly skilled musicians and engineers who made this work happen
  
• A huge respect for the amount of work it takes to accomplish all of this
• A donation program contributing 25% of all CD sales to other FSRP clients

After the FSRP what do I NOT have?

• no debt from the album
• no percentages to labels, or anyone
• no producer points
• no restrictions on how I choose to use or move forward with my music, brand or likeness

I have been asked by a number of people what my overall experience has been working with Loren at Brain Grenade Entertainment. So to provide my own review I thought I would include a brief quote from an email I recently sent to an artist who was curious about the process...

"If you are seriously considering the "real deal" of producing an industry standard album I would not hesitate to sign on Loren. He is a no frills, straight-shooting, hard-working, get-it-done producer. You will go from concept to product with clear and achievable goals and expectations.

Be prepared to work hard and trust his advice. And don't hesitate to ping me with questions ... The FSRP process is not easy, but it works. And we all help each other out. As independent artists we have to stick together! So sign him on and let me know what I can do for you."

Do Not Stop

It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop. -- Confucius

How many of you have ever tried to push a car? I think everyone would agree that the toughest part is getting the beast rolling. We've all experienced the grueling, football lineman stance of heave-ho that it takes to finally get it rolling forward (or backward). But once it has started, it really does not take all that much effort to keep it rolling, does it?

There are scientific reasons that help explain the kenetics, gravity, and other physics around it all, but suffice to say, it is clear that once the car is rolling, it doesn't really matter how fast you push, just that you don't let it stop.

Life can be that way at times, especially when we are facing extraordinary tasks. We can often become overwhelmed when we consider the distance we have to go to reach our goals. The temptation is to just stop and rest rather than keep pushing.

Confucius nailed it on the head (as he often did) when he noted that it really does not matter how slow you go, just don't stop.

As a musician, speaker, and writer, facing the daunting task of getting the message/music out seems like a long distance to go. Just as soon as I finish with one challenging task, the next one rears its head. Often I find myself surprised by budget impacts, slow periods, or just sheer exhaustion. It is easy to feel overwhelmed and to just stop moving forward.

Instead of just stopping, it would seem that the trick is to just do something small and accomplishable. If I am working on a huge and daunting project, I try to do something that I can handle in 30 minutes, or an hour that moves the project forward. If I don't have the budget to send out 10 promotional packets, I send out one. If I don't have any money to send anything out, then I work on my website, compose a song, or write a blog entry.

The point it would seem is to never let the goal overwhelm you. Just keep moving, keep pushing, keep going, one step at a time.

Baby Steps Forward

My producer recently sat me down to talk about the after-release stage of the album production. He expressed a very strong encouragement to do everything I could to move forward at a steady pace.

I have to confess, forward movement is not as easy as it seems at times. I can speak from my own experience, whereas we all wish that we could just flip a switch and begin working and/or doing whatever it is that is listed on the task-list, it's not always so simple.

We are human, right? And our humanity demands limits. It limits our energy, our strength, our capacity, our emotion, our patience and our motivation. We would love to consider ourselves as above these limits, but the humble reality is that no one is above these limits. What is more, those who try to move themselves beyond their limits will quickly find the reason for their necessity.

So how can we move forward without exceeding the limits and going out of our minds with stress?

I love the words, taken from Bill Murray's comedy, What about Bob? - "Baby steps."

I have my list of todo's sitting right on my laptop's desktop. Well, they hardly sit there. They seem to glare at me. And the only thing that is keeping me from becoming overwhelmed with the never diminishing reality of their growth is the knowledge that I shouldn't look at the list. My job is to look at only one todo, just one. I work on it and if I find some obstacle in the way of completing it I put a note next to it and move on to the next one.

Right now much of my future success comes down to research, soliciting reviews of my music, and writing. Of course behind the scenes lies the rest of the demands on my time, like paying the bills.

So rather than freaking out about doing it all right now, each week I make sure to:

• put out one packet/contact for review of my music
  
• write at least three pages a day for my book
• read my daily blogs and pull contacts/info from them

I'll be the first to note that it seems overwhelming to be an independent musician staring at this HUGE music industry and trying to walk a path where I maintain ownership of my rights, likeness, future and career.

Whereas making certain and consistent steps forward is the key, I cannot but recognize that the strength to do this comes largely from the great friends and family around me. They are a tremendous support and have made all the difference in making it possible for me to even get this far.