A platform of one’s own: Video Game High School takes control

What happens when a creator uses a highly-anticipated web series to launch a new website? The creators of Video Game High School found out when the highly-anticipated web series debuted on Rocket Jump — bringing millions of views to a platform they fully controlled.

For a few years now, creators have relied on portals like YouTube and Blip for both hosting and discovery — but third-party hosting means ceding some amount of control over your content. And as the space evolves, other strategies are beginning to emerge.

When the web series Video Game High School made headlines with the enthusiastic response to its Kickstarter campaign, there was no denying that the scripted comedy fantasy about a school for video game fanatics would find an audience online — especially given that it was co-created by Brandon Laatsch and Freddie Wong, AKA FreddieW, who has built a strong fanbase on YouTube with his blend of comedy, VFX and gaming references.

But Video Game High School wasn’t your ordinary web series release — because it drove the launch of the independent content platform Rocket Jump.

Building upon Wong’s pre-established audience online, and also drawing content from creators like Corridor Digital and Feast of Fiction, Rocket Jump uses a proprietary video player to host content for, according to the site’s About page, “people willing to stand on that razor’s edge of the envelope that gets pushed outside the box.”

Video Game High School was Rocket Jump’s first big release, with episodes released first to the Rocket Jump site, and then, a week later, uploaded to YouTube. And the strategy paid off. Numbers provided to us by the Collective (and independently verified by Visible Measures) showed that the series has so far, between YouTube and Rocket Jump, received 31.5 million views.

And while 24.4 million of those views — approximately two-thirds — came from YouTube, the remaining 6.9 million came from Rocket Jump. Most importantly, episode-to-episode, YouTube viewership remained consistent, but on Rocket Jump, viewership grew as the series progressed — increasing audience throughout the course of the campaign.

“We were able to drive real audience and grow that audience on a proprietary platform — without cannibalizing our YouTube audience. In that case it was a tremendous success,” Dan Weinstein of Collective Digital Studio, which co-produced and co-distributed the series, said via phone.

Rocket Jump, according to Weinstein, isn’t meant to replace the team’s YouTube presence — instead, “It’s about expanding their brand and providing a different level of engagement for their audience.”

But building an independent platform for their content has a number of advantages for the Rocket Jump team. First, it means that unlike YouTube, they have a greater level of control over the advertising appearing with their content: Rocket Jump videos currently include video pre-rolls as well as banner ads.

In addition, the Collective — which represents Rocket Jump in dealings with advertisers and sponsors — has a clearly defined property to offer. “Brands know who Freddie is,” Weinstein said. “Add in Rocket Jump, something [that's] owned 100 percent, and it’s another tool in the arsenal.”

But it’s not just the FreddieW show, either: Like other online video brands built around a central personality, such as Chris Hardwick’s Nerdist empire, Rocket Jump has the potential to grow into something much larger than one person. “It was meant to be bigger than the FreddieW brand,” Weinstein said. “They built it to be bigger than themselves.”

The Rocket Jump strategy wouldn’t necessarily work for anyone, especially the lesser-known independent creator. “It takes a large dedicated fanbase to migrate the experience to an owned and operated website,” Weinstein said. But for the right content, there might be life outside of YouTube.

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Romney takes hard line on Iran in Israel speech

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney visits the Western Wall in Jerusalem. (Charles Dharapak, Associated Press / July 29, 2012)

JERUSALEM — On a day that mixed religious symbolism, courtship of financial donors and tough rhetoric, Mitt Romney on Sunday declared in his most aggressive tones to date that the U.S. should stand firmly behind Israel if it chooses military action to thwart Iran's progression toward a nuclear weapon.

Flanked by several dozen Israeli and American flags, with the last glimmers of sunlight illuminating the walls of Jerusalem's Old City behind him, Romney argued in a speech that Tehran's ayatollahs "are testing our moral defenses" and monitoring "who will object" and "who will look the other way."

Accusing Iran of having a "bloody and brutal record," the unofficial Republican presidential nominee said, "We have a solemn duty and a moral imperative to deny Iran's leaders the means to follow through on their malevolent intentions."

The conduct of Iran's leaders "gives us no reason to trust them with nuclear material," he said. As they edge toward developing nuclear weapons capability, "preventing that outcome must be our highest national security priority."

Romney did not explicitly break with the policy set out by his Democratic opponent, President Obama, who has said that no option is off the table when dealing with Iran. Although Romney has insisted that he would not criticize the president during a three-country tour, he implicitly did so toward the end of his speech.

"Standing by Israel does not mean with military and intelligence cooperation alone," he said. "We cannot stand silent as those who seek to undermine Israel voice their criticisms. And we certainly should not join in that criticism. Diplomatic distance in public between our nations emboldens Israel's adversaries."

Romney also drew applause by stating unequivocally that he believes Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, a contentious issue in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. Obama made a similar statement four years ago, but according to Romney he has not shown enough public support for Israel's goals while in the White House. Romney has also accused the president of failing to enforce crippling sanctions against Iran soon enough and of undermining Israel publicly.

Obama's campaign has rebutted that point, saying that the Obama administration has offered generous aid packages and expensive, cutting-edge military hardware.

The sundown speech capped a carefully orchestrated visit that was aimed in part at the audience back home — particularly Jewish and evangelical voters disenchanted with Obama — and in part as a retreat for some of Romney's top donors, who filled the first few rows of folding chairs at his speech.

That elite group of fundraisers, many of whom joined the campaign at a recent Park City, Utah, retreat and a top-dollar fundraiser at the Wyoming home of former Vice President Dick Cheney, was greeted with gift bags containing yarmulkes and Israeli chocolates.

Several watched Romney's visit to the Western Wall earlier Sunday, and then dined after the speech with senior aides on a terrace at the King David Hotel overlooking lush gardens and the hotel's Olympic-size pool.

Romney, his wife, Ann, and son Josh spent the evening at the home of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who invited the Romneys to join him in breaking the traditional fast of Tisha B'Av, a Jewish observance that commemorates the destruction of the first and second Jewish temples of Jerusalem.

An unusual sighting at Romney's speech was Las Vegas casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, who could become the biggest spender of the 2012 campaign. Adelson and his family have directed $36.5 million toward Republican "super PACs" this election cycle — $10 million of which has gone toward the pro-Romney PAC Restore Our Future.

Adelson's first choice for president was Newt Gingrich, but his relationship with Romney seems to have warmed considerably. After shaking hands with many attendees after his speech, Romney leaned in for what amounted to a half handshake and half hug with Adelson, who told reporters that Romney had delivered "a great speech."

Adelson will also attend a Monday morning campaign fundraiser at the King David, but he declined Sunday to reveal his strategy for helping Romney over the next few months. When asked what he planned to contribute to the super PAC backing Romney, he replied, "A kosher dinner."

In the spiritual part of his day, Romney and his wife visited the Western Wall, one of Judaism's holiest sites. They wrote out prayers together before they arrived, and then parted ways on the plaza leading to the wall, where a partition separates men and women in accordance with religious tradition.

Romney wore a black yarmulke and was accompanied by the rabbi of the Western Wall. Pressing his palm against the stone, he closed his eyes and bowed his head in silence for 20 seconds before slipping his written prayer into a crevice.

Romney was surrounded by a throng of admirers who crowded around him shouting from the time he stepped out of his motorcade on the plaza. "Here comes the next president," one man shouted. "He is for Israel," another man said.

The Romney campaign declined to say what Romney had written. When Obama visited the Western Wall during the 2008 campaign, a student from an Orthodox Jewish seminary pulled his note out of the wall; it was published by Maariv, a Hebrew-language newspaper.

maeve.reston@latimes.com

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A platform of one’s own: Video Game High School takes control

What happens when a creator uses a highly-anticipated web series to launch a new website? The creators of Video Game High School found out when the highly-anticipated web series debuted on Rocket Jump — bringing millions of views to a platform they fully controlled.

For a few years now, creators have relied on portals like YouTube and Blip for both hosting and discovery — but third-party hosting means ceding some amount of control over your content. And as the space evolves, other strategies are beginning to emerge.

When the web series Video Game High School made headlines with the enthusiastic response to its Kickstarter campaign, there was no denying that the scripted comedy fantasy about a school for video game fanatics would find an audience online — especially given that it was co-created by Brandon Laatsch and Freddie Wong, AKA FreddieW, who has built a strong fanbase on YouTube with his blend of comedy, VFX and gaming references.

But Video Game High School wasn’t your ordinary web series release — because it drove the launch of the independent content platform Rocket Jump.

Building upon Wong’s pre-established audience online, and also drawing content from creators like Corridor Digital and Feast of Fiction, Rocket Jump uses a proprietary video player to host content for, according to the site’s About page, “people willing to stand on that razor’s edge of the envelope that gets pushed outside the box.”

Video Game High School was Rocket Jump’s first big release, with episodes released first to the Rocket Jump site, and then, a week later, uploaded to YouTube. And the strategy paid off. Numbers provided to us by the Collective (and independently verified by Visible Measures) showed that the series has so far, between YouTube and Rocket Jump, received 31.5 million views.

And while 24.4 million of those views — approximately two-thirds — came from YouTube, the remaining 6.9 million came from Rocket Jump. Most importantly, episode-to-episode, YouTube viewership remained consistent, but on Rocket Jump, viewership grew as the series progressed — increasing audience throughout the course of the campaign.

“We were able to drive real audience and grow that audience on a proprietary platform — without cannibalizing our YouTube audience. In that case it was a tremendous success,” Dan Weinstein of Collective Digital Studio, which co-produced and co-distributed the series, said via phone.

Rocket Jump, according to Weinstein, isn’t meant to replace the team’s YouTube presence — instead, “It’s about expanding their brand and providing a different level of engagement for their audience.”

But building an independent platform for their content has a number of advantages for the Rocket Jump team. First, it means that unlike YouTube, they have a greater level of control over the advertising appearing with their content: Rocket Jump videos currently include video pre-rolls as well as banner ads.

In addition, the Collective — which represents Rocket Jump in dealings with advertisers and sponsors — has a clearly defined property to offer. “Brands know who Freddie is,” Weinstein said. “Add in Rocket Jump, something (is) owned 100 percent, and it’s another tool in the arsenal.”

But it’s not just the FreddieW show, either: Like other online video brands built around a central personality, such as Chris Hardwick’s Nerdist empire, Rocket Jump has the potential to grow into something much larger than one person. “It was meant to be bigger than the FreddieW brand,” Weinstein said. “They built it to be bigger than themselves.”

The Rocket Jump strategy wouldn’t necessarily work for anyone, especially the lesser-known independent creator. “It takes a large dedicated fanbase to migrate the experience to an owned and operated website,” Weinstein said. But for the right content, there might be life outside of YouTube.

View the original article here

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Android Tablets: Apple VS Android, Winner Takes All?

If you haven't heard of Android tablets then you've missed out so far on the must-have gadget of present times! They are flat, portable PCs which house everything under just one big touchscreen, hence being named tablets. They are really blowing up in the gadget market and so expect to see a huge fight between the two tablet titans Android and Apple.

Android refers to Android OS, the operating system from Google. This is one option available for these devices, but what an option! Google have made great efforts to engineer this operating system to be as easy to use and intuitive as possible. This means that it is very easy to make the transition from computer to tablet PC as Android acts in a very similar way to Windows, for instance, that everyone is used to.

Apple are also in the market with their trail-blazing iPad. This was the first tablet to really capture the public's imagination and they have sold to date around an amazing 15 Million of them!

Apple has a huge following of adoring fanboys and girls that simply love its products. This is something that Android will need to work hard on in order to gain the same fanatical following, but in fact Apple prides itself on making very cool and easy-to-use devices.

However the mighty iPad is quite elderly now in gadget terms and has some big drawbacks that Android tablet users might snigger at, the most obvious being:

Lack of USB port - How can you transfer data to your iPad?

Flash incompatible - Buy this and you can't access Flash games or websites' Flash content.

No camera - Who buys any kind of PC these days without an integrated camera?

Limited storage - OK, you can buy a 64GB iPad which is a reasonably large storage capacity, but there is no way to add extra memory, not even portable memory.

Some or all of these features may be available on the iPad 2, but Android users are already enjoying all of these privileges without the cost or the long wait for a new Apple replacement.

This may explain why, according to comscore.com, Google's Android finally edged ahead of Apple in terms of users at the close of 2010. This is probably due to its appeal to a much wider market.

It is impossible to state which devices are better from Android or Apple as this is a personal choice. However it seems sensible to say that with far more choice of hardware Android caters for a far larger audience, as you can choose tablets with different size screens, processors, memory sizes and other features such as USB ports and cameras, whereas Apple simply offer the one device in response, the iPad.

If you're ready to join the winning team and jump on board the Android bandwagon then you'd better check online for the best prices and most choice. If you bear in mind the iPad's limitations, then you won't go far wrong in choosing the best Android tablet and at a fraction of the Apple device's cost!

Your number one source of Android tablets is right here! Visit Virtual village.co.uk or paste this link into your browser: http://www.virtualvillage.co.uk/android-tablet-pc

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