On net neutrality, you can't afford to be neutral.

In the last few weeks, the debate over net neutrality (SEE BELOW) has raged again as Level 3 accuses Comcast of violating FCC guidelines governing how broadband providers (like Comcast) manage traffic on their networks. Comcast has demanded compensation for increases in traffic it anticipates because of Level 3's new partnership with Netflix, which streams video content that consumes serious bandwidth.

Is Comcast playing fair?

Level 3's hints that Comcast has set out to thwart a growing competitive threat; Netflix streaming video is a clear alternative to watching movies and TV on Comcast. And, it's not the first time we've seen Comcast use their bandwidth to stymie competitors. Internet forums reveal that Comcast customers using competitive VoIP providers instead of Comcast’s VoIP service experience packet loss issues. These same problems are not experienced when using Comcast’s service. If you call Comcast to get support you will be told that VoIP is not supported on their network. A curious policy for a company that offers VoIP service.

Comcast, however, is not only in the business of providing cable programming. They are also a broadband provider. Their view is that the increased traffic creates additional burdens for them. They want proper compensation to offset the extra demand and that seems reasonable. Whether such an argument has merit or not depends on the nature of the peering agreement between Comcast and Level 3.

Such conflicts are at the heart of the Net Neutrality debate; which is getting just that much thornier with the proliferation of wireless apps and services. As smartphones become mini computers, consuming much of the same Internet content as a wired computer, there's more complexity to fan the fiery discussion.  Google and Verizon staunchly support Net Neutrality for wired Internet access, but not so much when it comes to wireless where they have other business interests.

You can surely argue that a public company has a right to make money and adjust pricing to protect their margins. For certain, these multi-media players have a lot at stake in this game.

But, as a consumer, what are your rights?

It's likely you have already been affected by these non-neutral business practices, and you don't even know it. Broadband providers can simply target particular types of traffic going through their pipes and prioritize its performance. If you believe you have a right to use the bandwidth you pay for how and when you want, you have a horse in this race, too. You need to be vocal with your providers. Let them know you want the right to use your bandwidth any way and on any device you want. And, not only in the manner that is optimized for their business models. This may indeed require government intervention to sort out, so being vocal with your government representative is also important.

It's a fight for freedom on a new technology battlefield. Don't leave the outcome to companies who won’t provide that freedom unless they have to.

Mike Lachtanski
HP Media Solutions

"Net neutrality" is the principle that data on the Internet should move impartially, regardless of type of content, destination, or source. Some refer to it as the "First Amendment of the Internet".
 
Meanwhile, high-speed Internet carriers are seeking legislative support for a two-tiered model in which carriers could charge Web site owners a premium for priority or faster access. They argue they need the pricing flexibility as new channels, such as wireless, develop and mature. Those opposing the carriers argue that the Internet was created to work in a traffic-neutral way and they, in turn, argue continued growth and innovation depend on it. They want Congress and the FCC to pass telecom reform in favor of Net Neutrality to prevent the development of an un-public Internet. At the most extreme, critics fear that without Net Neutrality, two Internets could emerge: the free, public one we know today and a private one with faster premium priced services. It's a heated debate with extensive and lasting implications.

The opinions expressed above are solely those of the author and do not reflect the policies or opinions of HP.

Karen Reynolds puts tribal knowledge to work for PSG.

When Karen Reynolds, head of Executive Communications for Stephen DeWitt GM of PSG Americas needed a webcast in far away Santiago, Chile, she wanted a no-risk, no-fail, no-panic attacks production. Media Solutions delivered.

Engagement Marketing. Yes, it’s a buzz-phrase. And here’s why.

While marketing to the creative community at the annual mega-award show in Cannes, Horacio Miranda ditched traditional marketing in favor of daily editorial videos of the event—and of the HP-sponsored Young Lions lounge. Awesomeness happens.

Why do some corporate YouTube videos have thousands or even millions of views, while others of similar quality and content seem to fade like a NASCAR fan at the opera?

Everyone interested in social media as a marketing tool should write the following sentence on a stickie and put in on his/her bathroom mirror for a month. (An ankle tattoo is not out of the question.)

JUST BECAUSE YOU POST IT, DOESN'T MEAN THEY'LL VIEW IT.

And, while you've probably mastered the basics for optimizing search with meta data (title, tags, description) when posting to YouTube, here are a few more handy tips and new tools:

1. Max out the meta data - title, tags, and video description. Yes, it's important to choose relevant terms about the product, benefits and people featured in the video, but we often tend to be more conservative than necessary. Include name brands as well as category generics. Define what type of video it is. Generally, as long as it's germane, more is more in this arena.

2. Upload a transcript AND enable CLOSED CAPTIONING. Independent research on YouTube and Google search indicate that they are indexing on both. (Speech to text recognition/ indexing in the works.) And of course, closed-captioning is helpful for supporting the hearing impaired and translations.

3. Encourage engagement. The # of "Shares", "Comments", "Subscribers", and "Favorites" all contribute to your ranking. Make sure you enable the interactive options when you upload the video and take advantage of the GOOGLE MODERATOR feature introduced in May for specific promotional or crowd-sourcing efforts.

4. VIDEO ANNOTATION is another relatively new way to add interactive commentary to your video—perhaps to add background information about the video or suggest links to related videos or channels.

5. Promote early, often and everywhere (appropriate.) Leverage AUTO SHARING when you post your video. Send emails with the link, post it to your blog, and encourage your friends and colleagues to do so too.

6. Make sure you’re content is something people want to watch/read/interact with. Yes, this one is straight from the Department Of Duh, but it’s worth a mention. People read what interests them—hopefully this includes your content.

Cool gadgets to die for.

CAN'T FIND ANYWHERE ONLINE TO SET UP YOUR VIDEO CAMERA? PERFECT!

Joby's Gorillapod line can turn just about anything into a camera platform. But up until recently, it hasn’t given much more than static ability to camcorders. Now, Joby has the Gorillapod Video stand, and let me tell you budding Stephen Spielbergs, you may now let your freak flag fly. Read More

TECHNOLOGY EVERYONE, ESPECIALLY JAMES CAMERON, WILL LOVE.

Holographic video conferencing researchers have made a major step toward a holographic videoconferencing system that would let people communicate with one another almost as if they were in the same room. Read More

Some guys are born to raise the bar. Craig is one of them.

You should take time to meet Craig Barnes. That is, if you can find him standing still.

Craig is Media Solutions' home grown Solution Architect and he is the workhorse behind our powerful Media Portal and all the features that go into it. He and his team of developers peer into the future and begin developing tools we don’t even know we’re going to want — so that when we do want them, they're already built. Over the past year, Craig and his team have done a complete refresh of our entire webcasting infrastructure, which was a massive undertaking requiring many late nights of pizzas, Diet Cokes, and conversations with the cleaning crew. Now that the hardware is live, we’d like to acknowledge Craig for designing us such a robust and solid platform.

Craig, you rock.

In today's global economy, the world never sleeps. So we had to create an infrastructure that didn’t either.

Ask anyone who’s ever renovated a house and they’ll tell you it was worth it, but oh, man, what a ton of work.

Media Solutions is no different. We recently completed a total redesign of the infrastructure supporting our rich media platform. It took unfathomable sums of energy and dedication, but it truly was worth it. This is the system used to host and transmit every HP CEO-to-all-employee meeting around the globe simultaneously to HP employees. It's a system that can support more than 1500 users joining an event per second. It can read/write at 300 Mb/second. And it has fail-over-redundancy and load-balancing from the clustered servers—virtually eliminating hardware single points of failure.

Made up of 16 internal and 16 external servers, this infrastructure allows us further to support and connect directly within HP, legacy EDS systems, and to the "rest of the world" reliably 24 x 7 x 365. All available to you with just one call (or email) to Media Solutions.
 
Sexy? Not so much. Impressive? You bet, bro. Especially if you’re trying to download a 15-minute keynote video in a hotel room in Brunei.

SECURITY THAT'S HYPER-SAFE, ULTRA-SENSITIVE.

HP’s Media Portal includes several security features which handle as much or as little content protection as is needed. Here are the main methods:

• HTTPS – for secured browser communications.
• User validation (requiring user login with individual passwords).
• Access approval – requires an event coordinator to "clear" each user before joining an event.
• Automated rules like *@acme.com can also be used to reduce the effort needed by the event coordinator.
• Event specific password – a separate and unique password used for each event and precommunicated to only those who should have access.
• Referral URL checking – Each event can verify that that the current user came from one or more URLs. It is also possible to deny access based on the referral URL.
• DRM (Digital Rights Management) for encrypted media streaming and policy distribution.

ANALYTICS, TRACKING, MEASUREMENT.
DATA LOVERS, YOUR PORTAL HAS ARRIVED.

HP’s Media Portal has full data reporting for each event. And each report - including registration, attendance, surveys, web page counts, and webcast user questions - are viewable through a web interface or exported to an Excel file. Separate read-only report URLs can be given to event stakeholders who want to keep tabs on their events, too, without giving them full access to the portal. (In other words, so they can't mess up your next event.)

Last issue, we asked "What’s the best way to ensure a viral video actually goes viral?"

OUR READERS ANSWERED:
Not surprisingly, given how many clicks the Old Spice guy still gets on YouTube, 64% of you selected "Make it funny"–the clear winner. 18% of you voted for "Shoot in Hi Def" and "Cross your fingers." While this poll may be a little short on scientific analysis and conclusive methodology, it does serve to make a point. Let’s just say, hypothetically, that you can’t afford to get Isaiah Mustafa to star in your video. You still need to do everything you can to create content that people want to watch. If you can get Stephen Colbert trying to out-rap Kanye, great. But even if you can’t, there are still ways to punch up a keynote or introduce a product that will resonate like crazy with your audience. Who in turn, will tweet, blog, stumble upon and share your message with an even bigger audience.

Yeah, you need some magic to make an idea go viral. But there’s also a lot of science that can act as a catalyst for that magic. To find out more, check out our feature article in this issue under “Stuff to Know.” Or contact us. We’ll rock your content.

HP Media Solutions in Singapore

On November 1^st, Léo Apotheker assumed the reins as the new CEO of HP.  Just 2 days later Piau-Phang Foo, Managing Director, SVP, Enterprise Business Asia Pacific Japan, introduced Léo to a packed meeting at an HP facility in Singapore.  This meeting was part of Mr. Apotheker’s ongoing Listening Tour, and was webcast live by HP Media Solutions throughout the APJ region.  Media Solutions managed all the technology within the venue, a live satellite link back to the U.S., as well as a live webcast which included live Q&A from both the local audience and the web. 

Connecting HP with PALM...

In the past when HP acquired a new company, it took some time to fully and securely connect and communicate to those joining our ranks. Integrating two existing Local Area Networks is no easy task. So when HP purchased PALM recently, HP Media Solutions offered a fairly simple and inexpensive solution to help speed the connection.

Working with HP Corporate Communications, our long-time broadcast vendor, and the IT team at PALM, HP Media Solutions coordinated installation of a small satellite dish and encrypted receiver at the PALM headquarters in Sunnyvale, California. Less than a week after installation and testing was complete, PALM employees were invited to watch their first HP All Employee meeting, originating live from Plano, Texas.

Immediately following the meeting HP Media Solutions Project Manager Michael Parker received this note from a PALM employee he had met during the satellite installation process… “You guys put on a great show! Thanks…”

A big idea helps rev up interest in the Byron Nelson Championship.

Mike Minchew needed a big idea to rev up interest in the Byron Nelson Championship golf tournament, and he delivered. He commissioned the renowned Orange County Chopper guys to build 3 custom Byron Nelson motorcycles to raise awareness around the EDS/HP-sponsored event and hired our very own Michael Cummings to document the story.

Meet Michael Cummings, producer extraordinaire.

Accomplished in photography, film, video, motion graphics, special effects and editing, Michael Cummings is much more than just a producer. His practiced eye and multiple skill sets give him the ability to see every angle and aspect of a project, from storyboard sketches to the final cut. He’s that rare media talent who’s a jack of all trades and master of every single one of them.

“Great production values, a solid storyline, and attention to the details, that’s what makes a great video,” says Michael. “There’s such a thing as working quickly but also not rushing the process. ‘Measure twice, cut once’ works in video, too.”

Metrics that matter most in digital video.

When it comes to online video, most of the old digital metrics apply, but so do a host of new ones. So how do you know which ones are really telling you something, and which are just data chatter?

Whether you are hosting video on a marketing microsite, incorporating video into a rich media ad unit, or posting on YouTube, the most important thing to clarify is what are trying to accomplish? Because as with every marketing tactic, the performance data that matters most is that which corresponds to your goals.

Below are some of the more important video metrics associated with specific communication objectives.

1. AWARENESS

Often at HP we are launching a new product or service and our goal is to create awareness of it. Let's say you've created a 3-minute video announcing the features and competitive advantages of your product and posted it to a microsite dedicated to the launch. You might be inclined to count visits to the site… and this is a great start, but it's not the same as understanding how many people have watched your video.

For that, we track VIEWS also called "impressions." The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) has helped to establish universal standards for such metrics. In this case, a view occurs when a site visitor initiates interaction with a video and begins to receive the content, creating "an opportunity to see" – and to be counted, as well.

UNIQUE VISITORS is the number of distinct visitors to a page and helps illuminate repeat views by a single individual. This is important for understanding both the number of people reached, as well as interest or engagement indicated by repeat viewership.

2. PERSUASION

In our industry, peer recommendations are consistently rated among the most powerful influence levers. And of course, technologists and engineers are heavy users of the Web with high adoption of both video and social media. Thus, getting an influential IT manager, developer, or systems architect to validate your video is worth its weight in gold.

You'll want to track actions that reveal interest and engagement in the form of COMMENTS or RATING. By reading the content of comments, you will get some rich insight into the thoughts and feelings of the viewer. This will help you assess the clarity of your video and how persuasive it is.

SHARING, ADD TO FAVORITES, EMBEDDING and LINKING imply that the viewer has connected with the content and wants to be associated with it. By forwarding your video, he/she is providing a de facto endorsement of it and creating the potential for it to "go viral" — i.e. to receive a dramatic spike in viewership in a relatively short period. (Note: often over-the-top humor or stunts are used to instigate viral impetus. Just be aware that not all attention is good attention. Refer back to your goals and objectives to help you decide how much to dial up the “cool factor.”) Sharing actions are valuable, though, as they are typically targeted at an appropriate and receptive audience.

3. LEAD CREATION

To increase lead creation, compliment your video with a specific call-to-action. Generally, we recommend that you surround your video with additional content and relevant links. This can be done in surrounding text with hyperlinks (for instance, on HP.com) or in a companion unit below or beside your video in external media buys. (In a future newsletter we'll profile some of the hot technologies out there – like overlays – to help make your videos work even harder when it comes to driving leads and sales.) Currently, tracking CLICK THROUGHS to get additional information and REGISTRATIONS that follow a video view are the best ways to assess lead creation. (They can also begin to establish corollaries to sales.) The metric monitored for this is how many viewers were motivated to take action in association with viewing your video, such as clicking on a link and moving to the associated landing page.

While it is not a measure of a lead, per se, tracking the EXIT PATH of a visitor can also be helpful. This literally tracks the path of the viewer as they leave the video. Did they exit the site altogether? Did they watch a subsequent video in the playlist? Did they spend more time on that marketing landing page? This data signals viewer interest in the content of the video and may suggest ways to enhance the context or programming strategy of a video channel – and how that total communication stream in turn influences opt-in or conversion.

CONCLUSION

In the end, it is not always easy to obtain all the information noted above. And it’s often not necessary. Tracking every measure sometimes obscures key learnings or makes it difficult to get the most out of your video strategy. In the end, knowing more doesn’t guarantee success. It’s knowing what matters that really counts.

Please drop us a line if you’d like us to help you set up a video optimization strategy.

Video gadgets to die for.

3-D CAMCORDER

Hammacher Schlemmer camcorder lets you shoot home video in 3-D. No $250M budget or James Cameron required. Read More

VIDEO THAT LOOKS LIKE FILM

RED’s EPIC camera is back on track for sometime later this year. Shoot movies at home that look nothing like home movies. Read More

CAMERA AND PROJECTOR IN ONE

It’s a camera. It’s a projector. It’s a camera and a projector—the new Nike Digicam is a compact digital camera with a video projector built in. Hook it up to your laptop and project your favorite movies. Popcorn optional. Read More

HTML5 MEDIA PLAYER

Open Source HTML5 Media Player—dynamically deliver any web media, including HTML5, YouTube, Vimeo and Flash. The only catch is…hey wait, there is no catch. It’s free. Read More

COOL PHOTO EFFECTS

Bad is good, not to mention unmistakably chic. Digital tools that build in imperfections (like the iPhone “Hipstamatic” app that creates washed out colors and grainy resolution) are all the rage. Read More

They’ve built a fine intranet. And a reputation for going above and beyond.

Seems like we’re all super-busy these days. Which is why, when two guys take on projects way outside the scope of their day jobs, they deserve a little extra credit. Tim Stuck and David Wilkins did just that this summer. These are the guys that made our new intranet site possible.

Most days, you’ll find Tim supporting one of our internal or external clients. But at night, Tim was doing double-duty organizing, encoding, editing and linking all the videos you'll now see on our site. It was a Herculean task. And Tim nailed it.

Not to be outdone, David managed the extensive programming of the site, including numerous revisions, and he even customized the groovy video player on the home page. This was a massive undertaking…and demanded the utmost attention to detail. Fortunately for us, David did an impeccable job.

Nice work, guys. We couldn’t have done this without you.

HP Media Portal insider tips.

WE'D LIKE TO TELL YOU HOW QUICKLY THE HP MEDIA PORTAL CONNECTS CUSTOMERS, PARTNERS AND EXPERTS. DO YOU HAVE A NANOSECOND?

Imagine you have an upcoming product release. Your goal is to reach and impress thousands of eager analysts and customers. And you've planned a fantastic live web announcement with a panel of experts. But how can you make your launch even more successful—knowing that nothing is quite as persuasive as one-to-one interaction with someone who’s a pro on the subject at hand?

Enter HP Live Chat. That's right, our portal supports literally thousands of real-time text-based chats. Just determine what specific subject areas you need and create a corresponding room for direct chat with the relevant expert(s). They'll be able to receive questions and comments and respond to those customers in real time. Just imagine it, thousands of people all chatting, learning, and being convinced at once.

NOW YOU CAN SEARCH VIDEOS JUST LIKE YOU DO DOCUMENTS AND EMAILS. THINK OF ALL THE TIME AND SWEAR JAR MONEY YOU'LL SAVE.

Have you ever searched for a quote, fact, or specific scene in a video—only to find that you had to rewind and fast forward endlessly to find what you’re looking for? To use an old expression, it’s harder than sorting through a gunnysack of coat hangers, isn’t it?

Well, then, you’re really going to appreciate the enhanced search feature on HP's Media Portal. Talk about a real time-saver. Now you can find specific video content based on key words in your search — it’s a lot like trying to find an email or folder on your PC. Just type in the key word or words and the video will cue up right to the scene or scenes that correspond to your search.

In a world where it often seems like there’s more information to sift through than there are hours in a day, features like this can really help. Stay tuned for more great ideas that’ll increase productivity, and reduce the number of stress balls you go through in a year.

How Media Solutions helped Sebastian Copeland get a warm reception at the Tribeca Film Festival.

We're not very good at tooting our own horn, so those who do know us are generally familiar with our standard service offering—live webcasts, video editing, on-demand streaming and so forth. But we've also produced a ton of custom solutions to meet the special needs or unique goals of some of our clients. One such effort was produced for Karen Cage, Manager of Marketing Partnerships for IPG worldwide.

Karen saw an opportunity to expand upon HP's sponsorship of adventurer and photographer Sebastian Copeland's recent expedition to the North Pole, and thus gain exposure for both Sebastian and HP. To kick things off, Media Solutions flew Sebastian to our state-of-the-art production facility in Cupertino—and shot 4 hours of interview footage using green screen technology. Thanks to the flexibility of this technique, Sebastian was able to re-purpose the footage, helping him promote his film “Into The Cold” which documents this extraordinary polar expedition. And HP received a ton of buzz from sponsoring such a distinguished artist, and featuring some of the interview footage on the IPG Facebook page.

Sebastian, HP, and countless polar bears, arctic seals and other species all benefited from this remarkable collaboration.

Greetings, and welcome to the new Media Solutions blog.

Greetings, and thank you for stopping by.

You may know that our team has been around in some shape or form for close to 30 years. But, like pretty much everything else at HP, we've changed a lot over that time. For one thing, because we always seek the most effective channels for communication, we saw the vast potential of the Web and digital media right from the outset. We knew we had to capitalize on the new technologies available so that we could help our clients reach more people in less time and with fewer dollars—in the most compelling manner possible. This greatly accelerated HP’s change from Satellite to the web.

Similarly (and for very powerful business reasons we might add), we were quick to embrace the interactivity the Web affords to support our customers and their audiences’ desire for real-time two-way communication and feedback. Since high-bandwidth penetration has become so prevalent, users are increasingly comfortable with text and video—and we are finding that our customers are more able to take advantage of the sophisticated technology and services this team provides.

The combination of this kind of technical foresight and our can-do attitude has given us a reputation as a solid, dependable partner. We're proud of that, but knew we could do better, and recently have taken notable steps toward improving our creative product. Not the least of which has been the addition of Michael Cummings and his group in the Plano, Texas office (formerly EDS). What's more, we've established partnerships with a variety of independent, small agencies to provide high-level strategic and creative muscle to our line up. When you have a chance, contact us and we’ll show you some samples of their work—including high-end animation, sophisticated customer videos, and complicated event set-ups. Now, we can help you with all that, while still ensuring you have an HP-savvy partner with your best interests  at heart.

Finally, it's worth noting that after all these years, one thing has not changed; our focus on your business. We support the needs of all the business units, and our greatest priority is helping you achieve results. Whether that requires the high-tech use of a halo room, a multi-media event involving multiple partners, a basic but still important webcast, or a custom solution, we’re here to provide it.

And we won’t settle for anything less than extraordinary.

Mike Lachtanski

Director, HP Media Solutions