Memorial Day Mash

Ok, here's some fun for the holiday weekend. Zack over at GameAmp (resident Machinimist and site admin) put together a Machinima music vid - pitting WoW dancers vs. the Guild Wars solid gold - all set to Hammer's Can't Touch This.



Good editing and fun use of the dance anims - this might be a new addition in my presentations. And as much as we try to avoid MC Hammer in our pop culture history (and boy, have we), I think we can only move past if we embrace it for all the awkwardness and embarrassment it has caused. Thanks, Zack.

Enjoy and hope all of my State-side readers have a fun and safe holiday.

Money is the Dividing Line, pt. II

Just finished reading a great interview over at Dispatches from Blogistan with Cory Doctorow, lead contributor over at webtrend compass Boing Boing, where Cory speaks of intellectual properties and the current state of laws around it. In one part of the interview, he digs into the faux/not-so-faux DMCA takedown vs. Machinima site RPGFilms.net from last year (previous blog postings here, here and here). He reveals some of the particulars in the interchange between himself and RIAA Head of Communications Jenni Engrebretsen (typo'ed in the interview as Jenny Angstrom). When pushed on the question of "Would you bring a suit against a machinima site?" her final reply--after two months--was a "No Comment" statement. Obviously, this is their default answer: giving themselves the option to pursue action if they felt it was justified.

This ropes back into the previous blog in Revver's hesitation to allow for Machinima posted to their site. Just as the RIAA is keeping their options open, Revver is covering their collective asses. This isn't wrong--but it fortifies the need for clarification, as well as CHANGE into our current views & laws of IP rights (cue the looping WAV of the "Creative Commons" theme). My previous presentations at Prof. Beth Noveck's Copyright, Innovation and the Net class, as well at Harvard Law's Signal2Noise event last year, explored the number of areas of Machinima IP that need addressing.

Update: TheDave sends along word that ultimately Revver was open to posting his films on their site--so long as he could provide proof from EA/DICE that the Machinima was his to upload (and ultimately cash-in on). Right.

Update 2: RPGFilms.net has since gone offline and the URL is now a forward to game content site FileFront.

Money is the Dividing Line

I recently tripped over this posting at "The Dave's Shit Tip" (love the title) in which Dave posts his Machinima film to several free video hosting services - namely, YouTube, Google and Revver. Everything seems to be going along fine, when suddenly, Revver pulls his vid. Why? It's considered a copyright offense by Revver.

Yow.

The story continues: Dave goes on to contact Revver, who confirm that they removed his Machinima because they felt it was in breach of EA's copyrights. He then mails EA to get some further clarification from their end - and is now awaiting a response. If Battlefield 2, in fact, includes BattleRecorder for the sake of making Machinima, why is the final product solely EA's work? (yes, lots of answers here). Unfortunately, I don't imagine that Dave will hear from EA too soon (if at all), but if they do reply, they'll most likely point to the EULA that states the work is not his to post, nevermind enjoying all the $$$ he could possibly earn from it.

Again, no surprises here - its easy to see why Revver pulled the vid. Revver, for those not familiar with their service, allows the end user to share in the ad revenue associated with their posted videos. Some educated speculation: Because Machinima falls into the grey zone of questionable fair use/derivative work, Revver sees it as a catalyst of possible litigation given its unlicensed use.

Google and YouTube have similar "authorized copyright holders only" agreements in place, but the ad revenue derived is not directly tied to the videos themselves, nor is it shared with the person who uploads the content. This allows them to squirm around the "video=ad revenue" question. Therefore, Google and YouTube can be a bit more loose around the agreements it holds with the end users (case in point: nearly any popular US TV series can be found in some shape/format on You Tube). And in that respect, I imagine both YouTube and Google will soon feel more pressure from industry to police the content posted to their sites.

The Academy is continuing efforts with different developers for either clarifications/revisions to their current EULAs around Machinima, but I feel its a few more Daves that will really stoke the "who owns it and what can we do with it?" fires.

SL Future Salon: Machinima Take Two!

We've finally settled on the revised date for the Second Life Future Salon on Machinima, taking place this Thursday, May 25th at 8pm EST/5pm PST on Media Island. Guests will be Pierce Portocarrero and yours truly. We'll be streaming both voice and video into the presentation so it should be a pretty interesting event.


Media Island in Second Life.

Stop by if you're SL'er or, if not, now would be a good point to create an account. Look me up once you're in world (Hiro Quasimodo).

And Wii're back!

Finding time to blog lately is nearly as challenging as getting to 30 in Brain Age...

I've finally returned from Melbourne, where the ACMI Machinima Fest was very cool all around. We had a great crowd who decided to brave some unfavorable autumn weather for the Machinima weekend. Quite a few people were there for the Red vs. Blue screening, but a number were there also to see what the Machinima fuss was all about. Sunday's forum panel led by SelectParks' Chris Dodds was a great mindbender with lots of thought provoking questions flying around.

At end of each day's activities, I had the chance to speak with a number of Australian Machinima filmmakers. It was great to hear about all these projects being worked on - both in variety and scope. I don't have any pics from the weekend, but hopefully some will surface either on Flickr or in the blogosphere itself.

All-in-all, the trip was a real blast. A tip of the hat to Helen Stuckey and the rest of ACMI for putting on a top-notch event - I'm sure the Machinima fans from afar would have loved the entire weekend.

Passing thru E3
Traveling back to NY (with major head cold in tow). I met up with Friedrich Kirschner in LA, and we quickly scoured the E3 show floor on Thursday and Friday - trying to digest all that was thrown at us. Some real standouts of the show were Spore (no surprise there), Battlefield 2142 (ok, I'm a fan of the series) and Crysis (though I hope hardware has caught up to the game by the time its released). Friedrich did a bit more digging in from the Machinima side of things (you can read his reviews: Day 1 here and Day 2 here). One of the most impressive parts of E3 had nothing to do with Machinima at all - it was the massive (and I mean, massive!) 360° display in their "booth." I say that in quotes because their booth is really a small convention center of its own.

Here's an MOS clip from EA's 360° panofantastic display (12mb mp4):



I didnt have a chance to sit in on any of the hands-on console demos - the 2-3 hour waits were not exactly working into my schedule - however, I wasn't too impressed with the floor offerings. PS3 demos were still running on emulation hardware, and the Wii's innovation buzz was missing its mark (lots of folks were coming away with the "cool, but not as much as the videos show"). Without sounding too much like an MS fanboy, I'd have to say it was the 360's show this year, as both the hardware and games were starting meet the word-of-mouth expectation.

While I love seeing all the tech and games headed our way, I've likened E3 to a PR nuclear blast - being in the middle of it isn't nearly as fun as watching from the distance. In fact, you really miss the entire show unless you do track it from afar. I spent more time looking at the Machinima-friendly stuff online than I did from standing next to it. Some interesting things coming up to say the least (more convergence on the horizon).

I have a few Machinima blog postings drafted - hope to have them up in the next few stays. Stay tuned.

Traversing the Southern Hemisphere

I'm currently sitting in LAX awaiting my flight to Melbourne, Australia, where I'll be at the Australian Centre of the Moving Image (ACMI) on Saturday and Sunday, May 6th and 7th - a guest of the Centre's Playing the Movies exhibit. ACMI curator Helen Stuckey has lined up a Machinima-laden weekend with Rooster Teeth presenting a screening of RvB Season 3 and myself presenting Machinima Past and Present, as well as selected works from last year's festival. On Sunday, we will both participate in a panel discussion along with Dr. Lisa Dethridge (RMIT), Helen Stuckey (ACMI) and chaired by Chris Dodds, about all things Machinima. This will be held at the end of the day and will be followed by a small soiree to close out the weekend.

As part of the event, Helen has written up a great essay about everyone's favorite subject - hopefully she will submit an expanded version to the upcoming Machinima Reader.

All in all, it should be a great event. I know RT has a pretty large fan base in Australia, so I'm sure they'll be out in numbers. However, if you're interested in Machinima and are in/around Melbourne this weekend, please stop by on either Saturday or Sunday - it should be quite the show.