It’s Reader Feedback Time! (Pretty Please)
Hey there friends,
First, we want to thank you, the readers. We love how involved you get, from keeping us on our toes with your insightful comments to your spot-on news tips. We look forward to writing about you and writing for you for a long time.
If you could do one more thing for us, as we hit the half-way point of the year, we were hoping you’d help give us a progress check on how we’re doing. We prepared some questions on the things we’re most curious about, and we’d also welcome any free-form thoughts you have. Please leave a comment below or email my first name at gigaom.com.
1) CONTENT: What do you think of our coverage areas? What do you want to hear more or less about? Who do you want us to call and what issues do you want us to track down? For reference, here are some of the topics we see as our current focus: new media studios and stars, funding news, startup profiles, traditional media going digital, hardware, video advertising, video infrastructure.
2) STYLE: Would you want us to alter the length of our posts or their frequency? Is it too much or too little or just right?
3) DESIGN: Do you run into any user interface issues on our site? Are there any features or design aspects you’d like us to add or remove?
4) NEWTEEVEE STATION: What do you think of NewTeeVee Station? How often have you visited it, and can we do anything to make it more useful for you?
5) OTHER: What other blogs, vlogs, online magazines or news sources do you read in this space?
Also, for those of you wondering, we will be starting up our summer Pier Screenings series very soon! Look for an announcement about that coming shortly.
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NTV continues to be a must-read.
I’d like to see you go back to covering indie videobloggers more - you know, not the studios and stars receiving all of the press, but the cutting edge, the risk-takers, the trailblazers behind the vlogs who are building a sustainable audience.
Frank Sinton on July 2nd, 2008 at 12:47 am - Permalink
2.
Something about the “Read more of this story” links isn’t convenient on this blog. Maybe a word count of the article can accompany the link, but possibly also eliminate the use of the “read more” links, which are intended more for much longer articles. I find myself with a tinge of annoyment if I’m reading an article I’m interested in and then have to click a link to get only a couple more paragraphs.
Beyond that, it took me a while to notice that the “read more” link was there, as there’s a sizable white space between it and the article’s text. I imagine new readers may have a similar experience and be missing some content.
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4.
I make web video content, and it’s ironic that I absolutely hate most web video content. The categorization of videos in “Comedy, Commercials, Drama, etc.” doesn’t seem to invite me to change my mind. This is a new medium, and if you’re attempting to sort through it, then perhaps you need to rethink the categories you’re using to sort. I’d like to see clear delineations of content created by major studios, scripted/unscripted, must-see, viral phenoms, etc.
It’s oddly frustrating, a lot of time we spend watching online video is spent simply surfing around. The Station could be a way around that, offering an “If you liked this, you might like this: ” service, or otherwise a way to quickly sort through niche content.
Perhaps it’s foolish of me to suggest that the video reviews might consider being more critical of the videos. i know, it’s difficult to look at 2girls1cup and say something constructive, but there is definitely room for an evaluation and judgment of choices made in any work. Web video is coming of age in the box-office-aware world, so there’s a knee-jerk movement to create a horse race out of web video (ie it’s got 30 million hits so it must be successful!!!). Not only is it dismissive, it’s condescending, I feel it’s stemming from the “amateur did amazing novel thing on internet” attitude which was fresh in 1998 but is getting absolutely tired nowadays.
Critical reviews, and perhaps them alone, have a responsibility to ignore that mindset and evaluate work on its merit as work alone. The problem, perhaps, is that somewhere along the line, the goal of video work has gotten lost. There are no standards for web video from which to gleen a set of evaluatons. Like TV, it has some unreviewable content (news shows come to mind), but beyond that difficulty is also the assumption that there nobody watches web video for the same reasons. In other words, you watch web video for completely different reasons that I watch web video. However, is this true?
We both, at least, hope not to be “wasting our time” by watching this or that. Ideally, we’re getting something “useful” out of our viewership. Perhaps the standard is “I would recommend this video to others.”
livyatan on July 2nd, 2008 at 2:17 am - Permalink
Wait- I already forgot the questions, Liz. Any chance you could do an online survey? I will say I’m reading more often lately and have put ntv’s rss directly near my gmail so I scan the headlines daily. I don’t really get the station. I got confused a couple times and when its logo appears in a blog post I’m still not clear. The only thing I’d caution is that ntv doesn’t want to drift the route of The Daily Reel (ironically a google search for TDR points to NTV) by stretching too thin and being a portal, community, news site, tv guide, etc.
I also read:
reelpop
insideonlinevideo
most blogs of videosites
onlinevideowatch
advertising blogs
techcrunch
and of course… willvideoforfood. :)
Nalts on July 2nd, 2008 at 2:53 am - Permalink
Hi,
Half of NewTeeVee station’s posts show up as an empty title in my feed reader. Isn’t there any way to embed the video so I can watch it in my reader? Or at least give a brief description so that I know if it’s worth my time to click through to see it?
Also, the olympics are almost on us, can you offer up more coverage as to where we can see them online?
Chris on July 2nd, 2008 at 6:50 am - Permalink
I think you guys already know I love you and find your site super valuable to my work and growth in the field.
That being said, I have only one humble yet pressing re-request:
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE add an RSS feed or email follow-up option for comments! I know I’ve asked before, but especially after getting into Disqus and Blogger’s email follow-up option, I’m getting spoiled and I hate the fact that I post thoughtful comments then forget them in the void and don’t continue contributing to the conversations.
In response to another query:
I hate to say it, but I haven’t looked at NewTeeVee Station since the day you launched it. I do, however, like your VodPod tool bar on this page which I regularly check out when I come to comment.
Mark Schoneveld on July 2nd, 2008 at 9:30 am - Permalink
*More posts about web video portal UI/UX, especially in regards to algorithms used for search, “hotness” factor.
*Use TubeMogul to look for trends, more data centric analysis.
*RSS feeds for comments.
*Less posts about low quality (production value) viral videos.
*Interviews with ad agency media planners about how/why/where they allocate funds into video ad products.
Pier Screenings!! Can’t wait… See you there!
Charles Baker on July 2nd, 2008 at 10:40 am - Permalink
Chris: There are video embeds in the feed items, but your feed reader might not be able to display them.
Foofy on July 2nd, 2008 at 10:52 am - Permalink
If you follow the blogs Nalts mentions in his post you’re likely to see many of the same stories repeated over and over again. Though I always appreciate NTV’s take on the stories of the day, I have to agree with Frank; I would love to see smaller, less corporate videos being covered more. I love discovering new film makers and companies on this site, and while established talents are news worthy as well, this space is equally important for the little guy.
Menlow on July 2nd, 2008 at 11:23 am - Permalink
I can’t believe you guys didn’t have a thing to say about the launch of Zipityzap. The first internet television service that works with a wireless remote control and nada? Especially now that new flat screen TVs come with PC and/or s-video inputs? You can tie your PC to your TV with $16 worth of cables (http://www.svideo.com/prosvideo6.html) and watch all kinds of great programming - FREE! Never mind that this is cheap alternative entertainment for 64 million basic cable subscribers. You guys are asleep at the wheel.
Regarding your questions:
(1) Content - I’m interested in technology, business and how industries are changing. I’d like to see a detailed analysis of all the many ways you can connect your PC to your TV, cost, services, etc.
(2) Style - nice.
(3) Design - your site was unavailable for a day or two a few weeks ago. “Internet Explorer could not open this page” or something like that.
(4) NewTeeVee Station - there’s lots of services for finding internet videos (Veoh, Joost, etc.). I’m more interested in finding internet television CHANNELS, not 5 minute video clips. With all of the great niche programming coming out, there will someday be an internet television channel for every interest.
(5) I read every blog that discusses internet television.
gerald on July 2nd, 2008 at 2:06 pm - Permalink
Love your site: it is–by far–the best new media entertainment/tech news source online.
Your snark-to-fact ratio is right on, and I enjoy both the day-to-day news and “where is this whole damn thing going?” types of stories.
I wish there was more activity in the comments, but I guess you can’t force it. Perhaps you could run a series that encourages responses to questions… and then engage the people with the most thoughtful responses for future posts (either in a mini-interview or a guest post).
As for the Station, I feel as though it is confusing in two ways: the context and the UI:
NTV Station UI: It’s difficult to navigate for the full experience of any particular video; it seems like there is a video-only page, a review page, a user-generated review page, and a place for comments. Surely these could be combined into one page/post.
NTV Station Context: I guess I’m not sure who this list is for (and therefore don’t know if it’s for me). Is it an examination of popular online content? Is it just fun stuff? An excuse to see indie projects? Is it for producers or marketers or tech enthusiasts? Perhaps an easily-scannable rundown of the clip’s significance at the top would help. Then I can choose whether or not to read the 5-6 paragraph review.
Last thing: I’d love to see more live events in Los Angeles. NATPE TV Fest and the New Media Expo (in Vegas) are great events, but I feel NTV has a closer connection to the kinds of people I’d like to meet.
Alec McNayr on July 2nd, 2008 at 3:09 pm - Permalink
Thanks so much for the thoughtful feedback. We have a couple nice actionable items in there that I will try to get implemented ASAP: fewer story breaks and RSS feeds for comments.
For NTV Station, it seems clear that the idea and design are a bit murkier than we thought. We are trying over there to surface and review noteworthy video. The basic idea is that lots of people like watching online video but don’t care about the business. Do you guys have any suggestions about better serving that need? And is there a way we could better present/link to those stories on NewTeeVee?
Liz Gannes on July 2nd, 2008 at 4:33 pm - Permalink
I’m using Google Reader, should the video embeds work with google?
Chris on July 3rd, 2008 at 7:40 am - Permalink
I’m a big fan of NewTeeVee. What I would like to see more of is a weekly summary of smaller online video players that have a unique spin on the industry, and are starting to get traction.
It seems like most of the coverage is on the big players with YouTube, Veoh, and other big players that have received millions in VC funding getting most of the attention. By focusing on some smaller companies, your content could have more exclusives not found on other blogs.
I’m a dedicated reader/viewer on a daily basis, and that will never change. Great job overall everyone at NTV!
Jeremy Campbell on July 5th, 2008 at 10:17 am - Permalink
Liz,
NTV is a must read in this space, one of the top blogs/news sites I/we at Inlet follow. I think the content you cover is spot-on; however, enhancements might include a bit more of the business dynamics affecting new media companies and technologies, and the shifting economics as internet “tv” breaks (and enhanced) traditional revenue models. Topics on the economic motivators that drive deployment are important as this industry goes mainstream.
Style, design, and length of coverage is perfect in my opinion. We read lots of other sites…. one group that may be less well known but i find full of insights is The Diffusion Group, who publishes both reasearch and a newsletter that are worthy of mention. http://www.tdgresearch.com/
neal page on July 7th, 2008 at 8:04 am - Permalink
Good team good mix good style improved design
Newteevee Station will be very good in the long run.
Adding thumbnail teasers in the NTV Station Today section
to illustrate the subjects you cover would be nice.
Or just replace the black area of the repeated Station logo
with a changing thumb. I know black is stylish but here it’s like
a signpost signalling me “dont’t read - dont’t watch - move on!”
Consider adding a 3 to 7 days short stickypost at the top
of the articles section. It could link to the most discussed
article (or important poll like this one) as soon as it moves
to the second page.
Congratulations and thanks
andy on July 7th, 2008 at 4:16 pm - Permalink
Thanks andy, we just modified the format of the NTV Station Today post for tonight’s edition — hopefully it works better for you.
Liz Gannes on July 7th, 2008 at 5:14 pm - Permalink
I don’t even remember when or where I found you guys. But I’m an rss addicted reader. If I had one criticism it would be the sheer volume of posts. I can’t keep up. But I have a ton of feeds too.
Really enjoy the site.
Stew on July 7th, 2008 at 5:57 pm - Permalink