Zisk On Demand: News, Internet, Technology, Politics, Music, and Chess!

Some of you may remember the Green Witch Internet Radio, a legal, free music, no ads, open source startup which we ran from October 31st 1998 until our acquisition in January of 2000. Some of you may also remember Jack Moffitt, who at Green Witch was lead developer of the Icecast Open Source Streaming Media Server as well as head of the Xiph Foundation, creators of Vorbis, FLAC, and Theora, along with Icecast.

After getting fed up with the music industry, Jack drifted back to school, formed a band Lousy Robot , got back into Chess, and joined the board of the Jabber Foundation where he learned all about the leading Open Source Instant Messaging Protocol. He realized that the existing options for playing Chess Online were relatively weak. And since playing a game is a social activity, very much based around communicating, he thought “why not build a great chat client (with full web integration) an combine Chess into it?” Millions of people play Chess. Millions of people use Instant Messaging. They’re two great tastes that go greater together

Thus, Jack Moffitt (with lots of help from Patrick Mahoney also formerly of The Green Witch, and about a half dozen fantastic developers) has developed Chesspark.com (part of the Online Gaming Group, LLC.) I’m a Strategic Advisor, but most importantly, we now have a way to play tons of Chess and call it work. No, wait, Chessplayers across America will now be able to play web based Chess without having to install a special program on their company’s (or Cybercafe’s) computers. No, wait, since it’s just starting out, your boss probably isn’t on Chesspark yet to see if you’re on it also. And even if you are, you’re just doing research! Actually, it’s a great place to get a good game of chess, whether against a human, any of several bots, or to build your mating skills using Robotrainer. The Pawn Star shirts should be showing up any day. There are a whole bunch of tools and innovations coming along which will be indispensable to the GM, and others which will be welcoming to even the most beginning of players. Tournaments and League Play should be starting some time in the coming year, as well as a website which will be upgraded to match the quality of the application. In any case, pop on in, check it out, and I’d be happy to play a game of Blitz Chess against anyone. And if you’re ever south of Miami, check out the US Chess Hall of Fame built by and named after my wife’s father Sidney Samole in one of the most incredible marketing moves of all time. You can’t miss it, it’s the giant chessboard shaped building with a huge Rook entrance along the Florida Turnpike. Stop in and say hi to Shoshana’s mom Sharon, she’s usually there running the gift shop.

Hope to see you at Chesspark.com, named after the location in every city where folks congregate to play.

Midem is an awesome music business tradeshow held each year in Cannes in the South of France.

I skipped it this year, and here’s a riff on my thoughts on the matter.

Lots of exciting stuff this evening. Running a little late for a second day at MacWorld, but I still plan to catch the Mac Podcaster Event at the Apple Store with Leo Laporte and many others. Then on to EFF’s 16th Birthday Party at 111 Minna.
The EFF does great work, and as a defender of Cyberliberties ends up helping those important individuals who push a little further. It’s also been great to follow the EFF’s growth, as you can see how a small yet dedicated team was able to grow a sustainable and extremely influential advocacy group. It showed me that creating something like the Future of Music Coalition (with lots of other great folks of course) was not only doable, but extremely important to do.

Hi Everyone!

I’ve been swamped this month but wanted to start posting a bit more. Brightcove sent me a test plugin to try out, and Micki from Revver agreed that the Revver plugin wasn’t working here, but was other places for her. Speaking of Revver and not working… At least (I believe) Steven Starr and Micki Krimmel are still over there as it’s a great concept and company. So I need to dig a bit deeper into the K2 Wordpress Skin where I think resolution to the plugin issue might be found. In addition, I’d like to try lightening up the text a bit so if any K2 experts out in the blogosphere read this and could easily point out which file I’d be doing this in and where, it’d be very much appreciated.

We were early Brightcove beta testers, and I’m extremely impressed with their offering. However, there are a number of publicly known issues I’ve encountered. The first (and close to a showstopper for me, the way I work) is that it’s difficult to embed a Brightcove player in Wordpress. I had high hopes that this would be resolved soon and was under the impression that Brighcove and Wordpress were working on a solution. However, I ran into Matt Mullenweg of Automattic, and he claimed to have never even heard of Brightcove, let alone to know there was a problem with Brightcove and Wordpress iintegrating.

Thus, while I’d really like to have a graphic to introduce the video (and though I could possibly figure out how to do this using Enric’s vPIP) I’m just going to post a link to the video and hope that Brightcove and Wordpress get their collaborative acts together, and solve a conflict which shouldn’t take more than a few hours to work through if they were to start communicating. I see that someone wrote a Revver Wordpress Plugin to do (what I believe) is exactly what is needed here, and I’ll try it out once Revver approves the video. Though someone recently complained to me that it takes Brightcove an extremely long time to approve submitted videos, I believe they are mistaken, as all the videos I’ve uploaded to Brightcove have been made available automatically, within seconds.

Anyway, here’s a link to another episode of Zisk On Demand:News, Internet, Technology, Politics, and Chess!

I believe Procter & Gamble’s Gain Concentrated Laundry Detergent in conjuction with jumping into some salt (and who knows what else) water game me severe chemical burns.

The UC Berkeley Digital Media Club and the Haas School of Business are inviting people to participate in >play which looks to be a truly remarkable gathering.

I’m on the Navigating the Murky Waters of Copyright in the Networked Age panel with a bunch of folks I’d get together with anytime. Cathy Kirkman of Wilson Sonsini and http://www.svmedialaw.com, Milt Olin, Jeff Ulin from Lucasfilm, Herve Utheza of Orb Networks, and Alex Rofman of SNOCAP

*”> play* is a unique annual event that brings together creative professionals, industry leaders, and students to discuss the emergence and implications of the digital lifestyle. Participants are exposed to new ideas and have the opportunity to connect with key thinkers in digital media. Driven by Berkeley’s legacy of creativity and its emergence as a center of digital media technology, * > play* combines creative and consumer viewpoints to spark countless ideas for growth and new product development.

* > play* focuses not only on exploring business models, but also on bringing together members of the creative community and experts on consumer trends. The diverse list of participants will foster an unmatched and inspirational networking experience. We have an amazing line-up of panels and keynote speakers, and an expo which will highlight the latest and greatest in digital media technologies. Now all we need is you — the amazing attendees who make each year’s conference so memorable! ”

* > play Details:*

*Date:* November 18, 2006
*Location:* Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley
*Learn about the conference and buy your ticket today at playconference.org/registration.html

Afterwards is the party celebrating the 11th Anniversary of The Laughing Squid.

OK so we’re on!

6:30 pm.

This Friday the 3rd.

Henry’s Hunan

110 Natoma between New Montgomery and 2nd, a few short blocks from the Vloggies Pre-party at The House of Shields which is being hosted by Dabble and Blip.Tv.

I couldn’t really tell Henry’s how many folks we’d be, and they requested we call back and let them know, and I let them know there’d be some uncertainty up until the last minute (and will call back again), so whomever gets their first, try to nicely rustle up 3 or 4 nearby tables of ten or so for the around 3 dozenish or so + people who’ll likely pop by…

All welcome. Bring your friends if they’re interested in the convergence of music and technology…

George Clinton and Lady Miss Kier were in town for the Exotic Erotic Ball, and though we didn’t have a chance to make it to that event, I did have the good fortune (after Steven Levy’s iPod presentation) to run over to Katland to hang while they recorded. George seemed in a really mellow space (for him) and Kier is a huge bundle of energy. Good to be around folks who have been able to engage the public consciousness.

GROOVE IS IN THE HEART!!!

Had a great time on Sunday at the Cybersalon at The Hillside Club in Berkeley. Steven Levy talked about his book and its topic, the iPod. Sylvia Paul has been putting on Cybersalons for probably a decade and they are a premier though extremely low key schmooze event. It was great to see the 70 or so folks who I’ve come to know over the years out of probably 140 total, and a lot of fun as I looked around the crowd and recognized more and more people. I totally enjoy the East Bay vibe and people. Dave Winer got a good picture of Laurie Flynn, Tony Bove, and I Brian Zisk.

The 6th Annual Future of Music Policy Summit which we held in conjunction with Pop Montreal and McGill University may have been the best one yet. Even at the end of the third day, the last panel was being wrapped up after running a half hour longer than scheduled and folks didn’t want it to end! While I wish I had more time to convey much of what went on, many of the panels can be seen here. While some of the sessions such as David Byrne’s Presentation: Record Companies: Who Needs Them? and the abovementioned “How the Money Moves” with Mario Bouchard, Ann Chaitovitz, Michael Hausman, and Marcy Rauer Wagman don’t have video available, I’m just happy that most of the panels were extremely interesting, and glad that most of them are up. Check out the Young Musicians panel with Win Butler of The Arcade Fire, Tourquil Campbell of Stars, Composer Brian Current, Bernadette Houde from Lesbians on Ecstacy, and Attorney Chris Taylor.

Zisk On Demand Episode #1:Music, Internet, Technology, Politics

Thank you for nominating us for 2 Vloggie Awards, in the Best Vlog and Best Male Vlogger categories. Looking forward to seeing many of you at the awards!