Editorial
One of the critical factors that delineates the digital media industry from other industries is its convergent nature. Digital Media is a curious blend of a range of disciplines – technological, creative and business mainly – each as important as the next and the sum of which, when correctly applied, can become exponentially greater than their collective parts. However, as anyone who works in the digital media industry can attest to, the challenge of balancing these differing disciplines is, well, challenging.
That is why it is refreshing to see a third level institution grapple with this thorny issue in a real and constructive (and not purely theoretical) way.
On Monday 21st April 2008, Education Minister Mary Hanafin at the Institute of Art, Design and Technology in Dun Laoghaire launched an innovative new course that has been designed in collaboration with the digital media industry to meet the needs of the digital media sector and support digital media creativity in general. The MA/MSC in Digital Media is the first of its kind in that it combines a number of disciplines – and two distinct academic streams – into one course. The course involves lectures, workshops, projects and independent study and blends media, technology and business skills.
The course is also unique in regards to the industry collaboration it underwent in its design. Its development was funded by the Digital Media Forum, The Digital Hub based industry training network, through the Accel initiative of the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment. It has also seen input from many Digital Hub based companies ( Fluid Rock, Kavaleer, Lightbox) as well as the likes of RTÉ, Apple, Google and the independent production company, Element Films. Cathal Goan, RTÉ’s Director General mentioned the importance of the course during his address at the Graduate Exhibition in IADT in 2007.
“This is a time of genuine convergence of communications technologies. RTÉ, as Ireland’s Public Service Broadcaster, realises the need for creative and innovative approaches to educating our students.” Cathal said. “In this regard, we note that IADT is proposing to bring forward a new postgraduate course of study in Digital Media.
This is an institution where the emphasis is clearly placed on studentship and professionalism, and where Creativity, Collaboration and Community all converge.”
The course is extremely flexible, so as to suit industry needs and can be done part time as either a Post-Graduate Diploma or a Masters. In this way it is hoped that enterprises will encourage employees to do the course, perhaps with a view to developing a product on the companies’ behalf that may be on the back-burner. In many ways, the course potentially offers enterprises an ideal way to skill up employees as well as undertaking vital research and development.
The inevitable aim of the course is to produce students educated in the realities of the digital media industry who will then have the potential to go on to create new business opportunities – whether they be on behalf of a larger enterprise or as a start-ups in their own right. For more information about the course, contact Helen Doherty helen.doherty@iadt.ie
Future Web Trends
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What he meant by that was in Hollywood, no matter how experienced you are or how much market research you do, nobody knows when or where the Movie God is going to appear and sprinkle magic dust and make a movie a hit.
The same could be easily applied to technology. Take these oft-quoted predictions for example:
"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." -
- Popular Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science, 1949
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
- Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943
"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
- Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977
But a necessary and fundamental part of innovation is the ability to spot trends which involves a certain amount of prediction. Yes, those predictions may come back to haunt you…but if you’re right, you may have struck gold. So for this month’s feature article, The Hub has been mining the blogosphere and conference circuits for a handle on what those “in the know” predict as the “next big thing”. So here we go:
Semantic Web
The Semantic Web is the next forecasted step in the web’s evolution as defined by its creator, Tim Berners-Lee. We sometimes forget that the World Wide Web was created as part of a research project by Mr. Berners-Lee at the Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire (CERN) in Geneva, Switzerland. With the help of Robert Cailliau, and a young student staff, he implemented his invention in 1990, with the first successful communication between a client and server via the Internet on December 25 1990.
The Semantic Web is an extension of that original creation whereby the semantics of information and services on the web is defined, making it possible for the web to understand and satisfy the requests of people and machines to use the web. In effect, we are talking about an “intelligent” web which understands the meaning and potential use of the content, or as Berners-Lee himself describes it: computers "analyzing all the data on the Web ‚ the content, links, and transactions between people and computers." |
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The potential of this evolved web in terms of communications and commerce contradicts the idea that we are entering another dot.com bubble. In fact, it is more likely that we are heading into another period of aggressive innovation. In fact, Ireland – or more precisely, the Digital Enterprise Research Institute in Galway – is one of the leading lights in this area of research where the stated goal of its Semantic Web Cluster is “to develop the baseline technologies that will make data on the World Wide Web understandable to machines.” It’s research areas are particularly focused on ambient intelligence, digital libraries, online communities of professional and social networks and search engines that will answer questions rather than just provide links to possibly relevant information.
The Grid
Grid computing is a phrase which can have several meanings but generally relates to the concept of “distributed computing” whereby the hard work of processing data is not done on the client-side but rather distributed across a network or “Grid”. This sort of “utility” computing means that users can access much higher levels of processing power or specific application software when they need it.
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The Grid @ CERN is one example of the innovative uses of Grid computing and springs from the necessity of dealing with huge the amounts of data which will emanate from the output of their Large Hadron Collider, the biggest scientific instrument in the world. When the Collider goes live this year, in an attempt to re-create the Big Bang within a laboratory environment, thousands of physicists around the world will start clamouring for access to the streams of data that will come out of the instrument.
The data will be a goldmine for finding traces of new exotic fundamental particles of matter, which in turn will tell physicists a lot more about how the Universe was formed and what its future might be. The data will be produced at about 10 Petabytes a year. That is more than 1000x the amount of information in book form printed every year around the world, and nearly 1% of all information that humans produce on the planet each year i.e. a LOT of information!
The only reasonable way to access this amount of information (actually, much more than this, since the cumulative data over more than a decade of operation will have to be stored) seems to be Grid technology. So CERN has taken a big gamble on Grid technology, and is pushing the technology forward in several ways, in order to make the 2008 LHC deadline.
The Attention Economy
As access to the internet becomes increasingly ubiquitous through a plethora of mobile devices, it is going to become increasingly difficult for television and radio broadcasters and print publishers to stand over their current model of advertising. To put it succinctly, the “television” doesn’t know who you are; the internet does. This is where the Attention Economy comes in.
Quite simply it is the concept of a marketplace where consumers agree to receive services in exchange for their attention – much like the way television broadcasters foist adverts on viewers. However, in this case the consumer has choice in regards to the services and the advertising is personalized for them. A win/win situation for all involved. However, its development is plagued at present by issues of privacy such as those that beset Facebook when they launched their Beacon initiative. Basically, the Beacon application shared purchasing information with friends in the network – a sort of “peer marketing” exercise that ended in disaster when Facebook informed one user’s fiancé that he had purchased a ring for her online. Sort of spoiled the surprise!
Virtual Worlds
The Hub has discussed Virtual Worlds in previous issues and so it is hardly surprising that we are still bullish about this particular trend. But it is breathtaking how quickly and vibrantly this sector is developing.
With the Chinese government rolling out a Cyber Recreation District outside Beijing solely dedicated to virtual world environments (with a platform courtesy of the Swedish company, MindArk), Asia is certainly taking the lead in this particular area. One need only look at the explosive growth of Massively Multi-player Online Role Playing Games in Korea to see how as the 'young generation' grows up and infrastructure is built out, virtual worlds will become a vibrant market all over the world over the next 10 years. The newer applications of virtual worlds (or 3D Internet as IBM like to call it) are not so much about living in a virtual reality as opposed to bringing the virtual into your own reality.
Mobile Web
Is this a trend? Do we not all have mobiles with internet access? Well, we thought we did until the iPhone came along. Yes, it took Apple to shake the mobile phone industry out of its dull lethargy in the same way they did with the music industry. What we are going to see now are many more location-aware services available via mobile devices; such as getting personalized shopping offers as you walk through your local shopping centre, downloading applications for everything from fitness mentoring to recipes on the fly. |
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The revolutionary iPhone UI is the one that brought the web to the fingertips and will open the door to a whole range of innovations. As Apple’s Software Developer Kit and Google’s open platform mobile OS Android gets in the hands of an army of global amateur developers, we will see an explosion in mobile applications and mash-ups “pimping” our handsets.
Other notable trends that we don’t have time to go into here include the following:
Artificial Intelligence: That old science fiction gem, Artificial Intelligence (check out Amazon’s Mechanical Turk http://www.mturk.com)
Independent film-making: As digital video empowers more and more film-makers, as writers digest the studio deal with the Writer’s Guild and as the internet becomes embedded into more and more devices, things look even brighter for independent film-making globally. (Check out http://www.bebo.com/sofiasdiary)
Personalisaton: We don’t mean that old cookie-powered trick of having your name at the top of the website you visit. We mean RSS news feeds, on demand video, music and text, personalized advertising and services created just for you. (Check out http://www.google.com/ig)
News
April 17th: Dare2BDrinkAware Awards Ceremony
Location: Digital Exchange, Crane Street, The Digital Hub, Dublin 8
The 2008 DARE2BDRINKAWARE competition was drawn to a close at an Award Ceremony held in The Digital Hub on Thursday 17th of April. The digital film competition was open to 3rd level students aged over 18 years. Teams were challenged to creatively explore the relationship between Irish culture and drinking through considering the values, attitudes and behaviours that young adults have in relation to alcohol. The winning films (3-5 minute shorts) were chosen based on their creativity, insight and opinion on the topic of young people and alcohol.
Pottor Productions from NUI Maynooth took the Best Editing, Best Narrative and Best Film award. The Best Creative Interpretation of the Brief and Best Cinematography award went to Tribes from NCAD.
DARE2BDRINKAWARE was a pilot project sponsored by drinkaware.ie and run by The Digital Hub. Drinkaware.ie is a MEAS initiative. MEAS (Mature Enjoyment of Alcohol in Society Limited), is a registered charity, established in 2002 by the principal companies and trade organisations in the drinks industry to promote social responsibility within the industry and moderate consumption by those who choose to drink, in order to reduce alcohol abuse and related harm.
www.dare2bdrinkaware.com
Digital Media Courses @ The Digital Hub
The Digital Hub has announced its list of courses that will be held in The Digital Hub during May.
6th May: Getting to know your Apple Mac
Price: €40
Time: 10:00am – 1:00pm
Repeated again on: 13th of May 2008
This short course caters for individuals that have used computers before and who own or have access to a Mac but are unsure of how to get started with it.
1. The difference between Mac and PC
2. How to get around your Mac
3. Getting the most out of your Mac
May 20th: Welcome to your iLife
Price: €80
Time: 10:00am – 4:00pm
An introduction to using Macs and the iLife suite of software. iLife is built around the concept of using your Macintosh as a hub for creative activity.
1. iTunes - Stores and organises audio and video content
2. iPhoto - Stores, organises and gives you creative ways to share digital photos
3. iMovie – A user friendly environment for capturing, editing and publishing digital video
4. GarageBand – allows users to record, edit, and mix voiceovers, music and sound affects
Whether you're taking digital photographs, putting your home videos on DVD, or making your own podcasts, iLife has an easy solution for you.
June 3rd: iPhoto Close Up
Price: €80
Time: 10:00am – 4:00pm
This course aims to offer an introduction to the many forms of digital image capturing and editing with the latest, user friendly applications.
1. An introduction to digital cameras, scanners and image editing applications with the Apple Mac.
2. iPhoto – Transfer, store and organise photos. iPhoto gives you creative ways to share digital photos including slideshow production.
3. Adobe Photoshop Elements – Retouch, edit, enhance and add effects to photographic images.
June 10th: Introduction to iMovie
Price: €80
Time: 10:00am – 4:00pm
iMovie is video editing software, created by Apple as part of their iLife suite. When you make a movie, you create a memory that will last forever. With iMovie, you simply arrange your video clips, still images, and music in the order that best tells your story. iMovie makes it easy to share your movies with your friends and family. Screen it on your TV, phone, iPod, or post it on the Internet.
1. Working with clips
2. Adding transitions
3. Working with sound
4. Adding effects
5. Sharing your movie
If you would like to book a place on any of these courses please email learning@thedigitalhub.com or telephone 00353 1 4806200
The Digital Hub is an Apple Regional Training Centre
May 9th- 14th: An Expedition - NCAD 3rd year media exhibition in The Digital Hub
Location: Digital Exchange, Crane Street, The Digital Hub, Dublin 8
Time: 10am-5pm Monday to Friday
An Expedition is a showcase of new work by emerging media artists from The National College of Art and Design. In the creation of work for this show each artist embarked on a journey of inquisition and discovery. They are not exhibiting, but expediting –mining technology for artistic purposes, anticipating the future. The artists see media as the most pervasive platform to communicate to a society underpinned by technological systems.
Design Ireland Skillnet creative alliance
Designers in the areas of architecture, graphic design, visual communications, product design, industrial design, fashion, textile design and photography can now access subsidised training provided by New Horizons Ireland through Design Ireland Skillnet. The focus of Design Ireland is to help designers reduce costs, achieve economies of scale, increase sales and turnover, enhance competitiveness in both domestic and international markets, and identify and absorb best practice, through training and networking events.
For more information please contact:
Muriel Molloy, Merrion Business Development, 087 296 6615 Muriel.molloy@upcmail.ie
Deirdre Doherty, Design Ireland Skillnet, 01 489 3649 Info@designireland.ie
Peter Ingle, New Horizons Ireland, 01 889 8700 Peter.ingle@newhorizonsireland.com
Events
May 14th: Assistive Technology for Dyslexic Employees
Location: Guinness Enterprise Centre, Dublin 8.
Time: 9am
Price: EUR190
Learn how Technology can improve productivity for Dyslexic adults. Do you employ people who are very good at their job but refuse promotion, or who turn down training opportunities or who can give excellent oral presentations but produce poor written reports? This course is directed at H.R.Professionals, learning support staff and disability officers. Learn how employees can talk to a computer so that it types what is said. Learn how employees can improve writing skills, read documents better and faster and improve spelling and vocabulary through the use of technology.
More info: admin@abdo.ie
Tel: 0539174579
http://www.abdo.ie
May 15th: IIA Congress
Location: Croke Park Conference Centre, Dublin 3.
Price: Discounts are available for group bookings and charities – simply contact events@iia.ie. The normal rate is €245 for IIA members and €345 for non-members from 12th April onwards.
Regional Discount
Any attendee from outside the Dublin city and county area can benefit from a further 20% discount.
Email events@iia.ie to receive your discount voucher.
The theme of Congress 2008 is "Beyond Websites: Business Uses of Social Networking and New Media" and it will show the impact that social networking has had on business, successful integration of social networking into organisations' business models and why it takes its rightful place as part of any company's business tools.
Speakers will include leading industry professionals from Bebo, Dell, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Microsoft, IGOpeople.com and Worldwide Cycles. As well as the successful Breakout Sessions run in past years, a NEW feature of Congress 2008 will be Web Strategy Clinics. You will have a chance to book a one-on-one 30 minute slot with an industry expert who will analyse your online strategy and advise on the best course for your business in confidence.
Full details, profile of past delegates, programme outline, breakout session topics and online booking are all available at: www.iia.ie/events/iia-congress/
Your registration fee includes access to all the plenary and breakout sessions, a web strategy clinic, to the exhibition and networking areas, and to all the breaks, lunch and the post conference drinks reception.
May 16th: Business & IT Summit
Location: The Royal College of Physicians, Kildare Street, Dublin 2.
Time: 9am
Price: Free
The summit will look at Business Performance and the challenges and opportunities for Business Executives across their respective units or lines. For many such executives, Business Solutions are required which build upon technology infrastructures, but are required to deliver business results and not to deliver IT projects. This event will help them gain an understanding of such opportunities from their peers and real world case studies from across the marketplace. We have confirmed Senior Executives and keynote speakers from leading Irish businesses to speak on the industry and economic trends in Ireland and outline focus areas to create competitive advantage through the use of IT and Telecoms. The event is targeted at business decision makers across 4 key functions or lines of Sales/Marketing, IT/Telecoms, Finance/Human Resources as well as CEO level Corporate Executives, to help them identify opportunities to enhance business performance within their respective divisions or organisations.
More info: rosie.byrne@ireach.ie
Tel: 01 2106008
http://www.ireach.ie/BizitSummit