Month: May 2011

As any of the thousands of you have witnessed the camera that I’ve used to produce the pictures and video for this little ol’ blog is a tiny thing.  Boy wouldn’t I love to use those $10,000 hi def cameras they use at Cape Ann TV to produce some stunning video. 

You can take a short two session class and learn how to use all the incredible equipment they have at your disposal up at the Cape Ann TV studio including the world class video editing software Final Cut Pro.  The cost is negligible (something like $25 or $35 dollars) and once you take the class you can take the super sweet cameras out and film shows for Cape Ann TV.  They even have students that will show up and work the cameras if you want to produce a TV show on local access cable and people who will edit that footage for you.

Now this all sounds fantastic right?  Well it is BUT I think that GMG could make it all that much more worth while and exciting to get involved with Cape Ann TV.

Here’s how-

Rich Sagall and Heidi Dallin recently invited to come in as guests on their respective shows.  In the studio there was Andrew Love the Producer, The Hosts,Two Camerapeople,  two interns and the other guests for each show.  I’m not sure how many man hours that represents to get a 22 minute show on air but I can assure you that these people all really care and produce some fantastic shows with a whole lot of time and energy which goes into each production.

As an example of how these programs are aired I present you the scheduled for The Cape Ann Report- Heidi Dallin’s show that I was a guest on last week-

Thursday, May 5, 6:00 PM

Friday, May 6, 1:00 PM

Sunday, May 8: 3:00 PM

Once these programs air, they are shelved…forever….with out an on demand way to access them.  Now I ask you, how many people are watching or looking out for, at those specific times those shows?   Your chances of stumbling upon these shows at those specific times out and contained to only being shown in the geographic limitations of Cape Ann TV’s airing audience is what, .005% of Cape Ann’s population?  Who pray tell is checking out channel 12 at 1PM on a Friday???? 

This is not to discourage folks from getting involved at Cape ANN TV but to offer GMG’s already built in audience of 15-22,000 people a day, every day to show these programs for all the people who are already putting in the time and energy to create this fantastic programming.  The shows are edited in Final Cut Pro which means they could also be uploaded to YouTube.  Here is my proposal- A GMG/Cape Ann TV partnership

These shows get aired roughly 4 times and then put on a shelf the way it works now at Cape Ann TV.  There is no way to search any of the shows for the general public once the shows have aired and view them at their own convenience. In the age of competing with over 200 cable channels the chances that anyone is watching at the very specific times they air is slim but if these shows are uploaded to YouTube after they air on Cape Ann TV and labeled with the content of the show, they would be forever available to the community and the people who produce them.  Imagine covering the Greasy Pole year after year with those fantastic cameras and editing equipment available to you at Cape Ann TV and being able to do a simple YouTube search ten years from now  for “Greasy Pole 2011” “Cape Ann TV” and being able to pull it right up?  This vs the current system where you would lug all the equipment around capture the fantastic footage, spend time editing it and the show only airing 4 times never to see the light of day ever again?

So in my proposal the people who create the shows take ownership of them (after all they put the time in to create them) they air on Cape Ann TV first and once they run through the four times they would air on Cape Ann TV, upload them to their own free YouTube accounts, and send us the links to their shows. 

We could air the shows on which an incredible amount of time and energy was spent producing, to our already built in audience on GMG.  We will tag it (which means it would be fully searchable by the subject matter in each piece forever), give full credit to the people who produced it and in this way the Cape Ann Community entire internet connected universe could enjoy the programs.

This in my opinion is one of those win/win/win situations for which I love to make happen especially when it’s right there and all we have to do is connect the pieces.

We’ve already built up the GMG audience, so here is how it helps everyone-

It helps Cape Ann TV because if people know that their programs in which they pour all that time and energy into will actually be viewed by the entire community and would be accessible forever instead of put on a shelf I just know we could get a whole lot more people involved at Cape Ann TV.

It helps the people who produce the programs because they get rewarded for all the work they put in because their shows actually see the light of day after they air 4 times at random times(many of which are during working hours).

It helps GMG to bring more great content to the community and the world.  Do you know how many people check out GMG from around the country and the world? I can’t tell you how many times I wish I would have liked to have seen some of the programs produced at Cape ANN TV but it just didn’t fit into my schedule or I didn’t know when it was going to air.  With our searchable database and reach those programs could be easily searchable and On-Demand forever.

I’m just saying….Let’s Make It Happen!