There's no doubt that Tony Perkins puts on a great conference. Each and every AO event that I've attended has a remarkable turn out of entrepreneurs breaking in new companies and rock stars from media, internet, and VC land who show up and actually hang out in the crowd. Lots of these events have execs who parachute in and then zip out the back door, but not at AlwaysOn.

The surprise for me was just how many FOM's there were in attendance. Friends of Magnify - FOM's - were literally around every corner. First - the Kane and gang from Sail.net was at AO showing off they're latest site - YouChoose . Great to see channel builders in the room. Then, ran into Magnify investors Brian Cohen and Gideon Gartner. Having guys who've literally put their money where their mouth is great, and knowing that they're going to be in the audience for the CEO presentation is a bonus. Brian Cohen and Gideon Gartner are both members of New York Angles - and both of them are long time leaders in the media and technology space.

Before long, it was time for our mom... [More]

Magnify.net is proud to have provided the technology and platform for this National Contest! <blockquote> ‘Doggy McGuire’ Video Entry Wins
Upper Deck’s Touchdown Dance Challenge Contest

Two-minute entry for ‘Best Celebratory Dance’ earns Kam Kaler trip for two to Super Bowl XLII!

Carlsbad, CA (Jan. 25, 2008) – Kamaljot “Kam” Kaler from Edmonton, Canada, is one lucky dog. Out of nearly a hundred entries in Upper Deck’s first-ever “Touchdown Dance Challenge” video contest, Kaler’s two-minute submission entitled “Doggy McGuire” was deemed the grand-prize winner. There were several outstanding entries, but Kaler’s canine-inspired version – as it played out to Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger” theme song from Rocky III – was determined the top dog by Upper Deck’s internal judging committee.

In the video, using a snow-covered Edmonton hillside as his backdrop and his buddy, Darren Chiu, as his doggy-suit-dressed wide receiver, the 25-year-old Kaler launches a 50-yard-plus Hail Mary pass to Chiu who pulls it down for the winning score. But his bone-jarring landing on the frozen tundra temporarily knocks Chiu unconscious until he gets revived by Kaler, who is now suddenly sporting doctor’s scrubs. Once he regains conscio... [More]

The OnMedia 100 Top Companies <blockquote> Magnify.net Selected by AlwaysOn as OnMedia Top 100 Winner

Recognized for game-changing strategies in advertising, marketing, and promotion

NEW YORK, NY, January 22, 2008 – Magnify.net, a peer-driven online video discovery and broadcast channel for websites, groups and businesses, today announced that it has been chosen by AlwaysOn as one of the OnMedia 100 Winners. Inclusion in the OnMedia 100 signifies major developments in the creation of marketing tools, services, venues, and advertising, branding, and public relation campaigns. Magnify.net was specially selected by the AlwaysOn editorial team and other industry experts spanning the globe, based on a set of five criteria: innovation, market potential, commercialization, stakeholder value, and media buzz.

Magnify.net and the OnMedia 100 Top Private Companies will be honored at the OnMedia conference scheduled to occur on January 28-30, 2008 at The Mandarin Oriental Hotel in New York City. This two-and-a-half day executive event will feature technology CEO’s from Silicon Valley leading presentatio... [More]

Magnify Adds Open Source Tools <blockquote> Posted by Phil Butler on January 18th, 2008

Magnify just announced that they are going to offer open source graphics development to online channel builders. Magnify is one of the most promising video curation services of Web 2.0 and their updates continue to add value to an already great innovation. This new Graphic Share Library (GSL) allows users of the Magnify.net community to create, share, and use elements from open source content submitted by other members.

Though sophisticated the sharing space is simple to use, as are all Magnify features to date. This newest addition to Magnify's rich platform is perfect for sites that have designed complex templates with color themes, graphic backgrounds, new icons and new CSS tweaks. With the "Share This Template" tool other channel builders can remix the work of other members. This addition to the Magnify arsenal could be a shot in the arm for site designers who are used to struggling with customization. Given enough user generated video, and with Magnify's massive traffic why not, graphic sharing has been sorely needed on Web 2.0.

Magnify is kicking off this lau... [More]

Hello - it's 2008. Yikes. So, what would a new year be without new toys?

First, we thought, we'll make a bunch more templates and graphic items for you guys. But then we figured, why not go 'open' and let the talented among us be able to both create and share graphics across the Magnify community.

So, here goes: http://YOUR-SITE-NAME/admin/design/gallery

Explore. Play. Add your own. This should be fun. And we'll keep adding graphics and elements here as well, so check back often for more cool stuff.

As always - bug reports, comments, compliments or such are always welcome.

Cheers,

The Magnify.net Team

ps: Here's the press release on the GSL feature. <blockquote> Magnify.net to Offer Open Source Graphics Development to All Online Video Channel Builders Ability to share, re-mix, and mashup designs will allow publishing partners to customize and improve the experience for their visitors

NEW YORK — January 17, 2008 – As the Magnify.net network continues to grow, the ability to encourage and even facilitate sharing of talent and resources has become an essential offering. Today the company announced a site-wide solution to encourage the sharing of design elements and templates among all channel ... [More]

We're looking for two great individuals to join our growing team. See if either of these sounds like a gig you'd enjoy.

Site Producer / Partner Support

Magnify.net is looking for outgoing, personable, technologically adept individuals to work with our online customers.

The gig entails learning the Magnify.net platform, working with partners to implement video solutions on their existing sites or build sites from scratch, helping with basic bug reports and partner support issues, and supporting and updating our ad optimization system. HTML, CSS, and Photoshop skill required. The job includes basic tech support (mostly advice and pointing to existing help and FAQ resources) and prioritizing support requests.

Overall, we’re a friendly tech shop that is looking for someone who enjoys interacting with both sophisticated and technological novices.

Please send your resume or link to an online portfolio to jointheteam (at) magnify.net.

New York based FT position for Web Server Engineer / DB Administrator

Magnify.net is seeking a senior server engineer with web application and database administration experience to join our team and help build and maintain our Internet infrastructure.

Candidates... [More]

Day two was Digital Hollywood day for me. (steve)

My panel, Monetizing UGV was moderated by Ian Ballon of Greenberg Traurig LLP.

Sometimes these things can be a snore, but this one was pretty rockin.

Chris Tolles from Topix was spot on when he talked about the coming changes in advertising. He suggested that in order for there to be a big change, there has to be a bit shift. And he suggested that Broadcast TV was going to take the biggest hit. This got us into a conversation about Mitt Romney and his zillion dollar ad spend in Iowa that didn't seem to hurt Mike Huckabee one bit. President Huckabee... hmm... anyway, what if political TV commercials don't work any more? Seems like bloggers, once thought of as very much on the periphery are now part of the media mix, and an increasingly powerful part of it.

Mike Jones of Userplane jumped in, suggesting that the world of sharing is on the rise - and you can see why AOL bough Userplane. Mike is a guy you want to partner with - and the Userplane product is inviting.

Chris Fralic from First Round may be one of the most engaging of the early stage web 2.0 guys out... [More]

Okay, we can admit it: performance over the holiday season was slower than we'd like.

We've been adding channels, video sources and user data at a blistering rate, which is great. But when you're looking for videos with a specific mix of keywords and the pile of data you have to sort through approaches 100 million records... well, the needle gets smaller and the haystack gets a whole lot bigger. So we've been a bit pokey lately.

Today we're pleased to announce that we've upgraded to a new, more powerful primary database server. With double the memory of our prior server, plus twice as many disks, responses times are faster, and timeouts or "server busy" messages are a thing of the past -- unless our traffic doubles again overnight (we've got our eye on it)... But for now, it appears we've got a bit of running room on this new configuration, so it's all good.

Thanks again for your patience, and for your role in Magnify's continued growth.

Las Vegas isn't designed to work. It's a maze of roads, paths, alleys, mono-rails, and streets that make NO Sense.
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I've always understood why casinos are set up to hide the exits (duh, they don't want you to leave). But now i get it: the whole downtown is a maze. No hotel wants you to be able to go across the street. In fact, crossing streets is pretty much a no-no. So when you put the crowds of CES into a rats maze... you get some pretty tough traffic.

Ugly actually.

But - no matter, CES still rocks. And this year there was a new sense of peace in the air. It's like the Consumer Electronics folks and the Content folks made a truce. And while they were at it, they made a truce with the UGC gang as well. Content will move around, devices will capture it. And share it, and make it. Really, it's time.

There were some stellar examples. Motorola (moto) was showing off its shiny new Z10.


... [More]