/me falls over laughing. Sounds ridiculous? (Well I suppose if you're a VC, it might)

In the past couple of weeks, three ideas popped up. One is the aikido-style re-direction of conceptual energy. Can Paypal donations be transformed into a type of Angel fund VC donationware? And yes, I've pondered my own entrance into the Angel space (I mean, do you really think people invest in *content* and the other ambiguous types of models? Doubtful, but I would.).

And we've heard about super angels and even Adsense-powered Angel funding, which in a roundabout way, enters Google into an investment space.

Or rather, if you create a recipe for a) brand building, b) lightweight development teams, c) extraordinary reach across blogosphere and everyday people markets, d) combinations of paypal and adsense pennies, e) and a relentless desire to be even more disruptive, you might very well be onto something. Besides, it's pretty durn easy to connect people together these days. Just look at the evangelizing outreach that some audio and video podcasters have. And bloggers. And all the stuff not on our radar.xml. Heh.

The two questions I have: Would a VC invest into an open source VC startup initiative (haha that would SO be the ultimate 2.0, now wouldn't it)? And if not, would a VC say that this idea is silly, wouldn't work, and thereby provide the fuel for someone to say, "Okay, that's all the validation we need to go ahead and do it." ?

Just food for thought, I'm thinking out loud here. ;-)

Or, also known as, Audioblog.com Japan. Castella is awesome and it launches today.

Some highlights:

-It's a podcast portal
-It's got the Audioblog podcast tools, but localized for Japan
-Listen and watch podcasts with the Castella player
-Listen to podcasts on mobile phones
-Search podcasts with Ask.jp

On a side note, it's been fun finding music podcasts from Japan, Woo!

PodGuide.tv doesn't have comments enabled, so I'm addressing the review of Backstaging here on my own blog.

"Mesmerizing like a car wreck" is the best shit EVER, I'm so stealing that. Thanks.

And yes, Backstaging is very much about the obvious, and that is exciting to me. Except it's not focused around the building of our studio, it's about damn near everything that surrounds the tools of this trade, whatever 'trade' is.... citizen media, home production, devices, software, and what not. And as we learn something, we'll share it. And if we need help, we'll ask for it.

Not everyone who wants to make media is the demographic of affluent blogger, hence duct-taping the shit out of something and make it look reasonably good might be some very useful information. And more importantly, we need to make content that people can take with them, on their iPods, to hardware stores, so they can get in on the action.

Flip on HGTV sometime, there's plenty of shows about the obvious (stapling felt to a board to dress it up? see the point?). I want Backstaging to ultimately be some twisted hybrid of MTV and HGTV, that's short, portable, useful, and if it's entertaining, well then score! It's also a living case study of, "Hey I want my own show. I don't want to pitch it. I'm just gonna do it." If it lands in traditional media, then so be it. The point is, I'm doing it my way. And that's what I believe to be one of the four types of media making.

(Now if I can get over the irony of the dollars we're investing to make a video podcast about how to do cool shit for seven bucks... welcome to DIY, I guess. Heh)

Thanks for the love. I'll go film some car wrecks for under 500 dollars. /me falls over. ;-)

Holy Christ, who is the person responsible for dreaming up these crack-like drinks up on Utah Avenue in Seattle? If you like the Egg Nog Latte, you MUST try the CHAI Egg Nog Latte. Crack, crack, crack, crack. omggsdjgas;fghj.

And as much as I'd like a Chai Egg Nog Red Bull and Vodka Latte, it would prolly be pretty gross.

I'm leaving this Saturday to head to Banff, Alberta, Canada for the Blogs n Dogs conference, where I'm part of the conference faculty.

Aside from all of the standard 'what's podcasting and videoblogging stuff' and 'how to make money stuff', I'm looking forward to and scared to death of a couple things:

1. Videoblogging while dog sledding and making travel through snow (in 12 degrees!) as productive as possible.
2. Spending 60 minutes of my 90 minute workshop assembling the aggregate of media (podcast/photos/videos) from the previous days, in real time. I'll have a ton of media assets that will be dropped on my lap, and I'll construct a coherent group of somethings/brands/products/art on command. Woof! That's both scary (as a presenter), yet Really Fucking Cool.

And, I'll admit it. It's not good enough to be considered some sort of prototype of the future. I want to be bionic.

(Anyone else have the Ramones in their head now? ba ba bah bah buh bah ba ba bahh... I wanna be bi-on-ic....ba ba ba bah....)

One of the blessings/curses of being a personal blogger with no editorial filter, is that it's oh-so easy to fly off the handle. Just ask Grog. He called to today to tell me that parts of my rant against the podcasting article in the Mercury News made no sense. He was right.

In fact, I was so pissed off that I left out important words like 'to' and 'of' and 'the', resulting in something that didn't read too well, which later I corrected. Gotta love that flexibility of freedom. I have no editor and it can show at times. And subsequently, it might not always be fair.

Someone called me on it.

So here's the thing: I was a bit harsh using the term 'lazy' to describe the article, when in reality, my purpose in writing that was to focus on a few podcasters here in the Valley who I believe are not as likely to be able seen in the shadow of the machines of top 10 lists and the perceptions of 'Adam-Curry-and-Podshow-Inc is the alpha and omega of podcasting' that the public is seemingly being fed, over and over and over and OVER AND OVER again. And trust me, I devote an awful amount of time engaging people mano a mano to get them to a) listen to podcasts or b) make podcasts. ---and ex-MTV is the word on the street. The PR dollars are well spent, yo. /smirk

So, to recap and clarify:
1. My irritation led to poor choices in wording when citing the article.
2. While Podshow might being doing some good things for media at large, the hype is nothing short of a constant source of aggravation for me.
3. I'll probably be curt and irrational again in the future, I'm sure. But hey, we can learn!

Booyah! Toll free love, friends and neighbors, as promised. We'll be posting show times soon so you'll be able to catch us when we're in the studio. If we're not, you can just leave a message for not only The Eric Rice Show, but any of the KSSX shows. 1-800-978-KSSX

Also, if you're in the LA area, or calling internationally, hit up 1-818-237-5533.

Next up: the SMS shortcode for the Mobile Edition of our podcast.

Photo of Niki, the host of the Metal Show on KSSX

Update: I was really pissed off when I wrote this, and I got called out on some things: I posted a pseudo retraction/clarification here.

The Mercury News had a lazy article from the front page in the tech section today about podcasting, with the easy way out: Podshow and Adam, props to them for the things they are trying to do; yet it didn't mention any San Jose podcasters (I'll give points for linking to my boy Furrier). And while I love Dan Klass' Bitterest Pill, it's not a valley podcast.

The Rose Garden Resident did, however, feature A Guy, A Girl, and A Bottle in their latest edition on podcasting.

"A Guy, a Girl and a Bottle may sound like the title of a television sitcom, but it's actually a weekly podcast focusing on wineries in and around Silicon Valley.

There are other podcasters locally that the Merc didn't pick up. There's the Think Future podcast; Art a Go Go; and friggin CISCO even has a podcast. And even Apple is being a little more community driven (they are taking baby steps, but making improvements). Cupertino, yo. Silicon Valley. And Yahoo, too. Sunnyvale.

Naturally, you'd expect me to pimp my shit. We've been doing this for four years, we do our damndest to help the community, grow our brand, expand in new markets, and are rallying the troops for a Silicon Valley podcast meetup (We like nearby free parking, sorry SF). And let's not forget Audioblog.

I grew up here in the Valley, and have been through many booms, and, at 33, I'm just a kid relatively speaking. When my 'newspaper of Silicon Valley' overlooks the Valley, I tend to take notice. I wear my Silicon Valley-ness like a badge of honor. Through thick and thin.

So the next time I do a mobile podcast, I think I'm going to do it from the Mercury News' headquarters. They are right up the road from me, and I can swing by Fry's Electronics and pick up some cables I've needed to pick up. And we'll talk about wine and art and tech and various other things. Because we're not just the easy story about old school pros... we're just the podcasters in your neighborhood.

Using Second Life as a virtual storytelling video engine. :-) And Mori... who is she? And Spin... is he dreaming?

Download and Watch.

Podcast Expo was a lot of fun. So much so, that I baaaaarely remember this epic exchange. Work hard. Play harder. (Irony: loads of videoblogs coming out of the Podcast conference. Mwah.)

Download.



Shout out to Dummycast.com for capturing the moment. :-)

Visit Backstaging for the last video podcast on the RCA cable trick for your video iPod; see how camera filters can work on different cameras with the help of step ring adapters.

Watch the latest episode and get future video podcasts delivered free in iTunes!

Watch various moments from the Monkey 2.0 podcast on the Eric Rice Show. Download video, iPod-ready!

It would seem very P. Diddy/Puff Daddy/Sean Jean/Diddy doo of me to want to get into *clothing*. But what's fun about the whole thing, is that I can use people like Cafepress to do prototyping. There's actually a series of artwork on the drawing board that I want to put on various t-shirts. Now, I'm not ready to go down the road of Kenny Cole yet, as the real world tends to be more t-shirt and jeans oriented. Who knows? Anyway, the EMR Signature Black T-Shirt is now selling at the KSSX Store. Cafepress announced black shirt support a while ago, but they just started shipping today.

Everything black. With accents of black. /swoop

The new podcast is up with our new c0-hosts Irina Slutsky, Eddie.com, the Monkey, and special guest Schlomo. Go get the podcast and have a great Thanksgiving week.

Four years behind the mic; five years of Slackstreet. Damn. The next few shows should be quite fun, especially since we've got the whole crew in one place, plus some new faces you'll hear on the shows. You've met one so far. And you'll meet another one, perhaps maybe the third most famous Eddie of all time--even before Mr. Van Halen! (according to Google)

And as a reminder, approximately 70-80 million of you can get the mobile edition of our show on your cell phone. Hit up Eric Rice mobile edition and get that Mobilcast player installed. ;-)

I'm noticing a couple things that seem to separate videoblogging and podcasting as similar, yet different movements. And since I live in both camps, I'm curious if I'm the only one who has noticed these things.

Gender Gaps - I'll admit it can take some thinking to count the women involved in podcasting, and as the recent Podcast Expo just happened, it became known that 15% of the attendees were women. In my own personal experience, I'd have to think much much harder to identify women podcasters as opposed to women videobloggers.

In a recent tour of Current.tv's facility in San Francisco, the audience was split virtually down the middle of men and women alike. Equal parity in video? But not audio? Why?

Social Issues - Podcasting emulates radio in ways I don't think we want to admit. Good ol' fashioned competition. I mean, you take a look at people like Opie and Anthony--- they've got people they can't stand. And vice versa. We've possibly all heard Howard Stern dislike various DJs.... and this is being mirrored in podcasting. Believe me when I say that there are people who want to fucking bury Podshow. It's personal, it's cutthroat, and it raises the bar.

I'm not seeing this in videoblogging. Follow the same bath of a bigger media model: television or film-- when was the last time you heard of harsh competition between filmmakers....... ? Yeah, I'm not seeing it either And you?

There have been too many personal experiences I've had that revolve around these two issues for me to think it's a mere coincidence.

Gabe from XOLO.TV gets hassled by cops and the camera keeps a'rollin.

This might make it as an example on my week-long deconstruction of how Current.tv isn't quite getting the we-make-media thang.

Hat tip to Nicole who pointed out some nasty trackback spam on my About page. I've slacked off and really given a shit less about trackback spam on the blogs, as it's an uphill battle and so many are used to seeing it. However at this point, I'm done with it. So all trackbacks are deleted and trackbacks blocked.

Five years ago today, my first son was born. What an amazing five years it's been.

Happy Birthday Aidan!

(And on a side note: Nov 18 is Mickey Mouse's Birthday and the Anniversary of Jonestown)

Having just uploaded some new photos to my flickr photostream, I realized that I do the suckiest job of properly putting Creative Commons licensing on my work.

So, until I get un-lazy, I'll say that most of my stuff is generally CC'd. Attribution required, share-alike, non-commercial usage, with some stuff being no-derivs, others being derivative-okay. And of course, if you're not sure, just ask me! :-)

And now, I must go back to flickr to see if I can set things to be CC by default instead of All Rights Reserved.