Last evening at a small gathering at the de Young Museum in San Francisco, we launched The GigaOM Show, a talk-show format Internet video show, cohosted by myself and Joyce Kim. The show is produced in partnership with Revision 3. (Event photos, thanks Scott.)
And it is truly a partnership – Joyce and I handle the editorial component of the show, from picking headlines and deciding on guests. Folks at Rev3 do what they know best – make awesome video, and handle the sales and production part of the show.
The back story on the genesis of the show is that Kevin Rose (co-founder of Digg and Revision 3) and I were on Cranky Geeks together. After the taping of that show he asked me why I didn’t do it regularly. My answer – I cannot deal with production and all that stuff. We talked about making a show that discussed some of the hot stories and have conversations with folks in the technology business, at the same time had some fun. Over a period of three months, we bounced around with the idea and finally decided that a talk show format would work best for us.
Joyce and I had met a while ago, and I was struck by her intelligence, the analytical nature of her questions, and her ability to put everyone around her at ease. She made a perfect partner for this endeavor – and she graciously accepted. Since then, it has been a lot of work.
Unlike blogging/writing which comes naturally to me, video is a different format, and needs different skills. Sure I have done some television spots before, and been on Cranky Geeks, but this has been a learning experience, and I still feel I am in pre-school. It is a start. We are learning, tweaking, adapting and evolving the show.
Some of you have been kind enough to share your thoughts, offered suggestions, and all of those are fantastic. It is only going to help us get better. I hope as we get our sea legs, this show will become part of your online life in some fashion in the near future. But before I go, a big UP to Rev3’s David Prager, Martin Sargeant, Sarah Lane and Joey Rabier for pulling this show together.
The first episode, about 27 minutes long features 5 Hitlines, and conversation with HotorNot co-founder James Hong and Bill Watkins, CEO of disk drive maker, Seagate. You can watch it here, or download it from the Revision 3 site or just add it to your RSS feed reader.
Congrats Om! and best of luck in this new media format… I’m watching right now…
++ for the cool intro
++ for “Hitlines…because that’s how we roll…” awesome
🙂
The show looks pretty good. I don’t watch news shows though – only thing I do like that is listen to NPR in the car while traveling. I prefer to read…or watch dramas.
Congrats Om, on a auspicious start! You and Joyce have a natural rapport and the guests are great. I love the random trivia thrown in as well, it adds fun context. Kick ass on the motion graphix too. Looking forward to what future shows hold.
Congrats and good luck!
Can you talk about your approach to viewers and ratings and success metrics? How many viewers do you need weekly for the content to be profitable? How many viewers do you need in a year to feel like another year is worth it?
Well done. Travolta shirts from 70s with couple of buttons off? Look out Leno.
You–like me–have the perfect face for radion Om. =) Just kidding: nice work.
That’s great news Om!!! I’m thrilled for you.
As someone with TV and Internet video hosting experience AND similar skin tone, here’s some advice: MAC is your friend. You look like an NC45 or so.
http://www.maccosmetics.com/home.tmpl
OM – good luck with your new effort – it can only keep getting better.
For people like me, a 27 min episode is a bit too long – how about some miniGiGa’s – 5 min episodes. Just a suggestion…
Nice Om, I really think you have something going here. I’m glad your doing this with Revision3, I really respect what they are doing with online media.
you rock. good luck.
i more than agree with G above – maybe a combination: one master segment (30ish minutes) and then break it up into chapters so that folks who hear about (for example) one company covered can just skip to that company interview/segment….
I must say you come across much more flamboyant on the video, compared to your posts.
Maybe it was the gangsta style you had on the show. I must say I was expecting you in a hat with the cigar. 😉
Jokes apart, you are pretty natural at this. You have to continue with this and make it a weekly episode. Make sure you have iPod versions of the video, for those of us who carry it around as if our life depended on it.
By the way checkout my thoughts around Hotlists within Facebook.
http://abhishek.tiwari.com/2007/07/22/social-operating-system-wtf/
Goodluck,
Abhishek
Om,
I think you are a great writer but you have to face the fact that you are just not a video person. The pointed finger shaking in the intro, attempts to be look cool (“that’s how we roll”) and the weird lack of eye contact/attention to your guest is just not happening. Either you get better soon or you are just going to end up seriously embarrassing yourself with this show. Take a hint from Scoble. Keep the camera pointed at your guests and away from your face at ALL times.
Great start!
Brilliant start. Keep it going. Waiting for new shows
Om your show sucks! Get a life.
Wonder if Revision3 will ever provide a way to embed their videos in web pages. What’s holding them from doing so ?
I think this is great show that is well produced. However, can the video be buffered (like YouTube) so that we can watch it one shot without any jerkiness in the video?
Never mind the negative comments, that was a great great job and just like any other show it will improve with time.
Just go no my G.
Never mind the negative comments, that was a great great job and just like any other show it will improve with time.
Just go on my G.
Good start OM
Hah! What a delight – and I’ll get to surprise my wife when she returns home from toiling in the bowels of banking IT.
Normally, she’d expect to find the Thursday dl.tv show queued up for after supper viewing in the living room [yes, AppleTV]. We both love your appearances on Cranky Geeks – and the new show is a splendid addition to our repertoire of video podcast viewing.
The link and subscription at iTunes worked just fine btw.
You are hilarious. Hopefully, you’ll have Lindsay Lohan on one of your shows, keeping my fingers crossed.
Om, I’m glad I stumbled across this, I will have to check it out. Although I’m not realy familiar with all of your work, I have caught you a couple of times on Cranky Geeks, and I really enjoyed your take on some of the issues discussed. I know you went toe-to-toe with Dvorak a couple of times, and he invited you back, so you obviously have his respect. And I didn’t think he respected anybody…
Dear Om,
Love your site, blogs, contributions over the years, but didn’t care for the show. Here’s feedback
Clothes & Coloring. You cannot wear that !! No No. Very fobbish 🙂 Its advice you can trust coming from the sf tech gay mafia ( I’m local and a part of it 🙂
Change the really red communist China background. Doesn’t work with asian skin tones
Humor needs adjustment. The lindsey obsession was borderline creepy for you. Don’t mention Paris either.. its just tragic at this point.
Don’t use the work -“like” so much. Sort of popular with fobs, and tweens.
Maybe you can avoid cutting Joyce off. It would be allright if she was aggressive and argued back with counter points, but she seems too sweet.
I think it’ll get better. Congratulations on getting into the video fray. Its a lot less forgiving, so apologies, if I was harsh 🙂
Awesome show! I loved it. And Om, you are so MONEY minded! I love how every guest you ask (so far) were strict questions about MONEY MONEY MONEY. SHOW ME DA MONEY OM! And Joyce is AWESOME! She is your ying to your yang.
Congrats Om on your new show. The first one looks great. Look forward to seeing more of them.
Kamla