[Ron Lindeboom]

You are welcome, Jim.

Ron Lindeboom

[Ron Lindeboom]

Hi Dan,

It was likely just a download gotcha due to the fact that at times the podcasts max the pipe and every ounce of throughput is being used to service the audience. (And believe me, it’s a HUGE pipe, comparable to 256 T-1 lines running concurrently.)

When that happens, you just let it download and then play it.

Most times it won’t happen, but when it does, that is the solution.

Best regards,

Ron Lindeboom

[Ron Lindeboom]

[Mike Cohen] “While I did not do anything business related on AOL, I did find one lasting relationship – my wife!”

I met my wife elsewhere, but did meet Walter’s wonderful wife, Rebecca, through the COW.

Does that count, Mike?

:o)

Ron Lindeboom

[Ron Lindeboom]

[Karl Soehnlein] “I have been a member of several social networking sites for years and found two (Facebook and LinkedIn) to be surprisingly good for business. Used right, I think these websites are hugely underrated tools that can not only promote your business, but help brand yourself or your company.”

[Karl Soehnlein] “I’ve never received any new business through these sites, but it keeps others aware of what I’m doing.”

Speaking as one of the founders and directors of Creative COW, we think that huge generalized social networking sites are fine but real value comes as things get more specific and focused.

This logic is seen when comparing the value of LinkedIn to Facebook for a business owner. Most would agree that there is more value in LinkedIn than in Facebook. The reason is that Facebook is for everyone, whereas LinkedIn is for business people.

Following this logic to the next step, as things get more and more focused in your industry that your business is in, the value escalates further.

Real “social networking” grows in value when it is done with those of like mind and focus.

Because of this, we have been adding more and more social networking features in the COW and have many more planned for the first six months of 2009.

One of the most obvious of these is our “Services” link in our orange navigation bar, which lets you advertise for free your studio, services and company focus.

Less obvious but, to many, more valuable is our linked profiles pages wherein people can dig in and see who people are from within their posts and answers offered. We know of many members who are working on projects together, and making money doing it, that didn’t come from the Services directory or from the jobs board — rather, they came from people liking what was said and wanting to work with that person.

We also know of leaders — one here in this forum that springs to mind is Mike Cohen — who has gotten job offers, etc., because of articles he has written and the ideas he has offered in the magazine, the blogs, the library and elsewhere in this site.

Social networking does not have to be done face to face and can be done using the Net. But our belief if that the more focused you can get it, the more value it brings.

It is sort of like direct mail. We could advertise Creative COW to all of the people here in San Luis Obispo County, California where we live but only a small number would really be interested — most, would scratch their heads and wonder what this is all about. But if we targeted a mailer by industry code and classification, the numbers of mailers would drop radically but the potential value in each prospect would grow just as radically in proportion.

These are the kinds of thoughts we have been addressing with many of the social networking functions we have been adding to the site and we hope that you find them valuable.

Best regards,

Ron Lindeboom
creativecow.net

[Ron Lindeboom]

[Bob Zelin] “Remember, your life is not as important as the TV show that you are working on.”

Thanks for NOT writing this while I was drinking coffee or I’d have shot it out my nose while simultaneously laughing and falling into an incredulous reactionary shock, Bob.

Now THIS was funny, Bob.

Ever a fan,

Ron Lindeboom
(who still doesn’t trust (though I love) Behringer mixers and would definitely check it to make sure it’s even working)

[Ron Lindeboom]

[Ignacio Recondo] “When I monitor the audio out of the Aja through the mixer it sounds all broken and distorted. Im using the Analog out ch1 & ch2 into a Behringer mixer”

Behringer makes very price-competitive equipment that works well — when it works.

Behringer competes on price to the point that they do not even want the old gear back when you file a warranty claim — just throw the old one away when they send you the new one.

I would bet money that the Behringer mixer is faulty, as I have seen many new ones fail right out of the box. As I said, when they work, they are a great bargain and a Grammy winning Platinum recording engineer that I know says that their $100 mic compares very favorably with some of the $10k to $20k mics he uses in his studio. Again, when they work.

I have had a few and of three of their mixers, one has worked and two had issues right out of the box.

Best regards,

Ron Lindeboom

[Ron Lindeboom]

Apple and Avid will in all likelihood not return, while Adobe’s booth was greatly cut last year to allow monies to be moved to the budget for the launch of Adobe TV. I doubt it will be any bigger this year. I can also remember when both Boris FX and Media 100 had large booths. Last year, their combined booth was quite small. Gone altogether from the halcyon days of yore are companies like DPS, in:sync and many others; swallowed up by others, or dead on the playing field.

Autodesk will be there until the sun goes nova, to quote my pal Tim Wilson.

I said it a couple of years ago and I believe it still today: NAB will return to being the “National Association of Broadcasters” show — with a much smaller crowd. The distraction that was the multimedia contingent (read: creative things computer-based) will be gone and the show will once again belong to the engineers and broadcast moguls that were once (and really are) its core. Multimedia was a distraction from the show’s real purpose and if NAB is going to survive in these days of massive cut-backs, they are going to have to focus on the part that they play better than anyone else. That is broadcast.

Best regards,

Ron Lindeboom
creativecow.net

[Ron Lindeboom]

[Brendan Coots] “Coal for all Grinders!”

But only one lump!

Ron Lindeboom

[Ron Lindeboom]

If you wish to be offended, Jonathan, that is your prerogative and you are entitled to your opinion.

But, that said, if we had not held a policy that the COW is for professionals and everyone else is welcome to peek over their shoulders and see what they are doing and how they do it — this site would have long ago turned into the kind of politically correct pile of standardless anything-goes that you find everywhere on the net.

We did not want that.

We have always stated that if you wish to learn from the pros, listen to them and respect them, they are giving you their time for free. If you wish to argue with them and tell them how they are wrong, well let’s just say that you better be ready to prove your point with blow-by-blow definitions of why you are correct. Generalities won’t cut it with people that do this day-in and day-out for a living.

I am sorry if you take offense at this, but we do not want this site to become what we see in so many other forums communities on the Net.

In closing, the prices that you cite (to working pros which are the backbone of this site) seem absolutely economical, compared to the prices that we paid not all that long ago. Many of us have had $100,000 and more tied up in our systems, so something that costs a few hundred seems like dirt cheap to us. It is not an insult, just a matter of relativity.

Best regards,

Ron Lindeboom
creativecow.net

[Ron Lindeboom]

[Michael Fitzer] “Any suggestions?”

Yes, you are likely to get more answers if you post this question in the After Effects forum. This forum is for questions about the COW site itself or to make suggestions regarding the site or our resources, etc.

Best regards,

Ron Lindeboom