Boing Boing tv: same old BB, but with talkies.

We're excited to share something new with you today -- Boing Boing tv. The idea is simple. Explore the same kind of stuff we've been obsessing about since Boing Boing began nearly 20 years ago, only explore it now in daily video. Five days a week, and short: under 5 minutes each.

Here is episode 1: Video Link.

For the first few weeks, much of what you'll see will be produced in-studio, but we also plan to do stuff out in the world, and all over the world.

Boing Boing co-founder Mark Frauenfelder and I are co-hosting the first few weeks of Boing Boing tv, but expect to see the other Boing Boing and Boing Boing Gadgets editors, too -- Pesco, Cory, Joel -- along with familiar characters whose work and eccentricities have been chronicled here before.

And: you. We also welcome video produced by you, our community, our audience, our internet-friends, and we're working out exactly that might fit in the mix (we'd love to hear your thoughts on that).

We're exploring different ways of producing this, and plan to publish a mix of faster-moving "internet zeitgeist" stories with material that remains of interest for a long time. Some lighthearted, other stories less so. In other words, a variety of material pretty much like you find on the blog.

This is not the result of a business plan, or a corporate focus group. We promise no huffy manifestos about Taking Down The Networks with A New Television Paradigm, no breathless hyperbole about Reinventing Citizen Journalism With the Disintermediation of Long Tail Postmodernist Blogonomics -- gah!

We just want to have fun and explore interesting things with you. But, y'know, now with video, because video allows you to explore stuff that text, photos, and audio -- all the things we've experimented with so far -- do not.

We don't intend to take ourselves too seriously. And we're not trying to be TV. Same old Boing Boing, but with talkies.

We hope you like it and find it worth your time to watch and participate, as you, our community, do with Boing Boing the blog. We hope you'll talk with us in the comments (or through your own video, if you wish) about what you'd like us to explore, though Boing Boing tv, next.

Link Discuss FTW!

TECH NOTE: RSS feed and the ability to subscribe via iTunes will be live ASAP.

THANKS: heartfelt gratitude to colleagues and friends without whom this would have remained vapor: Michel Wayne, Chris Kimbell, Jacob Riskin, and all of our production partners at the newly-launched Santa Monica-based studio DECA; all of our sponsorship, marketing, and tech partners at Federated Media (John Battelle, Jason Weisberger, Neil Chase, Ken Snider, Jonathan Schreiber, Ivan Kanevski, Chas Edwards, Bernie Albers, Andre Torrez, and Samantha Kahn, among others); George Ruiz and Nick Khan at International Creative Management (ICM reps BBtv); Brian Walsh at Castfire; the unfairly talented writer and producer Nihar Patel (he was once Xeni's producer at NPR, before that he worked at ABC Nightline, now he's part of the BBtv team), Scott Crawford of Scenic Route Pictures (shoot and post production), Tom Kendall and team at oftheworld.tv (BBtv title animation), and Kai Vermehr and all the folks at eboy who created the BBtv cowboy monster critter.

And thank you, dear viewer, for stopping by.

NEWS: Link to story in the LA Times. Link to Valleywag item. Link to Wired News blog post. Link to Laughing Squid. Link to Warren Ellis' blog. Link to Digg.

• [smith999]

  RSS feed for the videos will be useful

• [Anonymous]

  Mmmmmmm.
  Xeni doing a Max Headroom homage in a bikini.

  Please excuse my objectification; I’m male, and can’t help it.

• [Ape Lad]

  Congratulations! That was great!
  So that’s what you had be draw that picture for! ;)

• [Bill K]

  Who says “meh”?

  This is great stuff. I’d drop that red background, though. Too much like a Target commercial.

  It’s great to see the BB people relate their stories via video. Mark, put the glasses back on. Right now you look like a former Beach Boy.

  You have to allow your viewers to submit videos. It doesn’t all have to be a talking heads thing, but you can let people be creative.

• [RadioGuy]

  Great work on the first episode! I caught the link a few hours ago via Warren Ellis’ blog, and felt all special inside. ;-)

  I agree with #7 on the need for intros and transitions — I think it’d really help pull the whole thing together.

• [RadioGuy]

  Also, thanks for moving the “discuss” link to the bottom of each post. It’s much more convenient this way!

• [nex]

  After years of coming here daily for the content, slowly becoming blind to the site’s strange little quirks, suddenly I find the site itself becoming better and better. I’m surprised, and should you really be able to keep up this kind of quality on tv.boingboing on a 5-per-week basis, I shall be astounded!

• [JB Lavin]

  I’d personally love to see some more of Xeni’s journalistic stories. I’m sure she could produce something much better than the newscasts. Hell, if there was a XeniTV, I’d watch that. BoingBoingTV for me would be something more like news interspersed with artful “commercials” and maybe a MakeTV spot from Mark or someone. Then Cory could do like a “final thoughts” section.

  Oh my god.

  I read this blog way too much.

  *hides*

• [Matt Sanderson]

  Xeni, you rock! Seriously, you were made for this glorious sort of audio-visual nonsense. Very well done.

  Mark was okay too, but you can tell he’s at his best with a pen and/or a keyboard. :)

• [jeff.simmermon]

  Hey guys — I am a HUGE fan of BoingBoing, have been for years, and I’m going to continue to be. But while I think the show’s okay, I don’t think it’s the best medium for you … your blog is awesome and the TV format kinda loses something in the translation.

  I’ve posted a critique here, but please know that I mean it with respect and loving criticism. Feel free to comment or write me directly if you want clarification — and above all else, congrats on trying something new!

• [Anonymous]

  Will the video content be captioned? The intertubes are so slow with keeping up accessibility. New version of Flash comes with a captioning program, but it’s not enough to get people used to captioning!

• [adsyoung]

  Congrats on the move guys.

  If you can manage to put your loyal readers to work as journalists in the field and get some follow up and more info on interesting stories as they appear, that would no doubt produce some awesome TV.

• [Anonymous]

  is this going to be available over TIVO like other vlogs (rocketboom, cnet, crankygeek, ect.)??

• [grow-a-brain]

  Congratulations, Mark et. al.!

• [thebutler]

  One of the best things on this episode was the IT commercial. Now I know why CEO’s play golf.

• [Tomasz Gorski]

  That was pretty boring, except for the theremin thing. Sorry but I must agree. Regards

• [CZ]

  Xeni,

  Was the ‘Max Headroom’ homage intentional?

  -CZ

• [octopede]

  I like the idea! Not so sure about the talking-head approach, but this could be the beginning of something interesting. And any opportunity to see more Prelinger material put to good (re)use is fine by me.

• [Stefan Jones]

  Ooooh, neat!

  I hope BB-TV sends a reporter to the Klingons vs. Furries paintball battle. (No, that isn’t a real event, but now that you’re big media you can MAKE it real!)

• [wormtown]

  gotta gotta gotta get this on Miro!!!

• [The Unusual Suspect]

  Fail for the use of Flash.

  (Thx Xeni for the direct video link!)

  Win for everything else!

• [Rodney]

  Ye gods! Is this the beginning of an empire?

• [jungle]

  Good show. Keep it up.

• [Brian Damage]

  Why isn’t the show posted on the Miro guide? I want to subscribe!

  For those who haven’t tried Miro, check it out. Free community-created internet TV.

  http://www.getmiro.com/

• [OM]

  …Xeni, we’re expecting at least one episode with you in a really hot bikini! :) :)

• [Doran]

  My eyes! They burn!

• [Anonymous]

  Gosh, how am I supposed to watch this at work… I think I’ll stick to the quiet version – Thanks for5 Boing Boing!

• [Geno Z Heinlein]

  The Unusual Suspect> Om, Geno Z. [sic] Heinlein, regarding bikini remarks, speaking of fail: http://xkcd.com/322

  Okay, I just got home from work, so I’m bored and cranky, and definitely not in the mood to be scolded for nothing…. I’ll feed the troll.

  Xeni’s hot. Xeni’s smart. If she didn’t already have an SO, I’d propose. She’s the kind of woman I dream of. There would be something wrong with me if I didn’t want bikini pics!

  So, seriously, what’s the deal? What could possibly be wrong with finding Xeni attractive? Or with saying so? Please bear in mind, I’ll be somewhat harsh with any reply that implies that Xeni can’t take a compliment, or ignore a little flirting if she just doesn’t care for it.

  PS: And just for the record, if you read very precisely, I didn’t actually request bikini pics. I did think it was funny to juxtapose the two comments.

  P2S: The preceding postscript should in no way be construed as a lack of interest in bikini pics of Xeni, which would be simultaneously hot and cool.

• [Aaron T.]

  My thoughts exactly, Unusual Suspect.

• [Ferry]

  Thank you guys for giving me yet another distraction from my molecular biology homework

• [Bill Higgins– Beam Jockey]

  Put Teresa on, now and then.

• [Wolves Evolve]

  Congrats…this is the next best to a return of Disinfo TV.

• [invictus]

  So far, the space of a month, we’ve seen two major announcements, for a total of four new things (bb site redesign, the return of comments, and the bb Gadgets blog, and now bbTV).

  Will the trend continue? Is bb poised to challenge Google in the latter’s quest for world dominance?

  Stay tuned for next week’s episode of bbTV to find out :)

• [Sue Grant]

  Congratulations on your new foray into television. I can’t wait till you get your episodes on Miro.

• [jordan314]

  This is exciting! The bits could use more introductions / transitions, but I also like that it’s short and to the point.
  Nice work!

• [Mister N]

  Congratulations Boing Boingers, the website looks better, Joel Johnson is on B.B Gadgets, readers can comment on the wonderful things on the site, BB podcasts and now BoingBoing t.v.

  it just gets better…..

• [Seth Goldin]

  This is great, but it should be a video podcast. Is it? If so, what’s the feed URL?

• [t.a. adjuster]

  Nice work! I do think you need an RSS feed with enclosures, ‘cuz I know I’m not going to be able to keep up with sussing out and downloading the FLV each day. I suspect I’m not the only person who would like my “podcatcher” to pull this down and have it waiting for my portable media player.

• [Banky Edwards]

  In other words, “BoingBoing, but with clips from ‘The IT Crowd.’”

• [Anonymous]

  Are you going to provide subtitles? In the meantime, how are deaf people supposed to access this?

• [JB Lavin]

  Oh wow.

• [Xeni Jardin]

  Hey guys! Thank you each, very much, for your gentle comments. :)

  RSS feed and the ability to subscribe via iTunes will be live ASAP. Hopefully Wednesday October 3, the day on which we were *supposed* to launch anyway. We just couldn’t wait.

  Direct video link here, for those who have probs viewing Flash: Link

• [Werner Egipsy Souza]

  Somehow, I am used to just one blog at a time… so seeing Mark and Xeni together is a little out-of-sync for me.
  Talking about links..like listography.com… seems out-of-sync too… cos I would check the blog for them, anyway!
  Ofcourse, the more I see of Xeni… the better ;)

• [Geno Z Heinlein]

  Q: stinkingpig> How are 1-5 minute video clips going to make that better?

  A: om> …Xeni, we’re expecting at least one episode with you in a really hot bikini! :) :)

• [t.a. adjuster]

  My podcatcher just grabbed an FLV enclosure from the new feed! Zow. Ask and you shall receive. Rocking.

• [The Unusual Suspect]

  Om, Geno Z. Heinlein, regarding bikini remarks, speaking of fail:

  http://xkcd.com/322

• [Anonymous]

  Is it fitting that this announcement was made after the post about the baguette wrist pad?