SmibsTV Blog » Smibs Inc. http://blog.smibs.com Blogging From Inside the New Media Revolution Wed, 06 Jul 2011 16:43:36 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 en hourly 1 PREVIEW Episode 33 of ‘Fine Art Photography Weekly’ – Starting your own gallery http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1979/preview-fapw-starting-your-own-gallery/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1979/preview-fapw-starting-your-own-gallery/#comments Mon, 14 Mar 2011 19:54:40 +0000 Christy http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1979 Copyright - © Mike GrandmaisonPeter talks to landscape photographer Mike Grandmaison about his fine art work and the exciting news about the grand opening of his new gallery in Winnipeg, Canada called ‘The Canadian Gallery’ at the end of the month. Educated as a biologist, Mike has a fascination with the natural world and has been photographing it since 1976. Mike is a contributor to several magazines through his imagery and writing and he has produced several best selling books in Canada.

Mike will be live on Fine Art Photography Weekly, this Tuesday, March the 15th at 1:30 Pacific time at http://smibs.tv/live

For more information please visit:

Show Page: http://smibs.tv/FAPW
Facebook: Fanpage
Twitter: @PeterUrban / @Smibs
Vimeo: Fine Art Photography Weekly Channel
You Tube: Smibs.tv page

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1979/preview-fapw-starting-your-own-gallery/feed/ 0 #9 of TFL available for DOWNLOAD: F1 Testing & Tech Update http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1940/episode09-tfl-download/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1940/episode09-tfl-download/#comments Thu, 03 Mar 2011 00:39:31 +0000 Christy http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1940 Peter Windsor talks to Craig Scarborough of ScarbsF1 and former F1 engineer Willem Toet about testing so far this year as well as the upcoming test prior to Australia. They also talk extensively about KERS, aero and analyze team by team with regards to whom is doing what this season. Sit back and enjoy a humor-filled episode as the boys talk technology, predictions and reminisce about the larger than life F1 family.

Episode #9 of The Flying Lap is now available for on demand viewing and for download in audio and video format.

SHOW SEGMENT #1

SHOW SEGMENT #2

For more information please visit:

Show Page: www.theflyinglap.com
Facebook: Fanpage
Twitter: @TheFlyingLap / @PeterDWindsor
Blog: www.theracedriver.com
Vimeo: The Flying Lap Channel
You Tube: Smibs.tv page
iTunes: The Flying Lap Page

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1940/episode09-tfl-download/feed/ 0 Episode 5, February 2, 2011: ‘The Flying Lap with Peter Windsor’ – F1 Testing http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1889/episode-5-february-2-2011-the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor-testing-testing-testing/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1889/episode-5-february-2-2011-the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor-testing-testing-testing/#comments Mon, 31 Jan 2011 18:31:47 +0000 Christy http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1889 We are pleased to speak via Skype from Spain with ex-Sauber driver and
current Pirelli test driver Pedro de la Rosa. In studio this week from his
ScarbsF1 blog, is Craig Scarborough, the very knowledgeable formula one
technical analyst. The three wil be discussing the recent testing of the new
F1 cars and what this all means to the 2011 season.

For more information please visit:

Show Page: www.theflyinglap.com
Facebook: Fanpage
Twitter: @TheFlyingLap / @PeterDWindsor
Blog: www.theracedriver.com
Vimeo: The Flying Lap Channel
You Tube: Smibs.tv page

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1889/episode-5-february-2-2011-the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor-testing-testing-testing/feed/ 0 SmibsTV is now available on iTunes http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1883/smibstv-is-now-available-on-itunes/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1883/smibstv-is-now-available-on-itunes/#comments Fri, 28 Jan 2011 20:42:42 +0000 Christy http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1883 SmibsTVlogoSMSmibsTV shows including, The Flying Lap with Peter Windsor, 4th Down – Talking American Football with Curtis Dixon and Peter Urban’s photography shows, Fine Art Photography Weekly and Photo Espresso are now available on iTunes. Please check them out by clicking on the show your interested in below. If you like our shows, we invite you to give them a rating or add a comment any time!

The Flying Lap with Peter Windsor

4th Down – Talking American Football

Fine Art Photography Weekly

Photo Espresso

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1883/smibstv-is-now-available-on-itunes/feed/ 1 Jan 25, 2011 – Episode 27 of Fine Art Photography Weekly: Marc Muench & Phase 1 News http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1868/phase1/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1868/phase1/#comments Tue, 25 Jan 2011 19:12:40 +0000 Christy http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1868 Today we are profiling talented and successful landscape photographer and SmugMug artist in residence Marc Muench. In addition, we are joined by Michael Reichmann, Kevin Raber (Phase 1) and Claus Molgaard (Phase 1) to talk about exciting news from Phase 1

http://smibs.tv/FAPW

LIVE today at 1:30 Pacific Time at http://smibs.tv/live

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1868/phase1/feed/ 0 Episode 2, Jan 19, 2011: ‘The Flying Lap with Peter Windsor’ – F1 Rules, Rules, Rules… http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1860/episode-2-jan-19-2011-%e2%80%98the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor%e2%80%99-%e2%80%93-f1-rules-rules-rules/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1860/episode-2-jan-19-2011-%e2%80%98the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor%e2%80%99-%e2%80%93-f1-rules-rules-rules/#comments Wed, 19 Jan 2011 16:10:34 +0000 Christy http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1860 This week’s guests include Mark Preston and Todd McCandless, both via Skype. Mark is an ex-McLaren engineer and the current managing director and CTO of Formtech Composites, with a deep background in F1, working with, among others, Arrows Grand Prix and Super Aguri. Todd is the creator of Formula1blog.com, one of the most read F1 blogs on the internet, with over 1.5 million page views per month. All three will be discussing the new 2011 rules, modifications and regulations for the upcoming 2011 season and how they’ll affect the next few seasons of racing.

For more information please visit:

Show Page: www.theflyinglap.com
Facebook: Fanpage
Twitter: @TheFlyingLap / @PeterDWindsor
Blog: www.theracedriver.com
Vimeo: The Flying Lap Channel
You Tube: Smibs.tv page

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1860/episode-2-jan-19-2011-%e2%80%98the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor%e2%80%99-%e2%80%93-f1-rules-rules-rules/feed/ 0 New Show Announcement: The Flying Lap with Peter Windsor http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1849/new-show-announcement-the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1849/new-show-announcement-the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor/#comments Mon, 10 Jan 2011 22:41:51 +0000 Christy http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1849 After months of planning and studio-building Smibs.tv is unveiling its UK studio in London and its exciting new motor sport webcast featuring Formula 1 insider Peter Windsor (@PeterDWindsor). ‘The Flying Lap’ is set to launch, Wednesday, January 12th at 10AM Pacific Time at www.smibs.tv/live. Windsor has a line up of A-class guests during the coming months and will be doing remote shows from races throughout the year. Windsor says “the show is a great opportunity for me to go much deeper into topics surrounding motor sport than is possible in normal broadcast television, it is a privilege for me to be on the leading edge of new media”

For more information please visit:

Show Page: www.theflyinglap.com
Facebook: Fanpage
Twitter: @TheFlyingLap / @PeterDWindsor
Blog: www.theracedriver.com
Vimeo: The Flying Lap Channel
You Tube: Smibs.tv page

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1849/new-show-announcement-the-flying-lap-with-peter-windsor/feed/ 0 Alberta Venture reports on our venture! http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1732/alberta-venture-reports-on-our-venture/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1732/alberta-venture-reports-on-our-venture/#comments Tue, 10 Nov 2009 19:33:55 +0000 Christy http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1732 Alberta Venture
This month, journalist Michael Hingston publishes an article about Smibs in the Alberta Venture magazine. We are honoured to be a part of this very popular magazine, particularly with such a nice article written. The interview, which is the basis of the article, is with Peter Urban, the founder of Smibs. It takes you back to Peter’s days as a race car driver in Germany, through his entrepreneurial endeavors to present day as owner and operator of Smibs.

READ FULL ARTICLE HERE

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1732/alberta-venture-reports-on-our-venture/feed/ 1 Smibs on code: Upgrading to Git http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1709/smibs-on-code-upgrading-to-git/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1709/smibs-on-code-upgrading-to-git/#comments Fri, 14 Aug 2009 15:32:39 +0000 Forrest http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1709 A few days ago, our code repository server froze. Nothing a restart couldn’t solve, but this was the fourth time this month. The computer has been running continuously for a couple years, with a few developers constantly committing and pulling changes, uploading files, etc., and it had apparently had enough. Seeing this as an opportunity to fix up our development process a bit, I wiped the drives, and re-installed the OS.

The first thing I wanted to change was our code versioning system. Our office has been using Subversion (SVN) as our code repository for a couple years now. It’s done the job well, and has saved our butts on more than one occasion, but there were a few things I didn’t like. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I like moving around when I work; hitting a coffee shop in the morning, or taking my laptop to the local bookstore on a hot day. Subversion forced me to always have an internet connection to commit changes or make new branches. As a result, I would perform larger commits, or have branches pulling double duty, which is far from ideal. Further, setting up and maintaining the permissions with ssh and multiple developers is quite a pain on Subversion.

A few of our developers have used Git for some open-source projects, and we all quite liked it. We’ve been talking about changing for months, but we couldn’t justify the effort until we had to re-install everything anyways. We decided to use Gitosis to manage the Git server, setup the permissions, and manage users (good tutorial here). This proved to be fairly simple. I then imported all of our previous projects with git-svn with some help from this post. Next, our system was configured to send out a summary e-mail every time a developer pushed a change. Finally, I modified our deploy files so the servers read the code from our new Git server rather than our old SVN server. The entire process was completed in under two days.

While many of us had used Git before there was still a learning curve. I found a very useful guide called “Git Magic”. It starts off with the basics that all developers should know, but moves all the way to “Git grandmastery” in chapter 7.

Final thoughts:

Git has more of a learning curve than I expected, and is more complicated than Subversion — but it is so much more flexible, that I think it’s worth it. You can really use it however is best for you. For some developers, it won’t be much different than working with svn, but I’m really appreciating the differences. I read an interesting analogy comparing clones, branches, tags, etc. with multiple desktops, windows and tabs. The more options available, the longer it will take for a person to come up with the best system for them, but once they figure it out, they can really fly.

I would love to hear your thoughts on Subversion vs. Git (or any other systems you recommend for that matter). Why do you think one is better than the other?

]]> http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1709/smibs-on-code-upgrading-to-git/feed/ 3 It’s About Time: Thoughts on Teaser Marketing http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1679/its-about-time-thoughts-on-teaser-marketing/ http://blog.smibs.com/posts/1679/its-about-time-thoughts-on-teaser-marketing/#comments Mon, 10 Aug 2009 15:41:14 +0000 David http://blog.smibs.com/?p=1679 Finally…

Finally after weeks, perhaps even months, I can eat and sleep comfortably once more. Finally I can go throughout my day and not break down into a blubbering mess due to critical levels of mental anguish. Finally I can drive from point A to B without having to pull over on the side of the road and contemplate the meaning of my life. Finally… I know what the “August 5″ campaign in Edmonton signifies.

Metaphysical life-altering experiences aside, Edmonton’s Southgate mall recently finished an interesting marketing campaign to generate some buzz about their grand re-opening after substantial renovations. Featuring new stores, new physical outlay and a “new feel,” Southgate created a marketing plan to gain new shoppers and align itself as a legitimate competitor to the monolith that is West Edmonton Mall. How you ask? By simply posting signs around the city that said no more then “August 5″.

picture-1

Southgate's re-opening campaign had Edmontonian's wondering: "What the heck is happening on August 5th?"

Teaser marketing campaigns (definitely not something new or indigenous to Edmontonians) play off of and manipulate the innate human characteristic of needing to understand what is going on. By strategically providing only small pieces of information regarding the actual event/product, advertisers hope to stir up the most powerful marketing tool: word of mouth. In this case, mission accomplished. After only weeks of seeing the signs around the city, I heard numerous mentions of the campaign from all kinds of sources, ranging from newspaper and radio to simple banter between friends. People were agitated by knowing absolutely nothing about something they drove past every day and as a result they spread the campaign around the city for Southgate (at no extra cost).

Probably the most documented case of teaser marketing in recent memory was the 2007-2008 campaign for the movie Cloverfield. Movie advertisements featuring only a shaky camera and a single passing glance of a gigantic monster attacking a city caught people’s attention, but by not mentioning a movie title, release date, or any sort of information that would help the viewers figure out what they just saw, the advertisements caused everyone in the theatre look at each other and wonder out loud “what was that?” They added to this fantastic viral campaign with a website that gave out almost less information then the movie previews but featured videos and puzzles alluding to a post-apocalyptic world, creating more hype towards whatever the hell it was that advertisers were planning on releasing.

The catch to teaser marketing is that with added hype comes higher expectations. After toying with their emotions (as my fragile psyche would suggest) the consumer expects to find a light at the end of the tunnel that really blows them away. Anything less than that and the promoter can face anything ranging from apathy to resentment, severely damaging any hype they had created. Cloverfield did amazing out of the gates, but kind of tapered off by leaving some people expecting more explanation from the promoters as the storyline didn’t finish on a solid note. Southgate attempted to add to their re-opening by hiring performers but, from what I’ve gathered, the event left a few people saying “that’s it?” The teaser campaign can be an incredibly effective tool at drumming up publicity, but due to the hightened expecations a promoter needs to sit down and determine if their product is worthy of the hype.

Tease me all you want, but you’d better have something that’s worth my sanity.

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