Video Content, Flip Cameras & Video Editing

Lauren Davalla and Kira Jastive of Public Relations presented a handful of videos, produced by the department using Flip video cameras and shared using BUniverse and the BU Now blog. Public Relations is now using Flip video to respond to breaking news and build a library of content around evergreen topics. One video interview with Cutler Cleveland on the oil spill was later repurposed in a BU Today story. Kira and Lauren emphasized one of the main benefits of creating your own video content: it can be repurposed across many social channels (blogs, Facebook, BUniverse, Twitter) and help to promote experts outside of the university.

Jean Connaughton (CFA) explained that she had been playing with an HD Flip video camera at the Tanglewood Institute, and said that Flip video is a good way to share an event without having to rely on an external crew — a new way to showcase events that would otherwise go uncovered. The group also discussed the quality and options available when comparing Flip-type quickcams to more expensive digital video cameras (optical versus digital zoom, software for editing, etc.)

Kim Cornuelle of BU Today offered her suggestions on video editing: the staff uses Final Cut or Avid for videos and iMovie for slideshows. They also use a conversion tool, MPEG Streamclip, to convert videos for iMovie. She offered that while videos edited using Windows Movie Maker and iMovie will not be as clean looking as Final Cut videos, they’re a fine (much more affordable) standby.

To conclude the discussion on video, Mary Tunney offered to look into scheduling a workshop with a freelance video editor to go over filming and editing techniques. She will have more details on this in the fall.

QR Codes

Susan Lebovits of Sustainability presented briefly on her investigation of QR Codes with an outside vendor. She explained them as a type of barcode that can be added to posters or other print media, and then scanned by smartphones to bring users to specific websites. They are looking to try the technology in the fall for Sustainability promotions. Specific websites/tools discussed included ScanLife and Stickybits.

WordPress Upgrades & Facebook Integration

Scott Dasse of New Media came by to answer questions related to WordPress. Many groups are migrating their websites over to WordPress in the near future. Scott explained that many “shiny” widgets (such as Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr stream tools) are not currently able to be added directly to sites because they require editing of the theme, while others can simply be embedded right into a WordPress “text” widget. He emphasized that many of these “shiny” tools will actually hold up load time of the page, which is why they have not yet allowed them. As a workaround, they could investigate building something custom in WordPress (as part of the theme) that would be allowed for general use.

CFA said they use social media (mainly Facebook) often to announce changes to events, which is easier to update than the website itself. SMG also asked about inclusion of the “Like” button, which Scott said made sense to include. He also mentioned that a gallery widget is in the works, and should be available soon. Corinne Steinbrenner pointed us to the Collegian current issue on the CGS website, and their use of AddThis on individual stories (example). The tool can be directly added to the story without the need for a widget request.

Upcoming Events

Mary opened up the floor for event announcements which might require some coordination from the Social Media Communicators. We’ve compiled the list, including applicable hashtags and web addresses, and placed them in the “Communicators” section of the blog (Kerberos login required). If you are a Social Media Communicator and are unable to access this section, please send a request to jemack@bu.edu.

(Image courtesy Damon Duncan on Flickr.)

BUniverse

Ben Agoes (of the Creative Services group) presented on BUniverse, a video portal for the BU community (students, faculty, staff, alumni and our editorial team at BU Today) to share content. The BUniverse project is headed up by himself and Scott Dasse (New Media), and is currently in the beta phase. While full-scale promotions will launch in the fall, BUniverse has been integrated in many locations including the Dean of Students site, BU Today content and the BU homepage, and has been quietly gaining a following on Twitter and Facebook.

BUniverse fulfills the need for a video portal that can be tailored to BU-related content, while still tapping into the power of YouTube’s resources. Videos can either be uploaded through the site (which then uploads the video to BU’s official YouTube channel) or can pull metadata from an existing YouTube video. Tags can be added to categorize videos based on courses or colleges, which have already been populated in a smart search field to help categorization.

Contributors require a BU login to upload content and comment on videos, but anyone can view, share and embed BUniverse content. The community is moderated by Nelia Ponte (Editorial) and staff to ensure that videos and comments are within BUniverse’s Terms of Service. The top video on BUniverse has nearly 5,000 views as of 05/25, and there are currently more than 20 videos on BUniverse with over 500 views. Agoes encouraged all departments to upload their content (lectures, event videos) to BUniverse to further populate the library.

Daily News Digest

Jo Breiner (Public Relations) spoke with the group about a recent change she’s made to the Daily News Digest, a collection of news articles concerning Boston University that is sent internally to just under 300 staff and faculty members each day. She has begun using bit.ly for most of the URL’s so that she can track the number of clicks in an e-mail and gain insights on which pieces are of most interest to the internal audience. She also advised everyone to be mindful and not share videos of news coverage from our tracking service outside of the university. She stressed that while we may pass around the videos internally as much as we’d like via e-mail, we do not have the rights to distribute them externally on websites, Twitter or anywhere else.

Other Issues

Mary Tunney (Public Relations) advised the group of Public Relations’ plan to be visible at orientation and work with parents to connect with BU on Facebook and Twitter accounts (and help them get set up on the services if needed). She also updated everyone on the status of Boston University’s new Community Page on Facebook, and that we hope to know more of Facebook’s direction with Community Pages and privacy standards in the coming week. For some background on how Facebook Community Pages are currently affecting higher ed, read Michael Fienen’s “Facebook Hates Your Brand” on .eduGuru.

Next Meeting

Our next meeting will take place on Tuesday, June 29th, and a couple of our Communicators will present on their trial experience with social media monitoring software Radian6. Mary requested that the Communicators e-mail her with any other topics they’d like to discuss at the next meeting.