Mediolana: Soon to be Heard on the ‘Vine!

While we at Mediolana do not necessarily subscribe to the thesis that as surely as night follows day, video has superseded text, we are well aware of the new art form that is sweeping the Internet: Vine clips! Our CSO is arranging the installation of this remarkable new App as we compose this here blog post. For now, we’ll leave you with this thought: Flugtag!

A New Look for Twitter: Mediolana CSO’s Account in Microblog Makeover Sensation!

The more observant of our readers will have noticed that this blog enjoys multi-directional connectivity. Our tweets are published here automatically, as well as to our Facebook page; all blog posts receive the full ping treatment to the world’s two most popular social networks. (Links to all of our pages can be seen at Mediolana.com.)

In the full spirit of social media, we are delighted to announce that our Twitter account has a brand new header. But what does this photograph signify? All will be revealed later in 2013!

Can Florrie Rescue Pop Culture from The End of History? Article Now Posted at Mediolana.com!

Regular readers of this blog should surf to mediolana.com’s creative section where the above article on one of Europe’s most sensational musical prospects awaits!

IP Numbers: China Now World’s Number One Patent Applicant!

China's #SIPO overtakes the USA's #USPTO to become world #patent leader measured by applications received; #Japan patent office now 3rd #JPO—
Asad Yawar (@Mediolana) March 06, 2013

#Turkey overtakes #EU average on ™ applications, outscores #USA and #Germany on industrial design applications tinyurl.com/bqdhhro #WIPO—
Asad Yawar (@Mediolana) March 06, 2013

Is YouTube Killing the TV Star?

An article in the February 2013 edition of Wired (UK) had our Creative Director and CSO drawing strange diagrams in his notebook: Talent Tube, a lengthy feature detailing how ‘YouTube reinvented the entertainment business’. With echoes of the famous Buggles ditty – Video Killed the Radio Star was the first music video to be aired on MTV on 1st August 1981 – the take-home message could not have been clearer: a new generation of content creators is redefining YouTube as an effective replacement for television.

In some senses, Talent Tube is actually behind the times: anyone born in the developed world (and increasingly, the world as a whole) after 1990 consumes media – television included – in ways unrecognisable from those born in the 1960s, and for many members of Generation Y the idea of sitting down to watch anything longer than a few minutes, which includes the vast majority of televisual output, seems absurd. But whether online video has really supplanted television in as neat a manner as the article suggests is a rather more specious contention, notwithstanding the fact that YouTube’s organic search capabilities are several steps beyond anything implemented in TV-land:

1. Production Values. For a whole host of reasons, YouTube still suffers from inconsistencies in production values that would have proven fatal for almost any other medium. Even some of the most esteemed content creators – those with hundreds of millions of views – seem to have little or no knowledge of cinematography, editing, scriptwriting or even getting the best out of the incredible camera technology available to them. Without these, the financial rewards associated with ‘deep’ television watching – intense user loyalty and engagement engendered as a result of watching lots of high-quality material – may yet prove elusive.  

2. Qualitative Questions. This point follows on from the first: without a qualitative improvement in the original content being uploaded, there is a risk that YouTube will be perceived as second-tier entertainment – something that has its place, but which is essentially not that far removed from the ‘homemade videos of cats in washing machines’ caricature posited by Elisabeth Murdoch. Even on the Internet, reputations can take years to catch up to new realities.

3. Monetisation. For all the startling figures associated with the Google-owned video streaming giant, only a miniscule percentage of content creators are making any money out of it – even standout channels with hundreds of thousands of subscribers and tens of millions of views are yielding an income of around €5,000.00-€10,000.00 per month, peanuts by the standards of the media industry as a whole. These are not the kind of returns that will entice anything above those willing to accept razor-thin margins – and gargantuan initial time losses – in exchange for a possible shot at glory.

Korea Team Thinking: Samsung Rockets into World Innovation Top Ten!

Korean giant ranks #3 in #BCG survey, up 8 places on 2012; #patent dispute with #Apple 'no distraction' from investment tinyurl.com/aajzh9x—
Asad Yawar (@Mediolana) January 17, 2013

Conversations With Holly: The West London Years

Returning from a busy day location scouting, itinerary finalising + meeting with the CEO of patent geniuses @HollyIPLtd #humanswissarmyknife—
Asad Yawar (@Mediolana) September 16, 2012

Analogue -v- Electronic Entrepreneurship: The Debate Hots Up!

We at Mediolana fully admit that this blog is not amongst the most controversial on the Internet (with the result that most of the time our legal team is distinctly relaxed), but our post dated 1st July 2012 - Pen + Paper > iPhone + MacBook Pro: Entrepreneurship, Old-School Style – certainly ruffled a few feathers; our claim that the time-honoured combination of paper and pen can in many senses be a superior cognitive tool than computers and mobile telephones led to accusations of advocating environmentally-unfriendly practices and not sharing the knowledge ethic of the Internet.

Yet after another session in a glass-dominated branch of Pret on London’s iconic Strand with nothing but a Moleskine planner and some traditional writing implements for company, we are even firmer in our view that there is nothing to match the tactile freedom afforded by them. Even extraordinarily sophisticated telephones with capacitive touchscreens the size of small televisions are nowhere near as liberating or easy to sketch or link ideas on; moreover, the inherent limitation of viewing one screen at a time will likely not be transcended for a long time. Organic peppermint tea has never been so purposeful.

Pen + Paper > iPhone + MacBook Pro: Entrepreneurship, Old-School Style

In today’s Web 2.0, always-connected, smartphone-toting era, it is increasingly uncommon to do anything as remotely pre-June 2007 (or, for our more traditional readers, before the iPhone) as use a pen and paper for high-level executive planning.

Yet this is precisely what the CSO of Mediolana has chosen to do. Tired of forever staring at his MacBook Pro and looking for an entrepreneurial experience even more tactile than an Apple Inc. keyboard, these photographs clearly depict someone utilising a Paper Mate pen together with a pre-Fukushima Made in Japan pink Muji highlighter for those all-important strategic outlining moments.

In this epoch of electronic everything, it is all too easy to forget how constricting and limiting devices of supposedly limitless productivity can be; the simple clarity afforded by a piece of paper and a quality writing implement is in many senses far superior – not to mention cheaper – than anything the realm of electronica has – at least to date – generated. The fact that this photographic record was made possible by the CSO’s iPhone only serves to reinforce this point.

It’s a Wrap: New Japanese Robot ‘Invincible’ at Scissors, Paper, Stone

#University of #Tokyo #robot 'cheats' way to success by observing hand shape of human opponent; applications 'vast' tinyurl.com/7ty5rxp—
Asad Yawar (@Mediolana) June 27, 2012