So, what can we do better next year -- Dakar Coverage?

[Mad Cow]

Originally Posted by Smithy

Of course, the ultimate solution is to get a Rally Radio 4x4 van set up for 2 weeks of expedition, w/a motorcycle on the back hitch to roam and grab video coverage from multiple angles, edit in the biv, get interviews, and beam it all up via satellite link on a daily basis.

Well if you guys insist..........


Waddya think?

[Brodovitch]

Originally Posted by Mad Cow

Well if you guys insist..........


Waddya think?

you just gave me a naughty idea...

[IMG][/IMG]

wanna pair up? we can split the shipping,...

[Lav1200]

Originally Posted by snatchy

- the official Dakar 2012 Media Thread - Pics and Videos Only thread had a few people commenting and discussing. Deleting non info posts would be nice to keep it on topic

That's the only improvement I can suggest... the thread became a bit of a free-for-all. Let's try to keep it to just pics and videos next year.

Great job to all on making this the best Dakar yet for coverage!

[MsLizVt]

Originally Posted by ian408

The calls and Ted's updates from the bivouac were icing on a cake.

Originally Posted by Robear

I also really enjoyed Teds updates from the bivouac. I was captivated by what goes on there that most of the world doesn't get to know. Some of Teds observations of Gordon and how his crew interacted with him were priceless. I figure there are lots more juicy bits that Ted is holding back for the book. So anyway we could get another seat on the truck for more of this inside info next year would be awesome. Maybe Ted would be willing to go back?

Originally Posted by Country Doc

I thought the ADV (and Rally Raidio coverage in particular) was great.

Re: RallyRaidio - that was absolutely my favourite for SURE. It would be great to have other privateers call in. Simon Pavey, for example, would be a good call in if he were running. The more Rally Raidio, the better!

Hi!

We're probably all in agreement that the RallyRadio phone in calls were a huge part of each of our great ADV Dakar F5 experience. Having more people calling in, being their own interviewer and interviewee, would be awesome.

There's one more step, or should I say another additional option, Ustream. Ustream is a smart phone application that's either Free (there's a Professional versiontoo). The Free version downloads to someones smart phone, allowing the individual to send a live stream video up to their account on Ustream.com. There may be a way to have a central ADV Ustream account that everyone could upload to.

Anyone can watch the video while it's live, at the end, the Ustream-er can hit Save/Archive. The video becomes available to watch at anytime, like a YouTube video. There is no limit to how long the video can be, like YouTube videos do. Actually, I believe at six hours of straight videoing it's suggested to stop, save, and restart.

We can also do a search on Ustream "Dakar" for other peoples live and archived videos.

Oh, and this is good too, the Ustream-er can do the video in the dunes, not live upstreaming, save it on their smart phone, then upload it later when they might have better cell coverage, such as in the bivouac.

My suggestion is in addition to having someone from ADV who's our dedicated reporter in the field, enlist everyone we can think of to Ustream. Each team has sponsorship of some sort. It would make sense that they would like to show their sponsors what's going on with their team. Ustreaming is so easy and costs nothing for special cameras or audio equipment.

The options are unlimited as to who can be Ustreaming. The Ted type of guy could be videoing while hanging out in the bivouac waiting for the riders, or live updating the KTM team swapping a motor. The rider could do their own daily interview, or if they're stranded on course for the night they could live stream the antics of other cars and trucks stuck with them. Spectators can live stream their own Mud-Gate or River-Gate as it happens.

The thing is, no matter what someone live streams, it can be saved in perpetuity for use in the future to show their friends, potential sponsors, or maybe it'll go viral.

I suggest you download the Free app, set up a Free account, and try it yourselves. It's not the same process as going a Go-Pro, videoing, downloading to the computer, then uploading to YouTube. Instead it's basically one step, click video on live, click save at the end.

Does this sound like an idea that might work?



Liz



Here's an example, and the link to Ustream.


www.ustream.tv

[Carlos M]

Agree with CBV, a dedicated website merging Mischa's tables, ADV F5 Thread, links to media coverage, competitors info, previous editions statistics, regulations, tweet feeds, you now, all the windows that we have to open every day, and plus. That would be great. Ask an expert section, get previous competitors to answer questions. download kml to fly the stage (bluebull). Predicetd times to next WP and to ASS, though this is more Mischas's department. The same with graphical representation of riders on stages.

Regarding the F5 thread:
If possible, would implement stricter anti-chauvinism policy on the F5 thread. Sometimes it engages in "GO USA" and "france never won a war" mode and it becomes boring and hard to read.

Rallyradio is great, wonder if the F5 core (Doyle, Flood, PackMule and TroySafariCarpente) could just setup a conference call everyday and broadcast that as a radio show.

Hell, if you could get a decent text-to-speach thing that would read every entry on the Firehose, I could listen to it and acctually try to work instead of the F5-scroll down-F5-scroll down-F5-next page-scrolldown-F5 thing.

Aaaand...If we can´t make it bettter, it's OK as it is .

[Boondoggle]

Originally Posted by geode

I think it would be courteous if PM or Flood would remind Baldy the Dakar was coming up so he wasn't caught off guard when his servers get slammed by the F5 crew.

Check me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like he'll remember next year



Other than pruning the media thread a little more, I wouldn't change a thing. Sometimes "better" is the enemy of "great".

The magic of following the firehose thread is that it just happens. I'm afraid that if you try to put an artificial framework around that, you lose what makes it great (someone called it "organic"- I think that's a great adjective for it). One of the problems with rules is that once you start making them, it's easy to make too many, and eventually you end up making some bad ones.

Yes, as it is you get noise, and french-bashing, and off-topic silliness, but that's probably less than a percent of the total. I think that's just the price you pay for 1,000 daily posts that, in the aggregate, are absolute genius.

[doyle]

I think it went great this year. As usual, the RallyRAIDio call ins were excellent. Although for some unknown reason, I never use it, Mischa's work on dakartracker.nl is absolutely priceless. To a certain extent, I think the yearly thread has reached terminal velocity although one think I noticed this year was a lot more valuable contributions by a lot more people and I send out a big thanks for everyone that decided to dive in head first.

My how we've grown

Year - Posts - Views
2012 - 14,173 - 725,667
2011 - 12,452 - 758,577
2010 - 7,138 - 499,864
2009 - 3,362 - 285,430
2008 - 714 - 68,821
2007 - 1,327 - 74,175
2006 - 420 - 30,113

It's great to see more people jump in as it tends to spread the load a bit. The anti-Cyril, anti-Peterhansel repeats got a little old, but it also shows a passion for what's going on and I can appreciate that. Flood, I'm certainly willing to help out with the Cliff's Notes next year!

I am completely convinced that this thread (and the forum) is the single most comprehensive, English language source for Dakar news and information. That being said, I am not so sure an embedded reporter would be as valuable as it may seem. Scotty Breauxman (sp?) expressed a lot of frustration at the expense for just the credentials ($6K), then the costs to use ASO bandwidth, and then the controls they place over the content. Embedded team mates like Deadly99 add invaluable updates but I am not sure how practical it is for someone form one team to roam around interviewing others.

Live, English language (Maray) type coverage would be fun and exhausting for the participants that are working (or pretending to) at the same time.

All in all, it was a great year.

[Mad Cow]

Originally Posted by Brodovitch

you just gave me a naughty idea...


wanna pair up? we can split the shipping,...

"Enter" as a Press Vehicle and all you need to do is get to Le Havre (Sure it's a little bit easier for me 2 hour drive + 4 hour Ferry) ASO then do the shipping

But you will need to drop the Defender off in November

[barrier]

Originally Posted by PackMule

While it's fresh in your minds, what can we do better/different/more next year?

If Toby entes again we just need an 'ADV web cam' on his head and some long life batteries! (48hrs plus)
That should just about do it!

[DC950]

CBV said it all. I don't think it could get better than that.

But realistically, I think we're forgetting that we have this incredible free site right here. A dedicated sight isn't going to be free. Nor do I think anyone is going to dedicate the time to a dedicated site so that it would work commercially. It would be a huge amount of work and it has to successfully compete with a free site. I suggest we work with what Baldy let's us have.

So what to change?

1. Rally Raidio sticky with as many call in interviews as Nate can handle.

2. Cross posting of all pics between the Photo and the F5 thread. There are many good ones that only show up in one thread. I wish there was an easy way to do this.

That's enough for me.

Thanks guys, it's been fun.

[ian408]

I'd have to say if you're going to organize, then no cross posting of pictures. That makes threads much harder to catch up on--especially when there are redundant picture quotes. If you do cross post, cherry pick only a few--better yet, link to the thread.

[Vicks]

I think we lack boots on the ground. Full time ie.,

A pair of 4x4s with a 4 member crew each should be able to get good coverage through out the event. I'm quite interested to follow the 2013 Dakar in such a fashion while taking a lot of videos/pics/interviews at every possible opportunity. Contribution from inmates would go a long way to help put an ADV team for this purpose.

If ever this idea takes off, i'll be glad to perform driver/mech/photog duties as i'm not good with interviewing/PR skills....

where else will my desert driving skills come to use

[Dekatria]

I for one really enjoyed the Firehose-thread. Great source of information, and a great way to share new things. I'll be sure to chip in again next year

starting with a huge anti-Peterhansel post

[Scribe]

Originally Posted by Jadon

A few years back there was a scheme afoot to fund one of the inmates to do the Dakar. How about rather funding a newsman? We all score then, instead of just the guy that gets to do the race, and we can also be certain that we get our money's worth for the full number of stages.......

I am working up a plan to do just this next year. I'm a journalist with 20 years experience as a reporter, photographer and editor. I love the Dakar but I'll never ride it. But I could cover it. I'll be contacting the ASO to work on logistics in the next few weeks. It's my understand that they charge a lot of money for a press pass, so that could be a deal killer if it's ridiculously expensive.

As for this year's coverage, I think F5 had it all going on. I got blasted off the fire hose early on, but the Cliff's Notes version was invaluable, as was the media thread. Rally Radio was incredible. I'd like to see way more coverage of privateers, the "dreamer" types if you will, which is what I'd do if I get over there. Coma and Depres are interesting, but they are also aliens. The magic and beauty of Dakar is that guys like Ned can still do it if they have the will, and the stones.

[Hayduke]

Sorry I couldn't help as much as I would have liked with the Cliff Notes thread, Flood and Packmule; I was often in the mode of "print a shirt, hit F5, print a shirt, hit F5..." It was a miracle I followed as closely as I did.

BY FAR the best year for F5 coverage yet. The sneaky "chatytv" and "justin Tv" links were awesome; thanks for finding those MyWay and everyone else. The Youtube vids of the days coverage were awesome. Maybe a sequence of random numbers as a title, and a link here, would keep them up longer. Of course that would be wrong.

But my favorite, as usual, is the Rally Raidio call in's. I think, if we could get a few more members that are in the race or in the Bivouac to call in, that would make it even better. Maybe a commitment from the F5 crew to fund Sat phones for the guys willing to call in regularly.

Thanks for dedicating so much time to this, Nate and Flood, and Kaia. It was a great year.

PS: and as always, I will ride a bike in the Dakar and make daily call ins in exchange for full ride sponsorship. Your welcome. I'll start training tomorrow.