Daily Archives: September 7, 2007

CBC New Media sites upgrade and consolidation

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I just noticed that CBC Radio 3 has finally upgraded three massive sites for which I designed the backend software seven years ago, while living in Vancouver.

Mind you, they did also run the innovative Zed site in the meantime, but the latter has now passed on after four TV seasons. On the other hand, 120seconds.com, newmusiccanada.com and justconcerts.com have all been consolidated as sections of their main site.

My team and I built all the software used to run and manage the three sister sites, while the interface design was handled by a stream of super creative artists. Features included audio streaming, Flash-based UI (120seconds) and components, admin tools up the wazoo (for admins, DJs, artists, etc) and quite a bit more.

I think six years worth of use isn’t a bad ROI. If nothing else, I can’t be blamed for not designing and writing long lasting software. And it did score them a Webby nomination (though heavy.com wan this one).

Gotta love Steve Jobs

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You really have to admire Steve Jobs. Whether you like him and his style or not, you can only admit the guy’s got one massive pair of cojones:

Do you know how many CEOs dream of writing something like that (either version)? Both of the above pretty much say the same and the official one is just as gutsy from a market’s perspective.

Arrogant? Probably. Right on target? I think so.

Being an early adopter has its ups and downs, and seeing a dramatic price reduction a couple of months after the initial release is one of the latter. Although usually, the rest of the industry holds for as long as they can, when sales start going down, to lower their prices. Just look at the new Motorola RAZR2 being released at US$599. You know it’ll be free with activation in 3-6 months from now.

Sir, I salute you. Now if you could just personally come and manhandle our Canadian telco executives to sell the darn thing here, and I’d be all set.

Although, maybe the wait will be worth it?

Update: maybe I’m on to something with the above HSDPA wet dream… See here.