Online Video the Fastest-Growing Medium.

“Having gone from zero to mass market globally in three short years, online video is the fastest-growing media platform in history, according to a new report from social media research consultancy Trendstream and research firm Lightspeed. In one week in January, 97 million Americans viewed a streaming clip online — as many as are tuning into any major broadcast network — according to a recent survey of 1,000 U.S. active Web users ages 16-65.

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Network effects; youth vs adults; reshaping publics

Social media is not new. Media has been leveraged for sociable purposes since the caveman's walls. Even in the realm of the Internet, some of the first applications were framed around communication and sharing. For decades, we've watched the development of new genres of social media - MUDs/MOOs, instant messaging, chatrooms, bulletin boards, etc. Social media is the latest buzzword in a long line of buzzwords. It is often used to describe the collection of software that enables individuals and communities to gather, communicate, share, and in some cases collaborate or play. In tech circles, social media has replaced the earlier fave "social software." Academics still tend to prefer terms like "computer-mediated communication" or "computer-supported cooperative work" to describe the practices that emerge from these tools and the old school academics might even categorize these tools as "group-work" tools. Social media is driven by another buzzword: "user-generated content" or content that is contributed by participants rather than editors. But for the last few years, everyone's been abuzz with the idea of "social media." Right now, those who want VC backing need to bake the "social" into any Web 2.0 app they create. There are many new genres of social media that have gained traction here: blogs, wikis, media-sharing sites, social network sites, social bookmarking, virtual worlds, microblogging sites, etc. These tools are part of a broader notion of "Web2.0." Yet-another-buzzword, Web 2.0 means different things to different people.

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Nation's First Green Gym to Run On Human-Generated Energy

Shedding pounds and expending energy is no longer just good for you – it's also a way to give back to the environment. The Green Microgym, based in Portland, Oregon, is the nation's first gym that aims to use human-generated energy from clients as they work out. Adam Boesel, the gym's owner, hopes that in the future the gym will run entirely on the energy generated by clients. While the science behind generating energy from spinning wheels – commonly used in much of the exercise equipment installed in gyms – the issue at hand thus far has been how to adapt the technology and find the right equipment. A Texas-based company, Henry Works is currently developing a device called the Human Dynamo, which Boesel's Microgym hopes to use. The dynamo connects a number of exercise bikes with a battery that stores the energy generated as people exercise. Appliances like lamps or televisions can then be plugged into the box in order to utilize this power. Although installing the energy-generating equipment is expensive, if gyms can pony up enough to do so, they stand to save significantly in the long-term. And as with all technology, the expectation is that the further the concept is developed the more affordable and viable it will become.