YouTube offers $500,000 in storytelling contest

YouTube launched a new competition on Thursday involving stories, half-a-million dollars, and Ridley Scott.

If you fancy yourself as a bit of a storyteller, then you might be interested to know about YouTube’s latest project. And by storyteller, we don’t mean people who can read bedtime stories to their little ones in an impressive range of voices and accents – we mean original, engaging tales that could captivate an audience of movie goers.
YouTube announced details of the Your Film Festival on Thursday, and here’s the deal: you submit a short video that’s story-driven—any genre is OK, and format too (eg. short film, web-series episode, TV pilot).
Come June, the videos will be voted on by YouTube users around the world. The makers of the 10 videos which most impress voters with their storytelling prowess will win a trip to Italy to open the 2012 Venice Film Festival.
There, a Grand Prize Winner will be selected. And the prize? A $500,000 grant—yes, that’s half a million big ones—which the winner will use to make a brand new piece of work. The icing on the cake is that the winner’s idea will be produced by the legendary movie maker Ridley Scott and his highly talented team.
The free-to-enter competition is accepting submissions from February 2 and must be in by March 31. The Grand Prize Winner will be announced in Venice on September 3.
If you think you’ve got what it takes to spin a decent yarn, dust off the video camera and get filming. It may be the break you’ve been waiting for….

Sega ToyLets - Bathroom Video Game Concept

Sega displayed a new game concept for male bathrooms at Digital Signage Japan 2011. They actually displayed it in the bathrooms at this show, getting a lot of attention from attendees.

"We think guys have experienced aiming at a variety of things when they go to the bathroom. Here we want them to progress through a game when they aim at a target in the toilet. We think this is a completely new concept where they can play a game without using their hands or fingers."

The system comprises a game unit that includes a speed sensor and LCD screen. The speed sensor attached to the urinal measures the speed of the stream, and the game play progresses according to that speed.

"First, an infrared sensor detects when a person approaches, and changes the screen to the game ready display. Next, microwaves hit the stream of urine when the person urinates, and it reads the reflected microwaves to detect the speed of the urine stream. The volume is then calculated by the speed and duration of the urination."

Since the volume of urine is calculated from the speed, the average amount can also be calculated. In this demonstration the volume is measured for a game to display individual rankings, and Sega are now developing a game for players to compete against people who have used the toilet before.

"We are looking to drinking and eating establishments to install this game first. The advertising screen in it can be refreshed if it is JPEG data, for example, if the bar is being used for a party after a wedding it could show the faces of the bride and groom. That would be pretty funny if the faces of the bride and groom appeared in the toilet. Customers are coming up with quite a few interesting ways to use it."

YouTube Upgrades Its Android App

YouTube has just updated its Android app to version 2.3.4, and while the changes aren’t exactly groundbreaking, they do add-in some pretty useful new functionality.
Regardless of if you’re a big video watcher, or someone who’s more into uploading your own clips, there should be something in this release to catch your interest.
The introduction of a “watch later” queue brings that feature from the web-based YouTube to its mobile app. As you discover videos you’re interested in viewing, you can easily add them to your queue, and then watch them later at your leisure.
Uploaders should pay attention to the change in clip info editing features, letting you revise the metadata associated with a video while you’re still in the middle of uploading it.
Finally, the app gets a Google +1 button, giving you another tool to show your support for your favorite YouTube vids. The updated YouTube 2.3.4 is available in the Android Market now.