Video Blogs

First was lonelygirl15, a fictionalized series of confessional video blogs on YouTube made by an actress posing as a home-schooled girl. Then came "Prom Queen," a Web teen soap opera backed by former Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Michael Eisner. Now there's "Afterworld," an online animated series about a man who wakes up to find most of the world's population has vanished.

If a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? Updated to the digital era, the Zen koan could be: If a word is uttered in a podcast, can it be found by a search engine? The modern quandary, at least, now has an answer. Two online services are using voice recognition technology to translate speech in podcasts -- as well as the latest twist on the form, video blogs -- into text that can be searched for specific words, names and phrases.

Maryland recently gave a big "dislike" to employers asking for social media passwords, becoming the first state to pass a bill banning the practice. The state Senate and House last week passed their versions of the bill that prohibits bosses from “requesting or requiring that an employee or applicant disclose any user name, password, or other means for accessing a personal account or service through specified electronic communications devices; prohibiting an employer from taking, or threatening to take, specified disciplinary actions for an employee's refusal to disclose specified password and related information; prohibiting an employee from downloading specified information or data.” "We're really excited," said Melissa Goemann, legislative director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland, of the bill's passage in an interview with the Baltimore Sun . "We just think this is a really positive development, because the technology for social media is expanding every year, and we think this sets a really good precedent for limiting how much your privacy can be exposed when you use these mediums.

When I ask the Young Turk what stands as competition for his Internet video show on politics, he pauses for a beat. "Sh," he replies. "I just don't see them yet, thank God. The competition will come at some point and we don't want to be overconfident. But at the same time, right now, we have huge market dominance. " While many others have talked about new media forms and breaking down barriers, the self-styled Young Turk, a.k.a. Cenk Uygur, has administered his own wrecking ball.

Ultimate Blogs Masterworks From the Wild Web Edited by Sarah Boxer Vintage: 344 pp., $14.95 paper * IN 2008, are blogs really so foreign that they need explanation? The premise behind "Ultimate Blogs: Masterworks From the Wild Web" indicates that they do.

WANTED: Restless thirtysomething L.A. indie rocker seeks similarly situated working musicians for experimental new band with time-sensitive mission. Start now, write 10 to 16 songs fast, record album, make video and perform first show in less than 60 days. Make big opening splash. Then, break up and go separate ways. That's the gist of an ad placed on Craigslist July 29 by Giovanny Blanco, former VJ, struggling singer-songwriter, father of two. The concept of a band with a predetermined life span arose from a documentary he is doing on aging musicians and what makes them keep on truckin' in this digital age, when any wannabe with a computer can make music and be heard.

WHETHER we're talking online entertainment, commerce, technology or the Web in general, digital culture is so protean and chaotic, so subject to overnight zeitgeist, that, as far as its future goes, the less said, the better. That said, there are a few "spaces" to watch as the Gregorian calendar clicks off another year and the end of the first Internet decade comes into focus.

USC's Mike Garrett is studying game film on a screen in his Heritage Hall office -- but there's nothing secret about what the athletic director is watching. It's Trojans football -- on his computer. The game is a replay of an FSN telecast that is being streamed through the USC website. The Trojans' online channel, however, intends to go live as often as possible when teams are playing -- including volleyball, tennis, golf and baseball. Trojan TV All-Access is USC's version of sports webcasting.

On some bright, parched morning back in the Old West, folks must have heard grumbling as a boy nailed a list of new town laws to the wall of the saloon. And when they saw the sheriff and his fresh-faced deputies looking on with a satisfied grin, that's probably when they knew the West wasn't going to be so wild anymore. A similar scene has been playing out digitally at YouTube, the Internet's video town square. In addition to its long-standing campaign to crack down on illegally copied material, in September the site outlawed videos depicting drug abuse and last week tightened its guidelines further to restrict profanity and sexually suggestive content.