Yovav (Jay) Meydad's Personal Blog

A few weeks ago my friend Roy Zu-Arets (disclosure: I created his wikipedia page) who is the most gifted musician and very original composer I have had the luck to meet and I began working on a fun side project that involves music & social media. We call it “The Vibe Of Now”.

The idea behind “The Vibe Of Now” is to create a musical micro-blogging experience – release of original compositions that are created in a spontaneous, immediate, unplanned and instant way and reflect what the composer is feeling at that moment. The entire production process is also very fast. We meet at Roy’s studio in Hollywood three times a week (Mon, Wed and Fri) for 1 hour. It takes us 45 minutes to record a piece, mix the video with stereo audio that we pull out of the recording console and publish the clip to YouTube.

Both of us have worked and released products that reached millions – I have done it in the internet space at Snap, JDate and ICQ and Roy has worked as a composer, pianist and producer with many artists, performed in prestigious halls in front of thousands and produced platinum and gold albums. But this small side project has its own magic and is very exciting for both of us. Users from all over the world send us their feedback on the music videos and how they touch them. Our YouTube channel metrics are growing week after week – the number of daily views, subscribers (now is a good time to become one), friends, comments and ratings.

A few days ago we reached a new major milestone with the release of Roy’s first solo piano solo album (after a 20 year career of playing, producing and composing with and for others) called “Confessions of a Composer”. The album features selected tracks from the first series Roy released to YouTube during the summer of 2009 plus a few bonus tracks recorded with guest musicians. You can buy the album on iTunes , Amazon or order as physical CD.

We are also about to put the “The Vibe Of Now” concert. It will be a very original and different show from a typical piano recitals, and it will feature the album pieces, variations on a theme of known songs but with some twist, and original compositions that will be composed during the concert together with the viewers similar to the process that happens at the studio. If you are interested in bringing Roy to your venue, university, tech-conference, town hall or your next corporate event, please contact us.

Next for us are a few additional mini projects:
* A special album for the holidays which is being finalized these days (Update: It is now live)
* Collaborations with some of LA’s finest musicians
* A 100% live session that we will stream to the web using UStream and twitter
* And probably a few more fun projects since the tools we have in our hands allow us to do almost anything and take it to the masses.

Last thing – this project would not exist without users’ feedback. So if you have one for us, a request, suggestion, media inquiry, touring/booking request or a testimony/album review, please contact us using this form or on twitter – royzuarets or jaym.

Can’t believe it has been a year since the previous visit of the Israeli New Media Delegation to Los Angeles. Next week it will happen again and I will participate in it for the 3rd year in a row (see my post about the 2007 visit).

The delegation is organized by Yossi Vardi and Arnon Milchen and its purpose is to give young Israeli start ups the opportunity to meet with potential investors and executives from large media companies and pitch their companies and products in a speed dating format (participants — make sure you practice on your elevator pitch).

I will take part in a breakfast panel where the participating companies will meet a few Los Angeles based Israeli executives for tips and advise, Q&A and some networking. Together with me the panel will also include Alex Sirota from Yahoo/FoxyTunes, Roy Bahat from IGN Ent., Yair Landa ex President of Sony Digital and Leor Stern from Google. After two years of sitting together on this panel, I will miss my friend Nimrod Lev who recently packed his staff and family, left Fox/MySpace and moved back to Israel.

In addition to days full of meetings, the participating companies will also enjoy some fancy cocktails and dinners, LaLaLand style. So if you happen to be at the BetaSouth event next week in Santa Monica, you will have a chance to meet them over there.

Finally, here is more information about the visiting companies as provided to my by the organizers.

1. AnyClip enables consumers as well as professionals to find any moment from any film ever made. AnyClip seeks to create a new revenue model for Hollywood based on our core belief that clips have value as standalone content. With scale and efficiency, AnyClip will bring three nascent business models to the movie industry.
2. BloggersBase is a platform for discovery and delivery of premium user generated content, targeting newspapers, media companies, bloggers and readers. We aim to solve the problem of user-generated content overflow, of uncontrolled (usually low) quality. BloggersBase offers its solution as a white-label platform (B2B) and as a target site (B2C).
3. Dopa Music operates a background music service customized for each website and context that brings a whole new sense to online content. Dopa Music service is based on a sophisticated algorithm (patent-pending) that selects the best tracks in real-time based on more than 100 parameters. Site owners can pay monthly subscription or enjoy service for free and receive commissions on audio ads played at their site. Dopa Music secured seed funding from Israel’s Chief Scientist. Erez Perlmutter, Founder, former VP BizDev at Kasamba sold to LivePerson.
4. Funtactix combines the best of AAA game and web technologies to bring console-quality, multiplayer gaming to the browser. The studio’s end-to-end, white-label solution turns popular franchises into profitable online gaming communities through avatar-based, high-end game content and microtransactions.
5. IPgallery is a privately held company with more than 40 deployments. Its solutions deliver highly scalable, flexible and reliable solutions enabling SPs to deploy new revenue generating services.
6. MAGYX develops “Smart Content™” – unique interactive solutions combining high-end technology and content, powerful marketing platforms empowering the communication between end-users, media platforms and advertisers.
7. P-Kama operates Rummikub.com, an online platform for family style entertainment based on the world’s 3rd bestselling board game. The game attracts players of every age, including Baby Boomers and young teens. It connects to family values which are enhanced by social media features. An average of 15 minutes playing each game makes Rummikub a powerful tool for promotion and customer retention.
8. PicScout – With 85% of the images detected by PicScout on commercial web sites being used non-legitimately, there exists a vast opportunity to track, protect and monetize images on the internet. PicScout™, through its proprietary image recognition technology created a new era in image copyright protection, is now leading the way to authorize the image marketplace to become a legitimate internet economy.
9. Tweegee.com is a pioneering destination site designed exclusively for kids. The site empowers children and pre-teens ages 7 to 13 to express themselves creatively and safely through an innovative and customized online environment. Tweegee integrates social networking, digital content and interactive tools offering kids a complete web platform. All the online communication is protected with technologically advanced safeguards including the patent pending “wordup!”, giving the parents the reassurance they need to protect their children. Tweegee was recently reviewed and qualified for meeting the standards of the CARU kid’s privacy safe harbor program in the USA.
10. Qlipso is your den and your favorite sports bar all rolled into one. It’s an impromptu online party with your best friends from FaceBook, your favorite media from video, game or music sites – all synched up and live! Avatars, webcams, voice and text chat – Qlipso brings it all together!
11. XSIGHTS service allows consumers using their cameraphone to transform any static objects, (products, newspapers, magazines, wall-posters, books…) to an interactive multi-media experience. XSIGHTS is the only company capable to identify many links within the same image. The links may be, as small as, a “single-word” in a text document or a “street crossing” on a map, thus activating classified listings, product catalogues, advertisements and street maps. The user can navigate and view different links within the same session. XSIGHTS mature and field proven solution is operational with or without the need to download an application to the phone.

Photo credit: Menetnashté (On Vacation)

I have known Roy Zu-Arets since our sons attended the same day care a few years ago. Since then I have been closely following his unique journey in life which includes music, Judaism and a constant struggle of a musician trying to make it big.

After all, it is not easy to do what he is trying to do given his background. He started playing piano at the age of 3 and began his professional music career at the age of 12 (!). In his early twenties he was already a busy music producer, composer and pianist in Israel. He played with many artists, produced mega hit records and concerts like Rita‘s “A Great Love” 4 times platinum album and tour, HaYehudim (The Jews) debut album called “Separate Reality”, one of Meir Banai’s albums and many others including Guy Zu-Aretz (his brother) upcoming album. He wrote scores for movies and theater and had a successful and busy career in the Israeli music industry. But then he decided leave everything behind and went after his dream – move to the US to become a musician in the premier league. He first spent a few years in New York where he attend Julliard & Mannes music academies, and then he moved to Los Angeles where he is trying break into the small, close group of Hollywood movies score writers. In the mean time, he is slowly establishing impressive milestones n the US which including producing Taking Back Sunday’s “Where you want to be?” platinum album, and writing MacHeads soundtrack, but he has not gotten to work on a really big movie since in Hollywood it is very difficult for a “nobody” to become “somebody”.

This might change though, very soon, thanks to the way he uses YouTube to share his talent, music and work process with the masses. Every morning, as part of his warm-up, he improvises melodies based on his mood and feelings. None of these melodies were composed before and he does not memorize notes – he “simply” plays the melody that is going in his head at that very moment. His studio neighbors, owners of a video production company, heard him play and suggested to video tape those short improvisations and publish them to YouTube as part of a documentary series called “Confessions of a Composer”. The videos are recorded using two iPhone 3GS phones, the sound is recorded separately using Roy’s studio equipment (thus the high quality), and then they mix and edit everything to a short video clip that gets posted to YouTube. This entire process happens 5 days a week, Mon-Fri.

I predict that it is just a matter of time until one of Roy’s improvisation videos will become a major hit on YouTube. Naturally, the variation on a popular songs tend to get more traffic and views (probably not enough views given the quality of these videos), like Jason Mraz’s “I’m Yours” (see embed below), Michael Jackson’s Earth Song and Black Eyed Peas – I Gotta Feeling. But the improvisations are even more fascinating to watch, as they truly show his qualities as a composer and pianist.

From what I have gathered from Roy, the amount of feedback he has been getting after a few weeks of daily videos submissions is unbelievable. This includes comments, ratings and many emails from YouTube viewers from all over the world. More than that, a well known Hollywood director who stumbled upon one of his videos and loved it, already came to meet Roy at his Hollywood studio.

So, here are two video clips that illustrate how talented and versatile he is. My recommendation is to subscribe to his channel as well as go back and watch all the videos uploaded since the project began on July 13th. You will get a daily injection of heavenly and inspiring music from such an extraordinary & gifted talent.

I am attending OMMA Hollywood today. Snap has a booth ad the exhibit floor and I am spending my time meeting people at the booth, and listening to sessions & worskshops.

The exhibit floor is pretty compact with about 50 companies that have a presence here. Once cool product has caught my attention so far. It is called Snaptell (no connection to Snap.com) and it offers image recognition based mobile marketing.

One of their offering is called Mobile Movie Explorer, which is a very impressive mashup of mobile & web technologies. Snaptell utilized Amazon’s web services and their image recognition technology to provide movie reviews sent back to the phone. Try it – simply take a picture of the cover any DVD movie with your camera phone, send it to dvd@snaptell.com, and check your email.

While most the Israeli Internet scene got together to shomooze at iDrink 7 in Tel Aviv, a selected group of them showed up last night on the red carpet of the Beverly Hilton for the reception event. I had the pleasure to be there and meet in person very smart and creative folks who came to LA to impress the local media giants with their ideas, products and passionate personalities.

The reception was the end of a long day which started early in the morning in a breakfast/panel with a few Israelis who work in US media companies: Nimrod Lev, Shaul Olmert, Roy Bahat, Tal Pink, Sam Gonen, Itzik Ben Bassat, Ofer Shaked and myself. Later on, the delegation hopped on busses and went to visit MTV, Sony and other media companies. The format of all the meetings was very similar to speed dating – each company had two minutes to pitch their product to a group of executives, and then companies and executives could spend more time together in one on one meetings.

Personally I find three companies to be very interesting and with great potential: Prime Sense (technology/device that can see, track and react to user movements outside the computer), Musestorm (widget creation, syndication & distribution) and InnerActive (advertising in mobile gaming – check out Adidas ads inside the Fifa game).

I look forward to meeting the participants of the 2008 delegation which I am sure will be even more successful.