On Monday, the City of New York will begin a five-day test on their new computerized voting machines — one borough per day.

At the same time, Linderman's top computer programmers will be conducting a test of their own. They will be testing a program designed to rig the election without alerting the New York Voting Authority.

And that's where you come in. I need everyone here, each day, to reverse the manipulated votes in order to expose the flaws in their system and shut them down.

Tell everyone you know to help. You don't need to be technically gifted. I will open a portal and provide the tools needed to achieve our goals. Anyone can help make a difference for the future, from the very youngest among you to the very oldest.

So sleep well this weekend. Next week is going to be busy.

HG

..........
If Linderman wants to rig an election to put Nathan Petrelli in office, it can’t be a good thing.

We need to stop them together.

With your help, I've opened a portal into Linderman's five-day voting test. Today is day one.

I need your assistance cleaning out the rigged votes in order to thwart Linderman's "logic bomb" - a program coded to put Petrelli in office without the New York Voting Authority becoming aware of it or the people of New York having their true votes matter.

Click the link below to open the portal. You will have 60 seconds to clean as many corrupted votes as you can before the portal closes. Any longer, and they’ll detect us.

Target and click all votes labeled "Candidate02" in order to wipe them from Linderman’s system.

I've also managed to tap into their video conference line. Check back throughout the day. I'll be posting anything I think you need to see and will send you an e-mail or text message when I’ve got breaking news on our progress.

Thanks for your help.

HG

Wow, at least NBC is keeping us busy while the show is on hiatus.

Have you guys been keeping up with Hana's site? It's http://samantha48616e61.com/. Quite a lot going on there. Not to mention new stuff in Linderman's gallery at http://www.corinthianlasvegas.com. But to see the gallery, you have to play the games and rack up about a $360,000 bank.

The three codes that are the latest puzzle on Hana's site are pretty tough, but they have been cracked. Here's a hint: On brianundaunted's site, start with the sonnet and see if you can find what's missing.

I can't wait, only 11 more days until the next episode airs. Oh, and check out the official Heroes MySpace page for a preview video of the upcoming episode.

Last year Dan Hill (ex-BBC, now director of web and broadcast at Monocle) wrote an extremely erudite post on why Lost is genuinely new media. One year on and multiplatform media has a new poster child in the form of Heroes which has taken Lost's exploitation of interactive platforms (and the web in particular) to the next level.

First let's look at NBC's 'official' online offering (which, tellingly, is increasingly hard to delineate from 'unofficial' offerings). In addition to the text-based staples of plot synopses, character/actor profiles and interviews, the site has ramped up the content offer in three key areas: video, take-away content and participative features.

Video

As well as the usual video clips, full episodes can be watched on-demand (in the US) via an embedded Flash player, with added functionality appropriated from the DVD experience of chapter points and exclusive cast commentaries (you can even change the audio levels and size of both video windows - see below screengrab). The site also offers video character profiles and behind the scenes footage. This sort of 'value added' content, coupled with on-demand streaming of full episodes, gives users a compelling reason to watch online.

A while back, I told you "Heroes" fans about one of the newest super people, Hana, known as "Wireless" for her ability to intercept digital information. By going to the Primatech website and filling out a "job application," I opted to receive text messages from Hana in which she conveys "secret" information about the Company. Thus, while we are piecing together the mysteries of the show, so is Hana — and she's providing us with clues to boot.

Today, I received an email saying Hana will need my help next Monday, April 9. That day, according to a new NBC press release, Hana will send viewers directions about how to help her, and the fans' actions will somehow influence the next episode of "Heroes":

Starting April 9th, Hana ... will enlist fans to help with her plans to thwart Linderman's plots. The top-secret online activity will actually interact with the on-air story and will pay off in the Monday, April 23rd episode, when "Heroes" returns to the NBC lineup.

How cool is this? If you're a die-hard fan of the show and haven't yet signed up to receive the "top-secret" notices, you should do so now! What if something you write to Hana ends up on the show? Let's discuss when you

This kind of interactivity isn't completely new — the Hanso Foundation website from "Lost," for example, led fans to new clues. (And, by the way, the site has been updated to include some new, eerie information.) Yet the idea of influencing the actual content on "Heroes" is taking it a new level. What do you think about this interactive project?

NBC.COM LISTENS TO USERS WITH SITE CONTENT UPDATES WITH POPULAR QUOTE GAME FROM 'THE OFFICE,' AND ADDS NEW FEATURES TO '30 ROCK' AND 'HEROES'

NBC.COM LISTENS TO USERS WITH SITE CONTENT UPDATES WITH POPULAR QUOTE GAME FROM 'THE OFFICE,' AND ADDS NEW FEATURES TO '30 ROCK' AND 'HEROES'

Updates Include Quote Game For "The Office," "Marry, Boff or Kill" Game for "30 Rock" and Further "Heroes" Interactivity, Among Others

BURBANK, Calif. April 2, 2007 - NBC.com today announced several new site feature updates -- all centered around interactive features based on popular NBC programming, including "The Office," "30 Rock" and "Heroes." The new features were created in response to user requests. The announcements were made by Vivi Zigler, Executive Vice President NBC Digital Entertainment and New Media.

"One of the best aspects of the digital space is that it's a two way street," said Zigler. "We know immediately how our users feel about our content and can react just as quickly to deliver the experience they're telling us they want."

Each new interactive feature listed below can be found on the shows' sites on NBC.com.

"The Office" NBC.com has just launched "The Office" Quotes Game. The game was originally developed by "Office" message board users who were challenging each other to identify the character who had spoken a specific quote. Now when users get the quote, episode and character correct, they will be rewarded with the video of the scene itself.

In another feature from "The Office," NBC.com asks fans to share with the character Toby, their worst Human Resources nightmares. Users submit video clips of themselves as they tell the online audience about their funniest HR stories.

"30 Rock" -- "Marry, Boff, or Kill" -- is a favorite game used on the show in which the character playing is given the names of three celebrities and has the hypothetical choice to marry, boff or kill them. The online version of the game is similar, only the user has a time limit that he or she has to beat while selecting whom to marry, boff or kill. As the game advances, the time limit shrinks dramatically creating interesting choices.

"Heroes" -- Starting April 9th, Hana, the former Mossad operative who can "hear" the Internet, will enlist fans to help with her plans to thwart Linderman's plots. The top-secret online activity will actually interact with the on-air story and will pay off in the Monday, April 23rd episode, when "Heroes" returns to the NBC lineup. The all-inclusive experience is designed for both fans who have followed the digital storylines from the beginning and for users that are just now joining Hana's cause.

In addition, fans of "Heroes" who are also submitting their own artwork inspired by the show can view their creations on display in a gallery on NBC.com.

As another new feature, viewers and users have been asked to submit their "theories" about what's really going on in the enigmatic world of "Heroes." Selected video theories are being used in on-air promos and will continue through the return of "Heroes" on April 23rd.

A promise is a promise is a promise. I said this week would be devoted to the “novels” of the NBC series “Heroes,” which is basically a comic book come to life. And, well, here we go…

The NBC website houses twenty-five “novels” as of this article’s writing, with art by industry faves such as Michael Turner, Phil Jimenez, Michael Gaydos, as well as others, and writing from lesser known industry writers, whose works include The Covenant and comic adaptations of “Powerpuff Girls.”

The “novels” (the quotations marks come for two reasons: that’s what the site calls them, and the term is a poor attempt to dress up the word comic*) run 7-8 pages, with the first two pages always remaining the same. The first page is a car ad for the Nissan Versa (pictured when they start sponsoring The Outhouse, heh). The second is an introductory page, which went from one of Michael Turner’s best drawings ever (pictured at right) to a simpler black page with white lettering.

But, let’s look at this ad for a moment. Nissan probably pays to cover the cost of creating these “novels” (okay, we can drop it now and call it an online comic). A quick comparison of a random comic from my week’s pull list: 22 pages of story, 12 ads (not counting the inside cover, back cover, or the back inside cover), and only 2 of those are outside ads – i.e. not house ads put in by the same comic company.

The idea of a comic coinciding with a feature is nothing new; movies do it all the time. The marketing idea behind the concept goes as follows: if we want an already built-in fan base to follow a work, find that base and use their common bond to bring them to our product. Sometimes it works for you – Serenity the comic sold extremely well, and Buffy comics are still going strong years after the franchise left television – and sometimes it fails – while Dark Horse continues to pump out Star Wars books, the comic adaptation of Episode II spoiled the ending quite famously weeks before the film was released.

NEW YORK NBC Universal and News Corp.'s new video site might significantly change the game in the network Web site battles, but until it debuts in the summer, ABC.com and NBC.com are trading blows in the race for top broadcast portal.

In February, ABC.com saw a sizable uptick in unique visitors to finish the month with nearly 9 million uniques, according to Nielsen//NetRatings. NBC.com, which was first by a considerable margin in January, had slightly more than 8 million visitors for the month. CBS.com and Fox.com had 5.6 million and 2.9 million February visitors, respectively.

Bruce Gersh, svp, business development at ABC Entertainment, and Alexis Rapo, vp digital media at ABC, said that streaming episodes of Grey's Anatomy, which had a three-episode story line during the month, and Web features including a personality quiz around the primetime drama were the largest drivers to the site. Lost, Desperate Housewives and Ugly Betty also were popular on ABC.com.

Vivi Zigler, evp, digital entertainment at NBC, said that the network site's 13 percent drop-off from January was just a "natural fluctuation" and remains encouraged by her company's digital strategy. NBC said Thursday that it will be adding social networking capabilities to its site and will considerably expand features around Heroes, which is the biggest driver of traffic to the site. Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, Friday Night Lights and 30 Rock also performed strongly on the portal during the month.

A representative for CBS pointed out that it has deals with "dozens of partners," including iTunes and Amazon.com, to distribute online content outside of CBS.com. Jericho and Showtime's Weeds performed well online for the network during February, the rep said.

Fox declined comment on the findings.

Bound by Death and Luck
How would one find a flower? A ray of hope, a light that will illuminate nature's undisturbed process for looming survival. Mankind has a choice. A pathway, a destiny. Care to remind me of those simple times. Kids could be kids. Adults live caring for the world. Harmony lies in equality. I, an outcast, never belonged. Longed to bleach a dark world. Demons that live within the monolithic souls of cruelty. Yet, the hunter turns to the hunted. We hide in the shadows of factual inaccuracies. The light not to be seen. Branded with blindness. A matter of perception, such visions speak greater than words. Pleasantly resolved, convenient for humanity. When will I be free? When will we be free? Fates timed to precision. We follow a path. It crosses with each other. Realize the moment. Awaken. Unite. Ambivalence is not a solution. Blackness is resolved with truth. Love. Beyond walls of hatred, lies purity. Prisoners of silence. Lacking a leader, we have common goals at the core. Trust no one. Fight to avenge and open the eyes of the beast. Prejudice spawns like spores. Find me. Reach me. Email time@primatechpaper.com. My search continues for petals. The flower that drops no trace. A flower. Open your eyes so we can talk. Communication is conductor of truth. At the end there are ultimately many futures. At the beginning primarily, there is only one departure. History is delicate. It begins with one. Many butterflies cause too much chaos. One flap, precise catalyst. To see light again, a rift will be chanced. I grow weary of hiding on the 15. In simple times, we used a courier to tell truth. Analogous to death, invisibility to many familiar people. The irony. Once drowned within homogeneity, yearned to be special. Found air to drown myself bearing a mark. To a flower I speak. May I reach you to end this insanity. Preach the truth. Open the minds. There are no monsters. Only visions that are placed within minds.

Posted By: Jotaro Kujo

In further evidence of NBC’s efforts to use video sharing sites to promote is traditional network programming, the media mammoth is teaming with online company VMix to air clips of “Heroes,” “30 Rock,” “My Name is Earl,” “Scrubs” and “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” on a dedicated Web site “channel.” NBC also signed a pact Wednesday with Break.com to produce an original online TV series.

The deal is the second such arrangement in recent weeks as NBC cut a promotional deal with Google-owned YouTube, which is currently amidst a $1 billion-plus lawsuit by Viacom Inc. for copyright infringement.

Content owners see Internet video and video sharing sites like VMix as a valuable means to promote its prime-time programming. However, as the Viacom case demonstrates, they are very reluctant to let site subscribers view their TV shows and movies without compensation.

NBC Universal took its efforts one step further by inking the Break.com deal. Break.com is a video site for men.

This represents the first time Break.com has joined with a major entertainment company to bring professionally produced content to its audience of 16 million unique monthly visitors. The ad-supported series offers brands an opportunity to sponsor original digital material that reaches a large audience of 15- to 35-year-old men.

The working title of the program is "Breakers," and it will feature beautiful women finding creative ways to break different objects. The series is set to launch in the second quarter of this year.

"This is a realization of our vision of combining the best in original user-generated content with top professionally produced material to create the most compelling entertainment experience for our audience," said Keith Richman, CEO of Break.com.

The availability of content through so many outlets also raises the stakes in the digital right management (DRM) game as content owners struggle to build strategies for protecting their video assets in an environment where they may be viewed multiple times in multiple formats.

“If you are going to have multiformat video for use on laptops/desktops, TVs, and portable devices, you may need to store multiple formats and deliver only the one that’s appropriate,” explained Tom Nolle, president of CIMI Corp.


Spending on DRM software and hardware to protect entertainment, commercial software, and other information will exceed $9 billion dollars over the next five years, says a new market research report from Insight Research Corp.


By the close of 2007, total worldwide spending on DRM will reach just over $1 billion, and by 2012 business spending is forecasted to grow to nearly $1.9 billion, according to the new research study.

Unlike some of its competitors, VMix is interested in more than just video clips. The firm inked a pact with Tribune’s interactive unit in January where it will provide tools the media giant’s dozens of Web sites including ones operated by the Los Angeles Times and Newsday