Sander van Zoest: Behind the Scenes

These last few months have been very exciting and thought provoking. After working on many interesting and challenging problems to create an ecosystem of content, software and consumer electronics at DivX, I decided it was time to take a break. I have had a fantastic time working with some great folks on the underlying technology that powers a video on demand service in Italy, a whole new digital home platform named DivX Connected that is designed for portability and low cost embedded devices and building an architectural foundation to enhance productivity and maintainability for the company as a whole. It was a great experience and I would like to thank Jordan Greenhall for his trust in me and the opportunity to contribute to DivX.

I wanted to spend some time at home with the family. Doing this has been one of the best things I could have done. It clearly has created a much closer bond with my daughter and I have been able to catch some key accomplishments of her. It was uncertain for me as to how long I would be spending at home, but as soon as people found out I was spending time at home, I got a lot of inquiries, proposals and offers for new positions all around the world. The time off also allowed me to catch up with a lot of friends and old co-workers which was very needed as well.

There were a lot of events, such as DivX going public on NASDAQ and the Google/Youtube deal, that brought even more inquiries about when or if I would join another company again or if I would be interested in joining the founding team of some media startup, etc. All this buzz, did get me thinking about what I was going to do when I wanted to join the work force again. I contemplated on starting something on my own and spend a few years doing research. All of this opened a lot of doors and gave me an opportunity to keep my brain thinking about the online media space while spending time at home with the family.

After dozens of discussions with some outstanding teams and organizations, I decided to take on a Director of Operations role at a stealth media startup created by proven entrepreneurs who had put together a world class team of whom a few I had already worked with at previous companies or met through my involvement with Open Source. So, far I am really liking what I am seeing and applaud all the effort of the team that has put together what exists right now. It is truly amazing that this got put together in couple of months.

The company has been very quiet, although, recently has started to come more out of hiding and has said we can now talk more publicly about our jobs and the company we work for. Right now, the organization is publicly known as The Venice Project, but it will be re-branded at some point in the future when we are out of beta. If you are interested in what we are doing check out the company blog or sign up for a beta test account.

So, here starts another chapter in life. As I have come to realize, change teaches you a lot of things about what you had and what you have been missing out on. I am looking forward to learning more about both.

A few days after my last day at DivX, I had some of my old co-workers informed me that Electronic artist BT (also known as Brian Transeau) was in the office. Obviously, being a big electronic music fan and I was bummed to hear I missed out, but simultaneously happy to hear DivX was working with BT. I have had his latest album, This Binary Universe, for more then a month now and it is quite an experience. I am normally not that much into downtempo type music, but combined with the video it sets a very different mood. I wish I could have gone to one of his screenings, but I rarely get a chance to go to a show these days. I think the last show was seeing Satoshi Tomiie at the Karma Lounge of On Broadway several months ago.

Anyways, you will find the BT track named 1.618 in DivX HD 720p with high quality MP3 Surround audio on Stage6, which is nothing short of amazing to watch. Unfortunately, I do not have a 5.1 setup in my studio or office, so I was not able to take advantage of the MP3S audio encoding. However, having listened to the DVD I must say surround sound is a must have. I tried to play back the HD clip on our Philips DVP 5960/37 DivX Ultra Certified DVD Player, but it said it didn't support 720p via the USB drive. Which is not surprising, but it was worth a shot. I would only assume that this would playback on a HD capable player, such as the I-O Data AVeL LinkPlayer2. If you have 5.1 speakers hooked up to your computer, or you simply haven't seen the beauty of DivX in HD before. Be sure to check it out, otherwise enjoy it in Home Theater with MP3S.

Also, be sure to watch the very candid interview by Alastair "Digital56K" Mayo at BT's home in front of a Elektron Monomachine.

BT talks about the creation of his latest album This Binary Universe in depth. He discusses how he found the animators, how he financed it and its tour among other things. It was also interesting to hear his thoughts around being a new father and how that relates to his music. It reminded me of my experiences with my daughter while messing around in the home studio. BT also talks about music discovery via the internet and how it is truly a curse and a blessing for someone who does music for a living. He mentions that his records did not bring in any money and how compensates other artists when he likes a particular track. He mentions a variety of ways to find music including one of my online favorites BeatPort. He makes a brief mention of csound and how he integrated orchestral works into his album, but the one hour interview focuses primarily on what it took to create his latest album.

All and all, some great new content on Stage6 provided in its signature quality. Enjoy!