"Television is called the new medium. Its called a medium because nothing is well-done"
- Fred Allen (1894 - 1956), on the radio program The Big Show, Dec. 17, 1950
I wonder what he would have thought of YouTube?
I really don't know any other video hosting site as well as I know YouTube. By far it is the king of free video hoasting today. Other popular sites are trying to catch up, or get some 'market share' of their own. I see that GoogleVideos and YahooVideos exist now but they don't seem to have as polished an interface or appearance. Originally what attracted me to YouTube was the ammount of original content, and lack of excessive advertisments complemented by the white background color(although now there are adds on every video site, even them.) In fact, GoogleVideos is actuley pulling most of its content from YouTube and allowing Google users to organise them. Only a few videos on the feature page were from video.google. And, of course, in an act of shameless self promotion, all of the recommended videos were from video.google. The YahooVideos seemed to have more variety as far as where the videos were coming from(their original hoasting sites). It seems as if YouTube is the only site where the bulk o the videos hoasted are its own.
My brother and I have even used it for school(heck I'm doing just that right now aren't I?). He is in a film class right now and has to rent all different videos all the time, and they are often out of them by the time he gets to the store or library(he's not exactly prompt about doing homework...some boys) So in terms of providing homework help in libraries YouTube could be a valuable resource. If librarians can post videos on how to use services provided by the library, perhaps more people would use them if they knew how? YouTube can also be used to promote libraries as useful facilities that serve a purpose in communities. They could post video testomonies from patrons about how the library helps them, or videos of fun activities. However, librarians would have to get premission from individuals in videos, and locations as well(not all library activites have to happen at the library).
We can find almost any of the videos he needs to see in 10-15 minute clips online for free. We just preload all the clips and go to the next one when the first one is done. The quality may not always be the best, but it serves his purposes and does so for free and at his convience.
I'm sure this violates some kind of laws somewhere, but the problem is YouTube can change its terms of service and contracts in weeks or days if they want to while laws can take years to be passed. Clearly YouTube has the upper hand here.
For one of my classes we learned about an anthropologest Mike Wesch at Kansas State University. He says on his YouTube account,
"My videos explore mediated culture, seeking to merge the ideas of Media Ecology and Cultural Anthropology. Currently we are analyzing anonymity and pseudonymity on YouTube, throughout the web, and in the "real world" throughout all times and all places. You can check our progress at http://mediatedcultures.net/"
It was his video I posted way back in the beginning of this blog, and I'll be posting another one. The video below is about an hour long, you don't have to watch all of it if you don't want to. 5-10 minutes is plenty to get the general idea, but if you like it i recommend watching the whole thing.
Also Podcasts.
I don't use podcasts personally, I haven't had a use for them. I just got an mp3 player last year, before that I listened heavily to radio and still enjoy it time to time, but the mp3 player lets me listen to what I want when I want to without interruptions, and to replay things, skip things, etc. However, I still like radio.
It seems I've been doing something similar to podcasting for years. I'm doing it right now. I'm listening to some video on my computer instead of watching it, and I switch to that when it sounds interesting to see. I do the same thing with my computer or with radio. This is nothing new to me, I do a lot of multytasking. It's not the same as podcasting, but the idea is the same, to make use of that time on the bus in transit, or while waiting for something else to begin. I don't like it for use as a primary tool, such as listening to podcasts in place of regular addendance to meetings or classes. I don't think they serve well for that, well, not for me anyway.
And eAudiobooks
I am not really a fan of audio books either.
I really, really love reading.
I'm a good listener too, but I like reading because I can use my imagination, even if it is just an audio book on, say, something Library Science related. Maybe I don't want to hear the inferences in the readers voice, maybe their voice irritates the heck out of me. Well, I can always read it myself.
Unless I'm blind that is, in which case, this is a great service. It is easer to share audiobooks now then before, and they can be shared by more people then brail books can be. Even if I were blind I'm sure I would be irritated by the way the books are read...I just know it.
I looked at eAudiobooks but was not impressed. I would not use it just to listen to a book being read. Perhaps for conference speeches or somthing like that, but never for fiction, or even some kinds of nonfiction.
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