Lucid Media

enric wrote this 4:56 am:

Jeff Pulver & Chris Brogan invited videobloggers to attend VON which I found quite worthwhile. After some session I thought they were too presentational. You know, talk for 75-90% of the time and Q&A the rest. So as we met at different times, I had some suggestions to Chris. On the barcamp end I recommended open discussions with a strong moderator so that one or two individuals don't take over the conversation. On the Vloggercon end, I recommended something like the Bullshit Cards. These cards, I believe, are invented by the astute vlogger Andreas Haugstrup Pedersen. If someone in the audience disagrees, thinks the speaker is saying bullshit, they should raise the card. The people on stage have the option to have the card raiser respond. The card doesn't have to say "bullshit", but could be less confrontational like a "not" card (as in the Modonna or Borat "Not!")

Now that a few days have passed since VON, what I found most promising is taking two groups of individuals:

• Media Innovators (videobloggers, open software media developers, etc.)
• Media Industrialists (TV network representatives, Media Advertisers, etc.)

and create innovative ways they can meet, present aspects of their work, and get to know each other. The recommendations above are a few that can be considered to break down the separation between the innovators and those in the industry. What I recommend is to brainstorm and try different methods, mock them up and see which works best. Then iterate and improve. There's much that can and will develop in new media, let the games begin!

Filed under: Practical
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enric wrote this 6:15 am:

Interestingly the discussion on Amanda leaving Rocketboom has branched into a defining videoblogging. Now I see accurate models of entities as powerful and useful. For instance, Mathematical models of architecture allow the freedom to design new and revolutionary structures often in a few years. Prior to this in the Middle Ages, it took generations to build a cathedral. While the cathedrals are beautiful, there are few and large groups of people devoted their entire lives to constructing them.

However the danger in defining is dictating ones non-objective views and taste on an endeavor. This is what appears to be the purpose of some who'd like to narrow "videoblogging" to a style or method like "personal" videoblogs. This would be a hinderance to the growth and vibrancy of videoblogging for which a lack of stated definition is preferable. It is better to trust the wisdom of individuals acting in aggregate practicaly toward videoblogging than imposing a definition that excludes expressions.

However, I see that videoblogging has been around long enough with a large enough population for me to take a stab at a accurate definition. There are two aspects to videoblogging:

• Technological architecture
• Individual behavior

The physical architecture is the easy and apparent part of videoblogging. And it was defined early on. Currently wikipedia states:

A vlog is a video which uses a blog as its method of distribution. Regular entries are made and presented in reverse chronological order. A typical vlog entry combines an embedded video or video link with supporting text, images, and metadata.

Vlogs often take advantage of web syndication. Web syndication allows the distribution of video over the Internet using either the RSS or Atom syndication formats, for playback on mobile devices and personal computers.

So the physical aspects are:

• Video in a blog format with entries in reverse chronological order
• Which use syndication (like RSS or Atom) for distribution.
  Note: Syndication is not always considered a requirement

The human behavioral aspects I have observed is that people require personal control and distribution of videoblogging. From freevlog tutorials on how to shoot, edit, upload and present videoblogs on your own to numerous and continued questions on how to encode, techniques of shooting, hosting sites, etc. on the videoblogging yahoo group, the apparent feature of usage is personal control in creating media without requiring approval from a gatekeeper. For distribution, when a service like Veoh violates individual control of distribution -- contradicting the creative commons licenses of vlogs -- videobloggers will not stand for it. So the behavioral aspects of videoblogging are:

• Personal capability and control of creating a videoblog entry
• Personal control of distribution (syndication) of one's videoblog

Combining the technological and human aspects of videoblogging, I propose the videoblogging definition of:

Videoblog: Video in a blog format with entries in reverse chronological order that can be syndicated for distribution. The creation and distribution of the videoblog entries are personally controlled by the videoblogger(s) without approval required from any media gatekeeper.

Update on July 10, 2006: I have modified the part of the videoblogging definition from "The creation and distribution of the videoblog is personally controlled..." to "The creation and distribution of the videoblog entries are personally controlled..." This change is to the first comment by Steve Garfield that the individual posts or entries are being created and modified, not the videoblog itself. Thank you Steve for the clarification.

Update March 2, 2007: Adrian Miles, Steve Garfield and Michael Meiser have put up thoughtful and important responses to this post. I have been away doing other things and will respond soon.

Filed under: Objective, Practical
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