Euan Semple with some well founded concerns about the rush to audio and videoblogging.
[…] the video was simply imparting factual information that I could have got better from text - including the hyperlink that David had to hold up scribbled on a bit of paper and speak two or three times in case I missed it!I've already posted some reasons why I think podcasting is an inefficient way to deliver information, Euan has more in his post. Ultimately it comes down to what "mode" people are in when reading blogs or listening to audio or videoposts. Most of the time when I'm sat with my computer, I'm in "lean-forward" mode – wanting to interact, multi-task, click away at a hundred different links in a hundred blogs. When I'm in this frame of mind, I even find it hard to pay attention to a 3 minute music video deliberately designed to hold the skittering attention of the MTV generation, and I'm just not going to sit through repeated "errms", coughs, and general boring randomness, just to get to the few useful nuggets. Now, when I'm watching TV, or travelling to work and listening to my iPod, I'm in "lean-back" mode. My demands for interaction are vastly reduced, and I'm prepared to watch and listen. It sounds promising, but in this space the competition for my attention is even hotter. A-V bloggers are up against the might of mainstream media and their production values (and budgets), and so far they're losing. To be fair, how can they really compete – this isn't like blogs, where it's all about conversations, authenticity and information. Now it's all about my attention – it's all about entertainment:
Love the lean-forward and lean-backward distinction, Anu. Definitely recognise the two approaches.
I tend to agree with you on the lean forward lean back stances as well as teh limited natural of video blogging in the present tense. However as tech increases and time advances there will be certainly those who do instill the higher production values and efforts into reproducing or overcomming the mainstream media, These people who will be most effective will be articulate and effective in delivering the message. Another important attribute ofa successful video blog, will b e the limited nature of length. A thirty second clip or sixty second clip will be the most effect manner of delivery.