I found it fascinating to see people’s comfort zones and boundaries with video making being pushed at this gathering of YouTube participants in Minneapolis.
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I think it was ok, but it was a bit much. I guess my question is – does vlogging mean not editing? Is there anything that says it’s good to just let people talk on?
Something to think about.
Milt
Hmm. Well I did edit the piece with an eye toward trying to bring out certain themes, such as some of the different reasons people participate in YouTube. Obviously there was way more footage than what I have here. Still, always interested to learn when people feel the footage is just running on rather than serving what I saw as an organized transmission of themes.
One of the things I see media scholars do is to talk about how it is more theoretically rigorous to focus on what “ordinary” people do with media such as making videos. What I liked about the person who talks about video blogging is that he details how he got into making media through blogging first. He has a kind of history in terms of his media making. Many media scholars that I am seeing do not take this into account, and therefore I do not know what they mean by “ordinary.” I think they could benefit from hearing some of the varying histories of video bloggers, many of whom are quite experienced making media. Photographers who have started to video blog are another good example. Also, I left a second question to him, which was, can he connect with other artists on YouTube? Here he says that it is not always possible because some artists are more interested in display rather than social interaction. I thought that was a nice juxtaposition of questions, for instance. And so there was definitely deliberate editing going on in the service of specific themes.
Ah yes, it’s true what you say, from a scholarly point of view. But may I offer another way to look at it. It seems to me that if people get bored when the watch something, then no matter how scholarly important the piece may be – it won’t actually communicate that to other folks. As an artist, I’m always aware that what I’m doing might be just something I think is fun, or interesting, but one must be aware of whether what you are doing is merely self-indulgent, or actually “says” what you want to get across. If the audience falls asleep, or leaves, or clicks on something else, then what good is it?
Just something to think about, and in reality I did watch all 9 minutes of the piece but I tended to get lost in what the folks were saying – I couldn’t keep concentrating on what I was seeing.
Milt