Brook and I went to our second NY Video 2.0 meetup at Webster Hall last week and the energy was very different this time--I would call it "angry and excited," like a crowd gearing up for a protest. The crowd was protesting against the "televisionification" of online video. Sites like Hulu, NBC and South Park Studios are great for watching "tv" on your computer, but that is not really what online video (or the Internet) is about.
The Internet is about an individual's work standing or failing on its own. The July NY Video 2.0 Meetup was a little different then prior meetups. It was a town hall style meeting with the focus was on individuals whose work has integrity, the "Content Kings." These are a half dozen panelists who are successful web video artists. The panelists shared experience and offered some inspiration to the artists and content creators who want something more than Leave Britney Alone and Chocolate Rain out of the Internet medium.
Several topics were discussed, from monetization (aka "cashification") to the next generation of technology. The first topic though, was a surprisingly emotional one, what do we call this new art form? "Web tv" was rejected immediately as being too restrictive. It wasn't settled exactly how we should label the varied video content we see online. The consensus seemed to be that the word used for online video would in some way define this new generation of content. Personally, I think we should just call it by the medium it is viewed: online video, tv, or dvd. Why label it at all when we can let the work speak for itself?
Perhaps the question of what to call online video, and what online video is to become are really the same question. In which case, it would be really disappointing if online video just became "tv." However, I tend to agree with Shakespeare, "A rose By any other name would smell as sweet," and if we still have innovators producing content like we saw last week, I don't care what we call it.
Posts
