Please stop with all this video!

Like many people I've been trying to make more use of video content lately, as it's a technology who's time has most definitely come. Advances in processor and storage technology have made creation that much easier, both in static locations and when mobile, and YouTube has given us all a wonderful platform for dissemination. But what on earth is going on with the choice of what to video and what not to? It seems like just because people can now do video that much easier they think they should do video, when it's not the best medium for what they're trying to achieve.

A case in point was this video from Teachers TV - "Top 10 on the Web - Secondary ICT".

http://www.teachers.tv/video/4946

Now I know they are Teachers TV, so they do kind of rely on video, but a top 10 list covered in 15 minutes? Sure they also have a 50 list to download (although it's word only, and I don't have word on this PC - I know I can convert it easily enough, but should I have to?).

Anyhow, I didn't want to rant, but I predict this will only get worse in 2009. Now that people can turn to video they will, and they will encode things into that format that really shouldn't be there. The beauty about text is that we can scan it, and rapidly assess whetehr it's worth engaging with further. At present this is very difficult with video, and it'll be some time before a similar ability to scan video content is developed.

P.S. On that note, Google are now attempting to index video content so that you can search (and therefore scan) content using text. To read more see this link:

http://labs.google.com/gaudi

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