Why user-created video is so popular
Cory Bergman September 6th, 2006
In reading the press release on the Motionbox story below, I read a quote from the company’s CEO that is worth highlighting. “For 99% of people, online video is about sharing moments, not creating professional video presentations,” said Chris O’Brien. This is a very simple point that eludes many mainstream media people who still don’t understand why user video sites have devoured the online video market with a bunch of “stupid videos.” YouTube and MySpace and Google Video and the like are popular because they empower people to easily share their best video moments with their friends and family for free. Take YouTube, for example, which receives 65,000 videos a day. That’s 1,950,000 a month. Only a few of those clips “pop” on a mass media scale and see a ton of traffic. The rest are viewed just a handful of times by friends and family and other interested parties, which as an aggregate is a ton of traffic. The long tail of video. And these “stupid videos,” if they involve your friends and family, are a hell of a lot more relevant than 99% of the stuff on TV these days. So while mainstream media still shakes its head and can’t understand why people would think user-created video is more relevant than the high art they produce, well, they’re destined to fail in the long run. All in all, I think this is the greatest missed opportunity for television companies in recent memory.
17 Comments Add your own
1. Safran | September 6th, 2006 at 1:30 pm
I get asked this a lot. “Isn’t 99% of the stuff on YouTube crap?” (As though we don’t put crap on TV.) But it’s a bad question. People who take snapshots don’t aspire to be professional photogs. If they’re making a video for three friends, and all three watch it - that’s a 100 share. And if those three watch it, and it’s two minutes long, that’s six commercial minutes the network just lost on one “crap” video.
THAT’s the point.
2. Allusionist (sic) | September 6th, 2006 at 1:46 pm
Cory, I’m not sure your point “alludes” anyone. Perhaps you are alluding TO something … or perhaps you mean it “eludes” mainstream media? But like good grammar, professional video has its place. No-one with a brain would dismiss the importance of user-generated content. But this is not an either-or choice. The advent of the Super 8 camera, and the home DV camera more recently, did not put Hollywood’s talented storytellers, writers and artists out of business. It simply created the opportunity for more people to create their own stories — sometimes for themselves, sometimes for a broader audience, and sometimes for both!
3. Cory | September 6th, 2006 at 2:34 pm
Ah yes, the grammar police. Thanks for dropping by and being so respectful.
As for your real point, it’s not an either or choice, but mainstream media has barely any involvement with user-created video (MySpace, iFilm are exceptions, both of which were purchased). So as an aggregate, mainstream media is not taking it seriously enough.
And yes, a television company that avoids user-created video will ultimately go out of business.
4. thedetroitchannel | September 6th, 2006 at 3:17 pm
needless to say, i thought i had the grammar police so fucking busy they’d have left everyone else alone.
5. Jason | September 6th, 2006 at 6:17 pm
My flickr site which consists almost entirely of snapshots of my 1 year old son has had more than 20-thousand views. Granted, many of them come from my mainstream media tv station blog, but most of them come from family and friends.
That’s a lot of views of stupid pictures.
6. Leonard | September 6th, 2006 at 7:10 pm
>mainstream media has barely any involvement with user-created video… So as an aggregate, mainstream media is not taking it seriously enough.
I’m not sure that’s entirely accurate. I think perhaps it could be more of a case that the cost of creating the infrastructure to support the amount of content that would show up just isn’t in people’s budgets or timeframes to implement. I know we’d love to have more UGC, and we’re getting around to it, but the implentation jn the short term is just too steep, especially when there’s already other players out there you can link to.
7. Deirdre' Straughan | September 6th, 2006 at 11:47 pm
Except for those few that “pop”, mainstream media is rightfully uninterested in the long tail - their business is in the big head, they’re all about the big audience. So don’t blame them for not getting it - whether they get it or not, it’s just not something they can do anything with. They should keep doing what they do well, and leave someone else to figure out what to do with the long tail. And there are plenty of contenders for that.
8. Cory | September 7th, 2006 at 12:45 am
I see both Leonard and Deidre’s points, and they’re valid. I still believe, though, that mainstream media should have tackled this aggressively from the beginning.
YouTube says it has 60% of all online video traffic, which I haven’t heard anyone dispute. MySpace and Google Video and the rest of the user video sites are gaining fast, so conservatively, all of them combined are at least 60%, if not 70%.
How can TV companies and movie studios, which basically own 100% of television programming, allow themselves to be squeezed to a minority share with online video?
Just to say it doesn’t have a clear revenue model or is too costly or isn’t a core business isn’t good enough.
9. Alyssa | September 7th, 2006 at 9:46 am
“mainstream media has barely any involvement with user-created video”
My former boss (who happens to be Safran) utilized viewer video for things that New Englanders cared about, especially things relating to weather.
I also agree with the point about Flickr. I skip 99% of the stuff on it because i have little interest in the subject matter, unless it is absolutely striking. Though random photosets tend to get popular if there is nudityor erotic imagery involved…..
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