Reviews, Views and Adventures in Content Creation

Sunday, August 1, 2010

Vlogging For the Masses

In Andymooseman's comment on my last blog, "Why Do People Create on YouTube," he categorized himself as a hybrid of the first and third of the categories I mentioned - in short, someone who enjoys creating on YT for the sake of self-expression, but someone, at the same, who is open to exploring social media as an entrepreneurial opportunity.

It occurs to me that there may be a pathway to creating additional (monetary) value in the vlogs that Andy, Kenrg, OhCurt and many others create on a regular basis.  These vlogs are the modern equivalent of the opinion/commentary pages in your local newspaper (and now are as slashed to a bare minimum).  I'm not writing so much about the "Letters to the Editor" section, but the guest columnists that provided a community or individual voice on issues at hand.  These personal perspectives and anecdotes often provided the reader with a distinctly personal and  independent view apart from the "usual suspects" of reporters and paid columnists. 

Of course, guest columnists were never paid - but I still wonder if that concept can be adapted for the social media world.  Blogging, of course, has a robust presence on many news sites, but I would think that guest vlogs might even be a more attractive draw for the casual visitor.  

Guest vlogs on mainstream news and information sites, in turn, might help bring vlogs of this type to a larger (YouTube) subscription base - which in turn provides new opportunities for the vloggers themselves, reviving interest in this particular category, and widening the YouTube universe.

2 comments:

  1. Great idea Rich & i can see the possibilities as well. I'd certainly be interested in doing something like that, especially as i have a wide range of interests & opinions! That's one of the reasons i started my blog. To talk about things i might not discuss on YouTube.
    I know this "cult of the amateur" would upset some people. But, i do see a future in it. Especially in this day of the iPad. That local newspaper could have a link straight to your vlog.

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  2. Interesting - I never really thought of it that way, but I suppose many of my vlogs are "Op-Ed" type pieces. But certainly not all of them, and I usually think I'm doing more of the Op-Ed thing when I'm blogging.

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