Are video blogs on tech productivity ready for prime-time?

[Eric Mack]

I have a favor to ask. In anticipation of my eProductivity.NET site launch, I have been experimenting with adding video blog segments as a regular section on the site. Some of these might be "talking head" segments, but most will be "hands-on" or screen cam movies - essentially "how-to" segments about how I use technology.

I recently posted a sample video blog segment on my personal site in order to test the viability of a video blog and to solicit feedback. David was even kind enough to mention this on his blog. Record numbers of people watched the video, however, few provided me with feedback on likes/dislikes/Interests.

Would you take a look and let me know what you think of the concept of video blogs as a teaching tool? (The topic is RSS, which I know is on at least a few of your radars. If not, it should be.)

http://www.ericmackonline.com/emo/emonline.nsf/dx/really-simple-syndication

While I will certainly welcome your feedback on the content itself, I'm much more interested to know what people think of the concept of a video blog in general.

Do you think that you would regularly watch 3-5 minute videos on the productive use of technology, and if so, what kinds of topics related to "putting technology to work for you" would be of interest to you?

If any of you are so inclined, I would really appreciate it if you would blog something about it or otherwise put the word out; I'd like to get feedback from as broad an audience as possible. Feel free to post here or to contact me off-list. (emack@ica.com)

Thanks in advance

Eric

 

[mondo]

Hi Eric

I think the idea is great, but the irony of your first topic is interesting.

The issue with a video blog is that you need to be at your PC online, whereas the rss and other approaches allow us to view the data offline, and on handhelds, etc.

If I see something I like the look of looking at the rss feed of your site, I'll probably need a NA about it, so that when I am next at a computer I can take a look. Being video, its something I'll most likely leave till I get home, as I don't want to download on the corporate network.

On the plus side, the format is more personal, and the viewer can get a better feel for the bloggers emotion as they're talking. Practical examples will work better too.

I think the pluses will outweight the minuses, and am interested to see how the technology evolves.

 

[Eric Mack]

Do I have any egg on my face? (disconnected vs on-line)

Hi Eric

I think the idea is great, but the irony of your first topic is interesting.

The issue with a video blog is that you need to be at your PC online, whereas the rss and other approaches allow us to view the data offline, and on handhelds, etc.
...
I think the pluses will outweigh the minuses, and am interested to see how the technology evolves.

Mondo, you bring up an excellent point. It is kind of funny (now that I look at it) that my first topic would happen to be on RSS and the significance of the disconnected paradigm and yet I present it in a format (video blog) that requires the viewer to be on-line. Two things were at work: First, I wanted to find a compelling topic and second, I had many clients that I felt were overlooking the significance of what RSS could do for them. I became passionate about both. Thanks for catching the humor in that.

Despite this, it is encouraging that you found the video blog of value. I'll consider that a vote for the video blog as a possible presentation tool.

Eric

 

[mochant]

OK, it is a bit ironic

Eric:

While there is a bit of irony to your choice of subject, I think there's tremendous value in the presentation. I look forward to seeing where you go with this.

Ultimately, as RSS evolves, it may be possible for the syndication to deliver the video as well as text and images. Of course this would require broadband to be practical but with the steady rate of adoption of always on, high speed connectivity, that's not a big issue in my mind (I suspect that the fraction of the overall computing demographic that regularly uses RSS is also probably heavily populated with broadband consumers as well).

This could be separated from a convention low bandwidth feed by offering a separate "with video" XML feed.

Great work!

 

[bhammersley]

much that can be done

Mondo, you bring up an excellent point. It is kind of funny (now that I look at it) that my first topic would happen to be on RSS and the significance of the disconnected paradigm and yet I present it in a format (video blog) that requires the viewer to be on-line.

There are ways around this. I wrote the only book on RSS, and am just working through the second edition: since I wrote the first one, there has been a lot of progress in ways to embed video and suchlike within an RSS feed. Drop me an email if you want some pointers.

RSS, though, is just the thing for a more productive way of life. Pretty much any repetitive information gathering exercise can be automated into an RSS feed. After reading GTD I started to go through everything I did during the day and coding up feeds for everything I could: I have private ones for my bank account and so on, and you can track FedEx packages in RSS or validate your site with tools I wrote and made public.

Actually, if anyone has any ideas for things that could be better done in RSS (which is basically a NextAction list with a fancy user interface) let me know. I'll code it up for you.

 

[CosmoGTD]

I am on a dial-up, and the video/audio did not work in the browser, or as a separate player. The audio worked though as a separate player.
I still have Windows Media Player 6.4
I hate the hog of the current windows player, so i refuse to install it.
(I bet there are many like me!)

Random Idea:
Actually, an audio-blog is pretty cool. So much is communicated in voice-tone. Perhaps Audio-Blogs would be able to be syndicated and received on portable devices?

I do think both Audio-Video blogs are a great idea.
Its the most natural way for actual humans to communicate.
Face to face, voice to voice.

Coz