The remarkable success of Youtube and MSN Video — Web sites that let users view and share video footage — should give pause to broadcasters hoping to determine how television converges with the Internet, writes Michael Geist, who holds the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-Commerce Law at the University of Ottawa.
Youtube’s growth has been fueled, in large part, by the many amateur videos on the site. Those videos — often created and viewed by college students and other twentysomethings — are evidence of a blossoming "clip culture" that relegates traditional TV content to a reduced role, Mr. Geist writes:
These clips should not be underestimated. While user-generated content was previously all but unavailable to the general public — with the forgettable exception of television shows such as "American’s Funniest Home Videos" — the best of user-generated video today attracts large audiences and competes with anything being offered on the major networks. (BBC News)
