The DIUS team here at All Together Now grabbed Further Education Minsiter Siôn Simon for a chat about how government can support the use of tech in education.
Video
People like video
In an article on the BBC Technology News page, I read about how the British web-going public are really getting into online video:
British demand for online video sites has shot up over the past year, according to a new report.
Written by research firm Hitwise it found that UK internet traffic to video websites was up 40.7%.
YouTube is the most popular destination, followed by the BBC iPlayer and Google Video.
Which is rather interesting. I remember reading loads of blog posts – locations long forgotten, sadly – last year talking about how people couldn’t be bothered to sit and watch video, and that simple text based messages were the best way to engage an audience.
Using online video, however, is increasingly popular, and government is trying to make the most of this new channel. Downing Street has plenty of stuff going up on its YouTube channel, and DIUS’ channel has been around a while too, and was used to good effect recently as part of their Mature Students consultation.
For a list of all the (known) central government YouTubers, see Neil’s great list.
In fact, mentioning Neil at this point is rather pertinent, as his new department, BERR, have recently started a YouTube channel – BERRtube – featuring some really good content.
One such example is the collaboration between BERR and Yoosk, which saw Theo Paphitis questioning Lord Mandelson on issues raised by the public. Take this example, on the subject of bank bailouts:
What makes this video work well for me is that: it isn’t just a talking head, but an interaction between two people, both individuals are recognisable, it clearly isn’t a ‘normal’ government broadcast and it is nice and short.
Paul Canning has written a fair bit on online videos, especially their role in marketing and making them go ‘viral’. I’m not sure any of the government produced stuff is quite at the viral stage yet. But that is not to say that it isn’t of value, nor that by taking baby steps now, more exciting stuff won’t happen a little further down the line.
A new collaborative community
Helen has launched a new community blogging project over at digtialengagement.org which aims to be:
a collaborative space for all those interested in digital engagement to share ideas and agree priorities for action around digital engagement
This is of a much wider scope than digital mentors, and has the potential to be a real hotbed of interesting and vital debate. Helen writes:
By digital engagement we mean the use of social technologies for social good. What do you think we should do on digitalengagment.org? In the immediate future, we want to use this site to create a digital manifesto, what more could we all do, and do together to get more people online and engage in the right tools for them to help them in their lives.
I’ve helped out by setting the blog up, and will be adding my thoughts on digital engagement in due course. The aim is for the site to be as inclusive as possible, so see how you can get involved.
We are going to have some interesting announcements coming up, including how we are going to try and get this conversation going en masse at the Digtial Inclusion Conference in April.
Cambridgeshire County Council uses YouTube to encourage new councillors
Cambridgeshire County Council have put up some videos on their YouTube channel from the leaders of the three main political groups on the Council.
The aim of the videos are to encourage people to put themselves forward to become councillors.
As the Council’s press release states:
The films represent a first for local democracy in Cambridgeshire, with the leaders broadcasting individual messages on the importance of people coming forward as councillors for the County Council elections, to be held on 4 June 2009.
The videos are classic talking head style, and as with all initial attempts at this stuff, they are a little stilted. But that’s fine, and hopefully these councillors, and others, will continue to use YouTube as a communications tool – after all, with more practice things will always improve.
There doesn’t seem to be a single place for people to go to find out about becoming a councillor anywhere on the web at the moment – there is information on individual council sites, of course, and CLG have some bits too. London Councils have a special site to encourage people to consider standing for election. However, the content is very static and not particularly engaging.
Having some video stuff from councillors explaining what they do and what is involved would be great, I think, along with links to councillor blogs and other information resources. Even better would be some sort of interaction between those who are considering being a councillor and those with experience to pass on. Something to humanise the whole thing a little.
Video hosting services
Whilst beavering away this week in Stockholm on Cisco08, I had a chance to play with a few different video hosting services, namely YouTube, Vimeo and Blip. Here’s what I found:
YouTube
YouTube was the default choice for me going into the event, simply because it is a name that everyone recognises and most people are used to the format and the way it works. It’s also easy to upload quickly from a Flip using the built in software. There is also a huge community around it, with rating, favouriting and commenting on videos well established.
However, I found that the quality of picture and (especially) audio was poor on the uploaded videos on YouTube, and the service seemed pretty slow at getting the videos ready for publishing after they had been uploaded. Also, you are limited to less than 10 minutes of video in any one go, which is a pain for longer pieces, such as recorded sessions at events (though short interviews are no problem).
Another problem is that users can’t download the video from YouTube, so it is pretty restrictive.
Vimeo
Vimeo is much less well known outside the circle of social media fanboys and girls, which is a shame as it seems a much better service that is currently provided by YouTube.
The interface is really easy to use and it seems quicker at uploading video, and converting it for use online. One other small but neat feature is that it sends you an email when the video is ready: nice. The quality of the video picture and audio seems much higher than YouTube and the embeddable player is nice to use without some of YouTube rather intrusive buttons and links.
Vimeo also allows logged-in users to download the original video files.
The downside of Vimeo is that you are limited to 500mb of video uploads a week unless you upgrade to a Pro account.
Blip
Blip is aimed less at the occasional video poster and more at folk who want to regularly upload content as a ‘show’ – you aren’t forced to do this, but it is clearly the intention of the site that it’s there for the more dedicated creators of video content. For example, you can get a share of ad revenue from your videos if you like, and the embedded player is highly customisable too.
Blip doesn’t seem to have many restrictions in terms of what it allows you too upload, and also makes it possible to download the original video files. However, I don’t find the player quite as user-friendly as the Vimeo one, and all the options on publishing your video are quite confusing and distracting.
Conclusion
I am going to more or less ditch YouTube for the video I produce. The quality isn’t there in terms of the output and this outweighs the recognition factor for me. Vimeo is great for short videos and for anything below roughly ten minutes, that’s the service I will use. Blip is great quality, and fantastic for longer pieces, but the slightly less friendly user experience means my initial choice will always be Vimeo.
Which is your video host of choice?