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Nicole Ferraro

Five Reasons the Writers' Strike Won't Revamp Web Video

Written by Nicole Ferraro
1/10/2008 3 comments
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Despite recent findings that online video sites have doubled their traffic as a result of the writers' strike, the sudden success seen by online video will be short term.

As reported by BBC News, Nielsen Online found that, since the television writers put down their quills, online video traffic on some sites has doubled. Nielsen cites YouTube Inc. and Crackle as two sites that have experienced newfound growth as a result of our supreme boredom. Similarly, Pew Internet reports that 48 percent of U.S. Internet users visited a video site in 2007, up from 33 percent in 2006, with 15 percent watching or posting a video on a typical day.

While Nielsen attributes online video's recent success to the writers' strike and the temporary demise of television as we've known it, there is little reason to believe the strike will have any long-term affects on online video despite hopes of budding Webematographers. (Web + Cinematographers... No? Doesn't work? Sigh.)

Five Reasons the Writers' Strike Will Not Revamp Online Video

1. The writers will be back! And when they return, they will bring with them a strong fan base of TV addicts who are in dire need of a fix. Online video is merely a fair-weather friend in this scenario, and when tee vee comes back home, Web video will resume its supplemental role as something to do during commercials.

2. The outcome of the strike will change online video. Let's not forget why the writers are striking in the first place... They want their fair share of the loot their content generates online. Once terms are negotiated, this could perhaps change what methods are used to generate revenue on online TV, perhaps paving the way for more lengthy commercials or (dare I say it) pay-per services. Or, if things go poorly at the negotiations table, some content may not even remain available online. As a result of the strike, online television is more unstable than regular ol' run o' the mill TV has become.

3. TV still has more to offer in the way of professional content. While we do have a deep level of respect for those homegrown, poor-quality Webvids of frat guys mixing Pop Rocks with Coke, or of cats burping the ABCs, this does eventually get tiresome (right?). Besides, quick video clips don't fill our content void. We like a good series! Wait... What's that you say? There are series online? Well, that takes us to point four...

4. TV is still the preferred medium. Recall Quarterlife, which was first launched on MySpaceTV, where it achieved much initial success. It has since been noticed and acquired by (guess who?) NBC, and is now a television series. On real TV. Where it matters.

5. Online video is still working out a business model. Online video (just like everything else online in the era of Web-Two-Dot-OhMyGod...) is moving forward on an uncharted path, figuring it out as it merrily goes along. Once it's found out that, hey, maybe everything can't survive on 30-second ads alone, the Web video industry may be in for a shakeout.

— Nicole Ferraro, Site Editor, Internet Evolution

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rmwilliamsC2C
IQ Crew
Friday January 11, 2008 3:37:08 PM
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Nicole

You're dead on with this post. While some folks are watching YouTube, the most are watching nothing or catching up on old movies via MOD or NetFlix. I like to check out YouTube for it's potential impact on viral marketing but not as a form of real entertainment. There are entertaining elements, just doesn't compare with 30 Rock or The Office.

 

TNT
IQ Crew
Friday January 11, 2008 3:27:47 PM
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Usually when people watch less television, the birth rate tends to rise in about nine months...

 

The fact that televisions generally take center stage in most family rooms/living rooms in the US is in my opinion, the single largest reason people will return to watching more televison.  The "average" concumer, if there is such a person, does not have video web sites hooked to the television that can be viewed and navigated as easily as the regular channel changer...

Elisa Lucia Cundiff
IQ Crew
Friday January 11, 2008 9:59:19 AM
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As you pointed out, loads more folks are watching youtube because of the strike.  But this was expected. 

In 1988 the WGA went on strike and five months later, when the networks returned to normal programming, 5% less people were watching TV on a regular basis.  These people apparently found new ways to spend their time and this was before; youtube, the Wii or Guitar hero. 

The WGA strike is pushing people to explore new forms of entertainment and storytelling.  This may not "revamp" web video but it has provided a strong new crop of video viewers that is likely to push the medium forward.

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