Roundup for Vidders

A few items of interest to vidders:

1) As many vidders have noted, iMeem is no longer supporting embeds, and YouTube continues its policy of random takedowns. (Remember that you can dispute a takedown if you believe your vid is a fair use!) A lot of vidders are therefore looking at other streaming services. Markus Weiland did a good comparison of the terms of service of many of the competing sites (including Blip, Dailymotion, Kyte, Vimeo, and others) in his article Owned? Legal terms of video hosting services compared. Worth a look if you're thinking about a new home for your vids.

2) This may possibly make fan vidders squinty-eyed: Swanswan caught that a male artist is exhibiting something that looks a heck of a lot like a fanvid at the Glucksman Contemporary Art gallery at the University of Cork. Swanswan aptly summarizes the issue: "I don't know whether to forward this on to the OTW and say look! Other people making vids and calling it art, awesome!! Or look! Some random dude does what we've been doing for decades and all of a sudden it's art?" Hey, it's totally art! And it was art when we did it 30 years ago, and it's art when we do it now! (And I'll bet we do it better!)

3) You might be interested in the upcoming Open Video Conference, June 19-20 in New York City. This conference plans to tackle a range of issues surrounding online video -- from codecs to content, to fair use, and beyond. "Open Video" is a growing movement for transparency, interoperability, and further decentralization in online video, which encourages and invites remix, collage, and repurposing (including vidding.) Featured speakers include: NYU's Clay Shirky, Harvard's Yochai Benkler, Boing Boing's Xeni Jardin, DVD Jon, Free Press' Josh Silver, EFF's Corynne McSherry, and many more. (OTW's Francesca Coppa and political remix vidder Jonathan McIntosh are scheduled to present some work there too.) For the full agenda, go to: http://openvideoconference.org/agenda/. Register at http://openvideoconference.org/registration/.