Rupert Howe: Twittervlog.tv
I personally don't think that there's a lack of entrepreneurship in
Europe - that's an American myth, one adopted by greedy European
businessmen and politicians to break down regulation, worker's rights,
the power of the unions and the welfare state.
Just as many businesses start and fail in Europe as in America. The
world's second biggest retailer after Walmart: Carrefour.
Americans crowed about having the most productive workers in the world
in terms of dollars earned per worker. They conveniently ignored that
the next 4 most productive were France, Ireland, Belgium and Luxembourg.
So I don't think we need to learn any lessons about exporting our
culture, thanks very much. It's America's proselytising zeal to
export its values that's led to the trouble in Iraq, while they
preside over a massive financial crisis and a disgraceful wealth gap.
AS FOR WHY THERE ISN'T AS MUCH VIDEOBLOGGING HERE AS IN THE USA.
I don't want to be too facile about it, but it seems to me that the
problem is primarily that of language and national borders and
attitudes to privacy and change and technology. Pretty basic issues.
Not so much to do with the Germans' reluctance to fill Berlin with
posters of Hitler.
English-speaking North America is a vast place, with 300m+ people, who
share a lot of values and experiences. People on the Pacific coast
can make a videoblog that will be watched and understood easily and
with excitement by someone in the East, South, Midwest, Southwest,
Hawaii, Alaska and Canada.
The equivalent amount of land in Europe is divided up into many
smaller countries, with many many different languages.
Therefore most people in Europe who consume online video from other
parts of Europe or America would have to understand it through the
prism of a second language, and in a slightly different culture.
People just don't have the same massive audience to reach so easily.
Add to that the difference between Europeans' approach to Technology -
they tend to be proud of their centuries-old heritage and look at
change with some suspicion - and Americans, who embrace change more
readily and look to Technology to some degree as their society's saviour.
Then add in the way that people communicate casually with each other.
America is the land of the friendly greeting. Europeans visiting
America (particularly English people) often complain about how
overfriendly they are, how fake their show of warmth. I get fed up
with hearing Brits complain about the insincerity of American and
Canadian waitresses and shopstaff. Personally, I like it. But then I
also like videoblogging.
We are generally more reserved by nature than Americans, and less used
to the idea of conversing in an intimate way with strangers.
Combine those attitudes towards technology and towards minding your
own business, and you have a mixture that's poisonous to
videoblogging. Most people that I talk to in England think that
videobloggers must be a) narcissists b) sad and lonely c) geeks d)
boring. They assume that videoblogging is someone talking to their
webcam about their day, like they're writing in a diary.
It's not just videoblogging - people think the same things of text
blogs and bloggers, too.
That's why I don't think videoblogging is a particularly helpful term
in Britain. It doesn't describe the vast breadth of what's being made.
But even when people see what's being done, they still don't get it.
I just had a long email exchange with a friend of mine in charge of
web video production at the BBC, in which I forwarded him links to all
my favourite vloggers/online filmmakers. He's a person who's trying
desperately to understand what is new and different about web video.
He could barely contain his contempt for the personal nature of 99% of
the videos. He saw them as small minded and, I sensed, narcissistic.
Not dealing with Big Truths, he thought.
He was wrong. But although this is partly a TV professional's
viewpoint, it's also partly just a common British prejudice against
anyone who's willing to talk about themselves, let alone record and
broadcast it.
American media might be broken, but our whole method of communicating
with each other is broken by language, national barriers and suspicion.
I don't know what to do about it.
But showing lots of films and showcasing the best work would be a good
start.
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