After almost a decade of promises that the internet and video would entwine to create one fluid, multimedia orgy of visual fun, it appears that we might actually be just about there.
The past twelve months has seen sites like YouTube become de rigeur for your average broadband user, and many of us shun the TV schedules to watch our favourite shows online via places like Daily Motion. Don’t want to wait a year to catch the latest series of Scrubs? (And it is a good series, better than the last, I reckon.) You don’t have to anymore.
Internet technology has just about caught up with the predictions, and watching a new band video, highly dubious ‘cultural’ event or just plain crap now only takes a few minutes of your time. We have become integrated.
But is it any good? Do we get the picture perfect quality that we desire? Do you click on the video spots that DiS (fairly) regularly posts on our label profiles and news stories? And, more presciently for a music-driven discussion like ours, is it necessary or complimentary for music to be accompanied by video? Do we need to see ropey shots of a band recorded on a videophone played through your 4db laptop speakers? Or is this the internet fall-out of our MTV conditioning for 25 years?
There are masses of dedicated video channels on the internet now – DiS suggests you check out this new Joost channel and give it a bit of a test-run if you fancy (jag, we know, and we’re sorry) – but do you watch them lots? Is a site with thousands of music videos at your finger tips really that enticing? Tell us, like.
Probably the most useful aspect of videos on t’interweb is to see all those ‘can’t believe you missed it!’ moments. No longer does anyone ever miss them.
And, therefore, the fun crux of this DiScussion is: What’s like, totally the best music/culture-relevant shit you’ve found online?
We would like to suggest these things for pure fun/inanity:
1) Him out of Panic! At! The Disco! Getting twatted by a bottle at Reading festival last year.
2) Daft Punk smashing up every other band that weekend at the O2 Wireless Festival (see the 02 review just up here)
3) And, the iconic majesty of Zinedine Zidane going head-ramming mental in the World Cup final of 2006. The most striking (arf) image of the year?
Friends: get posting those links. Or just simply DiScuss…