In an article designed to make people believe that the mainstream media is ready to take back the Internet video market from the "amateurs," Scott Kirsner, writing in the Mercury News tries to prove too much in my estimation.
For example, he quotes no one from the amateur view, he instead gets people that have a vested interest in making people believe what he says. He quotes Jason Holloyway, CEO of Dovetail.tv, who says, "Viewers are looking for quality now, as it becomes increasingly available, they will watch more of it, and the pendulum will swing."
What does his company do? It's made to serve the professional and semi-p
rofessional producers of independent film and video.
The point isn't whether the mainstream media companies will get more of a following online as they understand and make specific offerings to this market. Everybody knows that a number of people will still want to look at some of these things.
But to say that the democratization of media via online sites will diminish and be mostly another outlet for the mainstream media, is completely wrong. It's a misunderstanding of what's been happening with media since cable was offered as a competitor to the big threee networks.
What's really going to happen is that mainstream offerings will be set beside all other offerings online, and will be considered a part of the overall whole. They'll never replace what's happening online because they call it "professional," versus those other "amateurs."
If it's something that someone wants to watch, they don't care where it comes from. That's never going to change no matter how much stuff the networks put online.
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