The Content Wrangler
Video Documentation: Seven Sites That Show You How To Do Things
By Scott Abel, The Content Wrangler
If a picture is worth a thousand words, how much is a video worth? This is a particularly important question to ask (and answer), especially if your job involves communicating complex concepts or developing training or education programs. Technical, medical, science, and marketing communicators are accustomed to creating written materials—user guides, online help, website content, training materials—but times are changing. Technologies that allow anyone with a computer, a webcam, and a connection to the internet to create and distribute video content have changed user expectations. Sites dedicated to “showing” regular folks how to do things are popping up all over the net. And, they’re jam-packed full of useful—often high-quality—instructional videos, created by both professional and amateur videographers. Let’s take a brief look at seven of the most popular video documentation portals.
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VideoJug is one of the largest libraries of video content online. Much of the content is professionally-produced, high definition video that covers many topics. User-generated content is vetted by the expert reviewers prior to being posted. The site offers “How To” and “Ask The Expert” videos that take users, step-by-step through everything from the lighter, more welcome aspects of life (leisure and hobbies, music, beauty and style) to the more serious topics (health and medicine, legal, money, parenting).
Check out the Do-It-Yourself channel on VideoJug. It’s wildly popular. Boost your basic plumbing, building and maintenance skills by watching the many DIY videos available. See how to put up a shelf, hang a door, unblock a toilet, bleed a radiator and perform a whole host of other DIY jobs around the house.
Uploading a video to VideoJug is quick and easy. Learn how.
Check out this VideoJug video that describes how to set up an account on Facebook.
You Tube “How To and DIY” channel is one of the most popular video documentation sites. The channel is home to amateur videographers and professionals alike. Martha Stewart has a special section dedicated to her unique selection of home improvement, gardening, and cooking videos, while folks who like to barbeque can stop byBBQTalk for recipes, instructions for cleaning and using grills, and advice on planning outdoor parties. The channel also boasts videos that can help you build a hydroponic garden, improve Windows Vista performance on a laptop, and unlock websites that your system administrators don’t want you to view at work.
Uploading videos is quick and easy. You can even upload videos from your mobile phone.
Check out this video on Food Safety (one in a six-part series) below.
Expert Village, as the name implies, provides instructional videos produced by experts from around the globe on wide variety of topics. The site touts itself as “a world-class repository of how-to videos and articles featuring advice from recognized experts in their fields”. The company says finding video documentation is not the problem. Finding “believable information” is the real challenge. That’s why Expert Village produces video interviews with some of the world’s foremost subject matter experts.
One great series of expert videos are the sign language lessons, a useful video series for those interested in learning to sign. Other interesting—and practical—video classes include the Video Bartender’s Guide to Mixed Drinks, How to Dance the Salsa, and numerous automobile repair videos.
As of the date of this post, we were unable to successfully embed a video from Expert Village without encountering snafus (the video starts playing automatically, or does not appear at all). So, you’ll have to visit Expert Village yourself until the site works out the bugs in its embeddable code.
Sclipo describes itself as “a social network for sharing knowledge and teaching through video and webcam.” Sclipo seeks user-generated video content designed to teach people new skills. Uploading videos is easy and fast. Sclipo provides tools to help users record videos online using a web browser and a PC web cam.
Sclipo differentiates itself from other video services by offering Sclipo Live!, an online service that allows you to teach classes online and get paid for it.
Videos are organized by subject and include: web technologies, languages, and design and animation, among others. Use Sclipo to learn how to animate a character in Adobe Photoshop, compress video files, and
Check out the video below, “How To Make Crusty Herbed Potato Wedges”.
5min.com specializes in short videos (5 minutes or less) that provide answers to questions. According to 5min.com, the site allows users to contribute their knowledge by sharing visual guides in areas such as arts, business, fashion, sports, health, tech, food, and much more.
5min’s basic philosophy is that “everybody is an expert in something” and “has something to teach others … so why not share that knowledge for the better of the whole?” The site organizes videos by category in containers called studios. There are studios that feature how-to videos on topics including: origami, self-defense, life tips, and many more.
Check out this 5min.com video on Web 2.0 below.
ViewDo markets itself as “the free online “how-to” video library you’ve been waiting for.” The company promotes the need for its service by saying: “When the written word won’t suffice, and a picture can’t quite get the point across either, a ViewDo gives you the detail and perspective you need to get the job done.”
ViewDo encourages its users to download instructional videos and use them on portable media players like the iPod, iPhone, or PlayStation portable. The company says doing so can help you “expand your media player beyond its role as an entertainment device and turn it into a useful tool.”
At ViewDo you can learn to , or apply Cascading Style Sheets in Dreamweaver.
Uploading videos to the site is easy (free registration required).
Check out this ViewDo video below and learn how to make an Ethernet cable.
TeacherTube is an online community for sharing instructional videos. The site seeks “to fill a need for a more educationally focused, safe venue for teachers, schools, and home learners. It is a site to provide anytime, anywhere professional development with teachers teaching teachers. As well, it is a site where teachers can post videos designed for students to view in order to learn a concept or skill.”
TeacherTube members can upload, tag and share videos they create and provide other members with access to supporting files (activities, assessments, lesson plans, notes, etc.) The site is also a social network that helps connect people with similar interests.
“Members are encouraged to not only upload educationally relevant videos,” TeacherTube says, “but also to make constructive comments and use the rating system to show appreciation for videos of value to one as an educator or learner. Users also have the ability to preserve the integrity of the site by flagging inappropriate videos. Staffers review flagged materials and will remove any inappropriate posts.”
At Teacher Tube you can learn about the process of writing, DNA and molecule interaction, and how mountains are made.
Check out “Teaching Technology and the Development of the Human Brain” (below).
Considerations For The Future Of Video Documentation
Video documentation is here today. Users are creating “how to” and “instructional” videos in record numbers and sharing them with others around the globe. Sites that provide video content are some of the most visited on the web. A popular video can be viewed by millions and are often featured on worldwide television newscasts like CNN.
Mobile devices like the immensely popular iPhone have changed user expectations by making YouTube and video playback part of the user experience. New services like Viddler are making it easy for folks with little technological know-how to create video content with nothing but a webcam-enabled computer and a connection to the Internet.
Technical authoring tools like Adobe FrameMaker and Adobe RoboHelp—now part of the Adobe Technical Communication Suite—have introduced support for video files (including Flash), allowing writers to embed videos into the documents (PDF) and web-based content they create. Users can watch video content from within applications like Adobe Reader or FireFox, without launching an external multi-media player.
Video sharing services are developing niche markets and supplying their users with easy-to-use content reuse features to help them share video content with others. Inexpensive web development and blogging tools are allowing people with basic technology skills to publish content quickly and for little or no cost.
As the video genie is clearly out of the bottle, professional communicators must now consider how to best utilize video to provide marketing, training, and user assistance information to those who need it. Best practices and smart strategies for creating, delivering, and sharing video content are needed, as well as markup languages that support the reuse of granular video content and the automatic assembly of video instruction sets, based on the same concepts we use today to deliver written content. Training classes and books on related topics are also needed.
Content management system vendors must prepare their tools to handle video content and to address the many different issues video file management introduces. For instance, video files are significantly larger than text files and will not be able to managed effectively by many old school systems, no matter what their software sales people may say. XML content component management systems, while best prepared to handle granular content and reassemble them on demand, will need to refocus their marketing efforts and revamp their demonstrations, white papers, and webinars to reflect the use of video. It’s not enough to say, “Sure, we support video”. The demands of video are not the same as those of text.
As communicators, we should not fear video. And, we shouldn’t view video documentation as “someone else’s job”. Instead, we should focus on developing skills that will position us to deliver high value content, regardless of format or delivery mechanism.
Well researched and very inspiring.
Hi Scott, There’s a new one on the scene: Graspr, which launched at the end of September at the DEMOfall conference. Graspr is an online video community designed to empower people to share their life experiences and expertise with others who are seeking it. At its core are user-generated (and professionally produced) “how-to” videos. Check Graspr out!
Hello,
My name is Cady Glaser, and I’m a business development associate at Graspr, Inc. You have a great site and what looks like a passion for spreading knowledge. Have you heard about Graspr? We are a free instructional video site that is perfect for your video tutorial section. We have video about everything from training your dog, to how to build a BBQ. I think we fit really well with your mission statement and would benefit your users greatly.
We can be found at http://www.graspr.com; Feel free to look around and review our material.
If you have any questions, please contact me at any time. I would love to discuss this with you further.
Thanks.
There are two different kinds of how-to video sites that I’ve seen–one kind collects user-submitted videos, and the other produces their own. Your first two featured (VideoJug & ExpertVillage) produce their own, although the difference is that VideoJug uses actors instead of experts. One site that is similar to ExpertVillage (which I love) is http://www.monkeysee.com. Their videos are all professionally produced and shot in high-def (at least that’s what their website says).
All the other sites–Sclipo, 5Min, WonderHowTo, Graspr and more–are variations on a theme. They have some good videos there, but you can find them anywhere.