1) I hate having to go to YouTube to watch vids because it affects the image quality, and Imeem streams so badly for me that I don't even bother following links there anymore. ITA with you that I've noticed the lack of permanent (or at least long term) links for vids, and it's a large part of why I don't watch many vids now. I understand that Youtube is nice because it can increase your visibility, I won't lie, I use it myself (but I have a link going back to my webpage with each vid) and some people like being able to see a vid before they download it, to see if it's worth keeping, but I just don't understand why someone would *only* use Youtube. The other day, someone on a comm on my flist posted a vid, which was hosted on Youtube, I watched it, and really enjoyed it, so left a comment asking for a download (since one wasn't provided) and she pointed me to software that would allow me to download from Youtube! I already have that kind of program, I don't *want* the Youtube crappy quality. And it really gets me that vidders can shoot themselves in the foot like this. It takes a *lot* of time and effort to come out with a good vid. I know in my early days, I could make one in a week, but now that I'm a more conscious of the process, it generally takes me at least a month to make one. If I'm going to put that kind of effort into make a vid, I want to know that people can *use* it. I would rather people continue to watch my vid, not just enjoy it for 5 minutes. And I'm with you, the way vids are presented has really turned me off watching them. When I first got into fandom, I was more into vidding than anything else. I was in fandom for *months* before I read my first fic. For a while, it seemed I had every QaF vid ever made on saved to my computer. I certainly can't come anywhere near saying that for SGA. In fact, since I haven't really been downloading new vids, I haven't even really been watching the ones I have, which makes me sad, because I really do adore vids. It also bothers me the habit I've started noticing where vidders, I guess, are trying to centralize comments, so have you click to their journals to get the download information, but then still make you click away from there (to their webpage, or to some other hosting site) to download the actual vid. That seems like a lot of extra clicking for me, I don't want to have to click away from my flist. And the funny thing is, with my latest vid, even though I posted direct downloads for it on a bunch of different comms, I only got one comment that wasn't on the post in my journal. I think commenters realize that vidders prefer getting comments there, and will go to their LJs to leave comments (or, like me, I save the name of the vidder in the file name so I can find them again should I want to leave feedback.
Vidding
I understand that Youtube is nice because it can increase your visibility, I won't lie, I use it myself (but I have a link going back to my webpage with each vid) and some people like being able to see a vid before they download it, to see if it's worth keeping, but I just don't understand why someone would *only* use Youtube. The other day, someone on a comm on my flist posted a vid, which was hosted on Youtube, I watched it, and really enjoyed it, so left a comment asking for a download (since one wasn't provided) and she pointed me to software that would allow me to download from Youtube! I already have that kind of program, I don't *want* the Youtube crappy quality.
And it really gets me that vidders can shoot themselves in the foot like this. It takes a *lot* of time and effort to come out with a good vid. I know in my early days, I could make one in a week, but now that I'm a more conscious of the process, it generally takes me at least a month to make one. If I'm going to put that kind of effort into make a vid, I want to know that people can *use* it. I would rather people continue to watch my vid, not just enjoy it for 5 minutes.
And I'm with you, the way vids are presented has really turned me off watching them. When I first got into fandom, I was more into vidding than anything else. I was in fandom for *months* before I read my first fic. For a while, it seemed I had every QaF vid ever made on saved to my computer. I certainly can't come anywhere near saying that for SGA. In fact, since I haven't really been downloading new vids, I haven't even really been watching the ones I have, which makes me sad, because I really do adore vids. It also bothers me the habit I've started noticing where vidders, I guess, are trying to centralize comments, so have you click to their journals to get the download information, but then still make you click away from there (to their webpage, or to some other hosting site) to download the actual vid. That seems like a lot of extra clicking for me, I don't want to have to click away from my flist. And the funny thing is, with my latest vid, even though I posted direct downloads for it on a bunch of different comms, I only got one comment that wasn't on the post in my journal. I think commenters realize that vidders prefer getting comments there, and will go to their LJs to leave comments (or, like me, I save the name of the vidder in the file name so I can find them again should I want to leave feedback.
(apperantly I like to hear myself talk, cont...)