Steve Woolf twittered about this today — and I’m with him, as he asks “what the hell is it with people lately?”
Well first of all, we’re just talking about one guy over at the Hollywood Reporter, so let’s not just write off the whole industry with one stupid article…
(Sidenote: And I’m not saying Steve was doing that – I’m mentioning that because that was kinda my own first response to this article. Kind of like a “fuck hollywood anyway if they don’t get it” kinda thing. And that’s not fair, because more and more people in Hollywood do get it lately — so after a few deep breaths. I realized what was wrong with “people” lately — making these kinds of comments about how videoblogging hasn’t met some kind of corporate expectations…)
It’s not that there’s something wrong with this writer or people thinking like him. They just don’t get it, and frankly, they’re sick of trying. Things shouldn’t be this complicated in the Entertainment industry. They haven’t been before, right? It’s not like the transition from radio to television displaced any entertainers or anything…or from silent pictures to the talkies…
The point is, they just can’t wrap their heads around the videoblogging community. They don’t get us. They don’t get why we do why we do? Why we want to make money, sure, but we’re kinda not willing to do stupid shit for it. And we need not just prefer to be creative – which means one episode of our vlog might be totally different than the last one, or the one coming next – and that’s part of the beauty of it — and that leads to more viewers, not less, in the long run, and provides a richer base for more content of better quality for biz to then pilfer from in the long run.
Even this guy contradicts himself in his own article a little – showing that he is starting to understand a little about what it’s all about – when he says: “What we didn’t understand about UGC is that it usually isn’t entertainment, but communication. The average Joe isn’t trying to outdo JibJab; he is simply expressing himself to his friends via video.”
Hey dude, what about expressing yourself to your friends in an entertaining video that actually does build on some common joke or theme from the last episode of somebody else’s Show Xyz? (which was, of course, a remix parody of something else.)
It is precisely these types of interlocking narrative storylines that weave their way through the videoblogging community that at first inspire before ultimately perplexing the current batch of entertainment moguls. When one or two of them figure it out and come around – providing a model for the others – the transition will take place.
Oh yeah – and we’ve even been reduced to an ackronym now: “UGC” (User Generated Content).
You know it’s a good thing this article sets it all straight for me. When I saw Tyson, the skateboarding dog, on the iPhone commercial last week, I almost thought user generated content had made it into the mainstream!
(Update – oh wow – it’s tillman the skateboarding dog — no wonder he didn’t look as snazzy as Tyson usually does.)
Ok here’s the article by By Andrew Wallenstein for the Hollywood Reporter:

Net’s Amateur Hour Lasted About That Long

Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to mourn the passing of user-generated content as a phenomenon.
There was a time not that long ago when UGC seemed poised to topple Hollywood, as if anyone with a video camera and a Web connection was deemed a budding Steven Spielberg. But ask yourself this: When was the last time an amateur viral video actually reached viral status?
Remember Lonelygirl15, the Diet Coke and Mentos Experiments and Ask a Ninja? It’s not easy to forget the Web darlings of yesteryear because few homemade videos have taken their place. Although the soda has long fizzled from those carbonated geysers, these videos still are regarded as the standard bearers for UGC, which is telling.
This past week, there were a few developments that amounted to multiple nails getting pounded into UGC’s coffin…
Now that the bloom is off the rose of amateur online video, what might have struck millions as a novelty last year doesn’t feel as fresh anymore. Videos that once commanded the attention of thousands or millions likely will just be sampled by hundreds.
The main reason the UGC boom went bust so quickly is that advertisers never embraced it. Few brands are going to associate their products with one-off sensations in the Wild West of the Internet…
On a volume basis, UGC may well outnumber its professional counterpart. But while more people are consuming online video — three out of four Internet users did so in May, according to new data from comScore Video Metrix — they likely are consuming infinitely more videos, as opposed to gravitating to a select few.
What we didn’t understand about UGC is that it usually isn’t entertainment, but communication. The average Joe isn’t trying to outdo JibJab; he is simply expressing himself to his friends via video.
The paucity of Internet-bred hits has taught us something obvious: Talent isn’t as pervasive as it might seem. Although so-called new-media experts fell in love with the notion that the Hollywood elite would have the playing field leveled by the consumers they so poorly serve, that hasn’t happened.
In retrospect, 2006 feels less like a changing of the guard and more like a brief moment when Hollywood and Madison Avenue were caught flat-footed by the opportunities for Internet distribution and regular folks stepped into the vacuum. But a year later, UGC has slunk back to obscurity. UGC hasn’t left the Internet, but it isn’t as popular as it was when it had the playground to itself.

Here is the full text of the entire article in case the link goes bad:
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003612987
Net’s amateur hour lasted about that long
By Andrew Wallenstein
July 18, 2007
Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to mourn the passing of user-generated content as a phenomenon.
There was a time not that long ago when UGC seemed poised to topple Hollywood, as if anyone with a video camera and a Web connection was deemed a budding Steven Spielberg. But ask yourself this: When was the last time an amateur viral video actually reached viral status?
Remember Lonelygirl15, the Diet Coke and Mentos Experiments and Ask a Ninja? It’s not easy to forget the Web darlings of yesteryear because few homemade videos have taken their place. Although the soda has long fizzled from those carbonated geysers, these videos still are regarded as the standard bearers for UGC, which is telling.
This past week, there were a few developments that amounted to multiple nails getting pounded into UGC’s coffin.
Look at the fate of leading viral outposts like Break.com, which Lionsgate took an unspecified stake in July 11, or Grouper, which Sony Corp. acquired and rebranded this week as Crackle with a new arm for in-house original content creation. These sites saw their financial future in strapping on the feedbag of professional studio product, not the free buffet that is UGC.
Or look at the July 12 launch of 60Frames Entertainment, a venture dedicated to linking professional content creators with online opportunities linked to advertising and syndication. Its new CEO is Brett Weinstein, the former digital chief at UTA, where he made his mark scouring the Internet for new talent, even setting up a channel on Veoh Networks for just that purpose. The fruits of those efforts have yet to be made apparent.
Now that the bloom is off the rose of amateur online video, what might have struck millions as a novelty last year doesn’t feel as fresh anymore. Videos that once commanded the attention of thousands or millions likely will just be sampled by hundreds.
The main reason the UGC boom went bust so quickly is that advertisers never embraced it. Few brands are going to associate their products with one-off sensations in the Wild West of the Internet.
Ask yourself what was the most viral online video that graced your monitor in past months? The only candidate that comes to mind is “The Landlord,” Will Ferrell’s hilarious foray into online video via new site FunnyorDie.com. “Landlord” couldn’t offer a bigger example of how the tide has turned away from the amateurs to the same forces that dominate film and television.
On a volume basis, UGC may well outnumber its professional counterpart. But while more people are consuming online video — three out of four Internet users did so in May, according to new data from comScore Video Metrix — they likely are consuming infinitely more videos, as opposed to gravitating to a select few.
What we didn’t understand about UGC is that it usually isn’t entertainment, but communication. The average Joe isn’t trying to outdo JibJab; he is simply expressing himself to his friends via video.
The paucity of Internet-bred hits has taught us something obvious: Talent isn’t as pervasive as it might seem. Although so-called new-media experts fell in love with the notion that the Hollywood elite would have the playing field leveled by the consumers they so poorly serve, that hasn’t happened.
In retrospect, 2006 feels less like a changing of the guard and more like a brief moment when Hollywood and Madison Avenue were caught flat-footed by the opportunities for Internet distribution and regular folks stepped into the vacuum. But a year later, UGC has slunk back to obscurity. UGC hasn’t left the Internet, but it isn’t as popular as it was when it had the playground to itself.