That the convergent future of telecom & broadcast industries revolves around the Internet is a 'given'. Naturally, telecom companies have been investing in high-speed networks to prepare for high-definition TV broadcasting. On the other hand, broadcasters are also preparing to deliver content across multiple platforms apart from TV - i.e., via the Internet & wireless media.

Serious testing is already in progress - with telecom cos. offering HDTV & Video via their fixed-line as well as cellphone networks. Recently, U.S. Sports Channel CBS Sports streamed college basketball via their web-site Sportsline.com.

Also, everybody knows that Asian countries like South Korea have long ago established a formidable reputation for their broadcast quality mobile TV services.

If we take into account the impending technology of VoIP over mobile networks in the not-too-distant future, the "convergence" of mobile & fixed line telecom becomes the next possibility.

All in all, the future of mass media over the Internet seems poised to take a giant leap, right? Perhaps, but with a few en route modifications - to adjust for new Internet phenomena. The latest being consumer-generated media & the online video clip culture.  

Full of Surprises   
The Internet is full of surprises, with one development following another.

The most recent Internet phenomenon revolves around highly popular video-sharing sites. What AOL saw as its roadmap to high traffic (by hosting video content on its portal) has rapidly transformed to a general model of hosting & sharing video clips. Thanks partly, to burgeoning broadband pipes. And partly to cheap technology for creating & editing video files.

Video sharing sites MSN Video, Youtube, AOL attract millions of unique visitors every month. And mind you, most of these sites were launched around a year ago!

One major side-effect of video sites is the online video clip culture. This is as much a result of consumer-generated content, as it is of reducing attention spans (leading to fragmentation of content).

The past year has seen rampant fragmentation & shortening (clipping) of video content. This phenomenon complements the growth of video sharing & distribution sites a la Napster.

Most of the videos hosted by video sharing services are not full-length features. Like movie trailers & sports channel highlights, these sites mostly host video clips whose duration ranges from a few seconds to a few minutes.

Sports highlights & digital news re-distribution are good examples of today's online clip culture - gather once, edit (clip) & distribute many times - as video clips via web-sites, email & mobile.

The clip culture is specific for video content - audio & text are generally spared from being clipped - perhaps because of their relatively small file sizes as compared to video content.

Origin of Video Clips 
Today's video clips have multiple origins:

Consumer-generated media clips:
These form a part of the mushrooming, user-generated content which typically started as blog postings. The advent of blogs along with cheap tools for creating/editing digital video content has given rise to consumer-generated video.

In addition to original video clips, consumer generated media also comprises of content that modifies, enhances & builds upon existing content created by others. That such clips cannot be taken lightly is clear from the following well-known examples:
• Self-styled marketing consultant for "new marketing techniques" Joseph Jaffe snatched the initiative from Nike's marketing team by transferring Tiger Wood's winning moment video clip from his TiVo to his PC and simply adding "Just Do It" (Nike's famous slogan) at the end of the clip. All within 30 minutes of the telecast! Jaffe had created his commercial for Nike One & posted it on his blog site - probably before Nike's marketing team had "seen" the opportunity.

• 2 brothers filmed each other spray-painting the words "IPOD'S UNREPLACEABLE BATTERY LASTS ONLY 18 MONTHS" on many iPod ads and then posted the video at www.iPodsdirtysecret.com - all because Apple refused to replace their iPod battery when it died.

Consumer-generated video clips are all about responding to news & events.

TV Program Clips : TV programming content forms the bulk of content of video sharing sites. These clips of videos previously aired on TV are the most controversial because they usually appear without the permission of the broadcaster/content-owner!

Recently, 2 clips from NBC's Saturday Night Live were hosted by a number of video-sharing sharing sites including Youtube, resulting in demands from NBC to remove them.

Trailer/Promo Clips : These video clips are released by media companies to promote their programming. Given the increasing popularity of video sites, media companies should find it to their advantage to use video sharing sites to promote their programming. And perhaps even distribute commercially.

MTV group channels are reportedly negotiating with video site Youtube to distribute their music videos a la Napster.

Video Clip Gallery : Given the "aggregation" oriented nature of the Internet, video sharing sites have rapidlly become libraries of video clips. Using today's uber-popular keyword search logic, video sharing servers can, from their huge database of clips, display a collage of video clips pertaining to any subject. Given that most of these clips are consumer- generated, this could serve as the next-generation video fan mail.

Challenge
Broadcasters & telecom cos. have to take into account the challenges of "clip culture" in their vision of an on-demand, Internet-based service. This is especially challenging, because users who are no more satisfied with just consuming content, will insist on sharing, enhancing & re-creating it.

After all, consumer-generated media is the new-age common man's way of responding to news & events!