Short-form content

"Short video" redirects here. For the concept of short films, see Short film.

For the film, see Video Clip.

Short-form content (also known as short-form videos, or less commonly, video clips) are short videos, which usually contain witless jokes and/or funny clips, often from movies or entertainment videos such as those on YouTube. Since the early 2020s, short-form content has surged in popularity, particularly among Generation Z and Alpha with the emergence of TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts shaping internet culture. Video clips are usually taken out of context and are made into memes. Sometimes short-form content can be used to attract the public to the user's other accounts or their long-form videos. The term is also used more loosely to mean any video program, including a full program, uploaded onto a website or other medium.

On the Internet

Main articles: Internet video and Video hosting service

Video clips gained popularity online. By mid-2006 there were millions of video clips available online, with new websites springing up focusing entirely on offering free video clips to users. Many established corporate sites added the ability to clip existing video content on their websites.

While most of this content is non-exclusive and available on competing sites, some companies produce their own videos and do not need to rely on the work of outside companies or amateurs.

A detailed icon for video e.g. to link to video content on a website

While some video clips are taken from established media sources, community and individually produced clips are more common. Some individuals host their created works on vlogs (video blogs) and the use of Internet video clips as they became bigger grew swiftly. Between March and July 2006, YouTube grew from 30 to 100 million views of videos per day. One of the developments during that period were the BBC's iPlayer, which was released for open beta testing in July 2007.

Advertising

Video clips are a common form of advertising. With online entertainment sites delivering television programming content, free of charge, online video entertainment rose substantially in popularity.

Today, as businesses seek to tighten budgetary allocations, advertising on video sites has become increasingly common and many of those advertisements are longer than 20 seconds. Video clips are also used in advertising by vloggers to promote products. The average ad goes for 15–30 seconds.

Rise of amateurs

Unlike traditional movies largely dominated by studios, video clips are supplied by non-professionals.

In 2005, Chinese students Huang Yixin and Wei Wei, later known as "Back Dorm Boys", lip-synced to a song by the Backstreet Boys in a video uploaded to some clip websites and quickly became renowned. They appeared on television shows and concerts, and they were also granted a contract by a media company in Beijing, China for lip-syncing.

In May 2006, The Economist reported that 90% of video clips on YouTube came from amateurs, a few of whom were young comedians. It, in effect, also brought up amateur talents.

An earlier celebrity was David Elsewhere, who was a talent at popping and liquiding. His performance to Kraftwerk's song Expo 2000 at the Kollaboration talent show in 2001 was widely viewed on the Internet, and this subsequently led to him being hired for TV commercials and music videos. Not only did video clips submerge into the world of TV commercials and music videos, but it also became a popular form of entertainment and a hobby for people called "Vloggers" (video blog creators).

Citizen journalism

Citizen journalism video reporting dates back as early as the development of camcorders, but all videos were screened by the local media outlets of the time. This was until its spread was aided by free upload websites in which censorship was limited to make a vast number of videos available to anyone who wanted to view them. Scenes were rarely broadcast on television, and many first-witnessed scenes have since become publicly available.

In December 2003, videos in Hong Kong showing the bullying in De La Salle School outraged the public and raised a wide concern on school violence that led to the arrest of 11 students, 7 of which were later dismissed in 2020.

Notably, in December 2004, tourist videos of the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami offered worldwide audiences the first scenes of the disaster.

Vlog

Main article: Vlog

From late 2005 to early 2006, a new form of blogging emerged called a vlog. It is a blog that takes video as the primary content, which is often accompanied by supporting text, image, and additional metadata to provide context. Su Li Walker, an analyst with the Yankee Group, said that "like blogs, which have become an extension of traditional media, video blogs will be a supplement to traditional broadcasting". Regular entries are typically presented in reverse chronological order.

Convergence with traditional media

The evolving market for video clips garnered interest from traditional movie studios. In 2006, the producers of Lucky Number Slevin, a film with Morgan Freeman, Lucy Liu and Bruce Willis, made an 8-minute clip for YouTube. Celebrities in traditional media have proven to confer more popularity in clip culture than most amateur video makers.

The emerging potential for success in web video caught the eye of some top entertainment executives in America, including former Disney executive and current head of the Tornante Company Michael Eisner. Eisner's Vuguru subdivision of Tornante partnered with Canadian media conglomerate Rogers Media on October 26, 2009, securing plans to produce upwards of 30 new web shows a year. Rogers Media would help fund and distribute Vuguru's upcoming productions, thereby solidifying a direct connection between old and new media.

Short-form videos

A video example in short-form format, featuring Endeavour docking at the ISS

Short videos became popular in the 2010s. Snapchat started allowing users to share 10-second videos in 2012. Vine, which was launched in 2013 and restricted videos to a maximum length of six seconds, helped short-form videos achieve mainstream popularity and gave rise to a new generation of public figures such as Kurtis Conner, David Dobrik, Danny Gonzalez, Drew Gooden, Liza Koshy, Shawn Mendes, Jake Paul, Logan Paul, and Lele Pons. Instagram responded to Vine's popularity by adding the ability to share 15-second videos in 2013, and has since expanded its video functionality with numerous additional features, including Reels.

Following Vine's closure in 2017, most of its notable users began making longer videos on YouTube. After TikTok merged with Musical.ly in 2018, TikTok became the most widely used short-form video app and has since become one of the world's most popular apps. In 2020, Vine co-founder Dom Hofmann launched Vine's intended successor Byte (later renamed Clash and then Huddles). In 2021, as a response to the ever-increasing competition presented by TikTok, YouTube launched YouTube Shorts to host videos up to a maximum length of 60 seconds, later extending it to 3 minutes. YouTube Shorts collectively earned over 5 trillion views within 6 months.

See also

• Timeline of online video
• List of Internet phenomena
• Internet meme
• Media clip
• Screencast
• Video evidence
• Video sharing
• Quoting out of context
• GIF

Further reading

• Dilworth, Dianna (30 August 2006). "AOL joins online video battle". DMNews. Retrieved 2 March 2007.
• Jay Dedman, Joshua Paul. Videoblogging, John Wiley & Sons, June 26, 2006. ISBN 0-470-03788-1.
• Michael Verdi, Ryanne Hodson, Diana Weynand, Shirley Craig. Secrets of Videoblogging, Peachpit Press, April 25, 2006. ISBN 0-321-42917-6.
• Stephanie Cottrell Bryant. Videoblogging For Dummies, For Dummies, July 12, 2006. ISBN 0-471-97177-4.
• Lionel Felix, Damien Stolarz. Hands-On Guide to Video Blogging and Podcasting: Emerging Media Tools for Business Communication, Focal Press, April 24, 2006. ISBN 0-240-80831-2.
• Andreassen, T. B. & Berry, D M. (2006). Conservatives 2.0. Minerva. Norway. Nr 08 2006. pp 92–95
• Jennie Boure, "Web Video: Making It Great, Getting Noticed", Peachpit Press, 2009, ISBN 978-0-321-55296-9