I might get into trouble for this, but this kind of thing bugs me. Steve Garfield is a videoblogger (or ‘vlogger’) who’s another member of the Blogging at Berkman group over at Harvard. A couple of weeks ago, Steve was interviewed by E-Media, “Austria’s leading magazine about internet, high-tech and multimedia”, and the interview went like this. Most of it’s pretty decent, but then you get to this part:

Why – in your opinion – are vlogs the next big thing on the internet?
Vlogs give people a voice. Vlogging gives people a distribution method that isn’t controlled by others. Vlogging allows people to get feedback on their productions. Vlogging brings people together. Vlogging makes the world smaller.
Vlogging is the next big thing on the internet because it promotes the ability to get to know people in other countries on a personal level.
Vlogging brings pen pal corresponding to a whole new level, and allows the whole world to join in on the conversation.

Now, what bothers me so much about this is that it’s essentially a stock answer ripped from a generic blogging fluff piece circa 2002. Swap off one little letter and you get this:

Why – in your opinion – are blogs the next big thing on the internet?
Blogs give people a voice. Blogging gives people a distribution method that isn’t controlled by others. Blogging allows people to get feedback on their productions. Blogging brings people together. Blogging makes the world smaller.
Blogging is the next big thing on the internet because it promotes the ability to get to know people in other countries on a personal level.
Blogging brings pen pal corresponding to a whole new level, and allows the whole world to join in on the conversation.

See what I mean? Where’s the deep insight on the psychological impact of being able to actually see and hear the person doing the reporting? Where’s the discussion on how vlogging is bringing weblogging to other media formats that were previously ill-suited to textual weblogging (like phones or TVs)? Where’s, you know, the thought and analysis?
There are two sentences earlier in the interview that provide a little of this, but only a little: “Video allows others to really get to know you. The intimacy of video gives you a glimpse into our lives.” Aside from that, he spends the rest of the interview talking about the revolutionary fields of commenting and international community-building. Oooooo. Again, how does that differ from what weblogs have been doing for the last couple of years?
C’mon, Richard. You tout your weblog as being “seen in TIME, BusinessWeek and the NY Times”, but is the only reason you’ve garnered so much attention that you’ve mastered the art of providing easily-accessible predictable sound bites?