Video on the Net: Day Two

Overwhelmed.

That's how you could put it.

That's how I'm sure 9,950 of the attendees of VON will feel after wandering through the Video on the Net portion of the conference. After two days of this, I'd be inclined to join them.

Except I'm one of the other 50.

There were approximately 10,000 people registered for the VON conference this year. Included within VON was a subdivision called Video on the Net... except that's really where all the action was happening. That's because web video is more than the new "killer app" -- it's the new global communication.

Let's put it this way: once upon a time, we couldn't communicate without standing in the same room. Then came telephones. Then television. Now the internet.

Are you seriously going to tell me it stops here?

Now, try to explain this to the people who've made their living in existing technology, with existing tools and established paradigms. Try telling them that they need to adapt in the next 18 months or their businesses will die. Try telling them that the old empires are already history, and the new mindblowing information they've received at this conference is already obsolete

And then realize that we need at least 30% of them to come with us or else we're dead.

We new media moguls, we evangelizers and content producers and disruptors, we cannot exist without monetization. We cannot continue to produce astounding work without paying our rent. We can't explode the system without fuel in the tank.

So imagine being able to see through time, and then turning around and needing to strap training wheels to the vast majority of the populace, knowing fully well that they need to follow the carrot you're dangling or else you're both screwed.

That's Video on the Net.

I'm one of the 50 who "gets it." I spent my time with Chris Brogan, Jeff Persch,Steve Garfield, Brian Conley, John Herman and the fine folks at Blip TV today, and when compared to the information exchange at PodCamp, it felt like going from 60 to 0. Every one of us would have rather sat down and talked with the people who already understand our lingo, who know what we're doing and why, who don't need us to validate our actions every time we open our mouths.

But without the masses, we die.

So we dilute the message and allow the people who ask Andrew Baron questions like, "Now how do you get Rocketboom on TV?" or make statements like, "Well, I don't think our company should be blogging" to find value in what we do, so we can all make the next move together.

Someone has to go first. Someone has to find the road so the others can turn it into a highway.

Someone has to shine the light so the people will follow.

I'm one of the 50.

Are you?