Dick,
Your recent email regarding content for the ARRL Lifelong Learning program stirred my interest. Thanks for calling some of these issues to our attention.
First, as to content, it was good to see Ms. Jairam’s comments from an educational perspective. She mentioned “structure and curriculum, an ability to add learning exercises, skill assessments, etc.” as things that a good educational site would offer that You Tube would not. She has far more experience in that area than I do, but I agree wholeheartedly with her.
As for video, well, that is my area of expertise. I spent years producing and directing news, documentaries, commercials, public service announcements, and even corporate videos, before capping my career with 25 years supervising the production of commercials for the world’s biggest advertiser, Procter & Gamble. I think I know video and how it communicates.
So I was intrigued with your offering of all those YouTube producers. I spent some time looking at each of their offerings. While I did not look extensively at each producer’s work, I got a good enough look at each of them to be able to offer a bit of an assessment of their quality, both technically, and from a content standpoint.
Interestingly, I found that your list, intentionally or not, reflected my assessment of the quality of the producers from top to bottom. I was enthused about Dave Casler, KE0OG. He is a good host, his videos are technically well-produced, and he is well-organized in what he says and interesting in how he does it. As we go further down the list, quality deteriorates, in my opinion. Also, I would note that at least two of the sites listed are more “talk” sites, discussing issues, attitudes, and many other things relevant to ham radio, but not “instructional” as most of us would understand that term. Many of the other sites offer poor quality, either in content, quality, or especially in “likeability.” And of note, at least one of the sites is on such a high technical plane that on Howard’s “Spectrum of Hams” (February QST), it would be at the far end of the quadrant of “technologists.” Not bad, but not of widespread interest.
How am I assessing these videos? I made a list of criteria, with four major points, and some explanations about each.
Content
o Organization of ideas
§ Concise, not rambling
§ An objective for the video, and some key take-aways for the viewer
o Technical correctness of subject matter
Quality
o Video (good quality technically, steady shots, good lighting, etc.)
o Audio (close-miked, not noisy or echo-y, no distracting background noises, clear diction, etc.)
Editing
o Easy to follow
o Demonstrations that are clear visually, with close-ups where necessary, and appropriately placed to follow the audio that describes them.
o Not allowing any distractions encountered during shooting to intrude on the program
Likeability
o Visual Interest--meaning, for instance, appropriate cuts and close-ups, never staying too long on either the host or on a particular graphic or piece of equipment
o Engaging host
o Music and titles where appropriate
o Appropriate length for the subject matter
At this point, I’m not offering a detailed evaluation of each site. I’m not sure how helpful it would be, or whether or not it would be worth the hours and hours of viewing that it would take me. I would hope that we could interest the staff in taking a look at a few of these, in particular if Dave Casel is interested in working with ARRL.
YouTube is useful, but one has to be wary of the content and the producers. Some “how to…” videos are just the thing for repairing that obscure piece of equipment, and others can mislead. Within ham radio, just the sampling of what you listed, let alone the hundreds of thousands of other videos, can be anything from really good to frighteningly awful.
ARRL has a lot of excellent content. We need to find ways to pull it into screen-friendly applications, and we will need a lot of help doing that. So let the dialog continue.
Tom W8WTD