Friday’s here! I just looked back at the archives and see that this is our dozenth edition of Friday Five. Today I’ll revisit the topic that kicked us off: How do you save online video? Although that article is dominated by YouTube (as is the online video landscape in general) there are several alternatives for finding quality video for instruction and professional development. Some of these alternatives may be especially appealing to educators who are unable to access the likes of YouTube from behind school firewalls.
1. Teacher Tube
TeacherTube is–as you might suspect–like YouTube, but with teaching in mind. Materials on TeacherTube are created by and for educators and students. Videos and comments are moderated for a safer browsing and learning experience. Note that TeacherTube is ad-supported–just create an account and sign in to skip the ads.
2. Google Video
Before they bought YouTube, Google created their own video sharing service. It still exists, but its popularity pales in comparison to that of YouTube. It also suffers from the poor signal-to-noise ratio that YouTube does; however, if you log in with your Google account you can set filters for safer searching.
3. Vimeo
Personally speaking, Vimeo is my favorite video sharing service. It’s friendly, easy to use, and provides privacy considerations other services may not include. Vimeo is especially useful for sharing clips you may not want the whole world to see, but do want to provide limited access to via a password. Vimeo’s community guidelines are a good model for keeping an online ecosystem civil and secure.
4. Blip.tv
Blip.tv caters more to video makers who are creating series as opposed to one-time clips. It does this by presenting material using a familiar metaphor of shows and episodes (as in, a show consists of multiple episodes). Blip.tv is easieset to use when you know exactly what it is you’re looking for–a favorite podcast, for example–but once you’ve found the show it’s easy to feed it into your favorite podcast viewer (such as iTunes) or watch it directly in your web browser.
5. iTunes Podcast Directory
Speaking of iTunes, did you know that it includes a well-stocked directory of podcasts? Subscribing to podcasts is easy, and results in video clips saved directly to your computer (without having to jump through the hoops usually involved with saving online video). You can also sync these videos with your iPhone or iPod for watching them on-the-go.
Photo: Robert of Fairfax on Flickr
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