HAVE you seen this video?” someone asks, thrusting their cellphone at you and quickly showing an online clip of something funny, strange, delicious, or interesting.
Your phone pings and you look down. You’ve received a new shared video from a friend, probably about dogs and cats acting funny.
I’m a huge fan of curated online content and I jump at the idea to support any communication channels that are informative and fun, do social good, and allow you to be goofy, crazy, and generally painfully awkward.
I’m loving how media companies, groups and individuals continue to create interesting curated content for online markets. Videos have become all the craze now and I’m thoroughly enjoying the fun and informative content you can find online.
For food and recipes, you get media companies and groups like The Food Network, Tasty, Tastemade and Cookat who just suck you in with the eight-minute videos of delicious steaks, baked goods, Korean dishes and other delicious treats.
If by chance you scroll past any of these videos on your timeline, you just pause and allow yourself to get totally famished watching some of these videos.
Buzzfeed is a huge digital media phenomenon that provides a myriad of curated digital content from food to lifestyle and DIY hacks, to entertainment, to news and other vital journalism bits. Buzzfeed has increasingly become a go-to site to cover my curiosity over strange life hacks (like how to make ice bubbles) or to get a dose of international news reporting.
Recently, I’ve become obsessed with content from Cut, a Seattle-based “storytelling company” that owns brands like HiHo (the kids from “Kids Try”), 100 Years of Beauty and This Matters.
I absolutely love it because they provide meaningful content that tickles your funny bones with their kids of “Kids Try” (look for the Kids Try Food from the Philippines episode) or leaves you thinking with its strong, meaningful messages in their This Matters and 100 Years of Beauty channels.
As a communication graduate, I love how producers develop their content and how everyone is absolutely hands-on in the whole production process of these videos. I’ve spent hours pouring over behind the scenes videos of companies like Cut and Buzzfeed, and love how content is produced and executed.
I miss working in an environment where teams like in Cut and Buzzfeed come together, brainstorm and develop content. These are absolutely fun processes to do.
Creating videos and content has gained ground locally as well. And while I’m tempted to create my own Hiho version with my dog Kiki, I’ll have to think about it more still.
However, I recently had the chance to be interviewed by a vlog! It was a fun thing to do. We talked about dogs, social change and working for social good. It was a fun practice to share what I was most passionate about—dogs, agriculture and social change on a platform that I’ve fallen in love with. Check out Vernon Joseph Go’s page and our interview.