Video and the Net, Web 1994. The Guardian.A decade before youtube

On viewmagazine.tv -The Newspapers and the Net circa 1994.

It's difficult to fathom. Video and the web 1994.

It's the year of Friends, Celine Dion's The Power of Love, and an advert which had bizarrely cross over value, which ad people call "overlook". Remember "Hello Boys, Wonderbra".

So in 1994, the web had just been conceived, Marc Andreesen cracks a browser code, Mosaic. At an interview for my new job, the managing director asks me if I know anything about the Internet.

I say yes, blagging it a bit. I'd worked on a gas-model flow programme in 1987 for the Net, but the web is different. However I soon have an account with compuserve and my first graphic design tool, Corel Draw.

1994. Fifteen years ago, a generation in itself. Video on the web was being trialled. Cybercafe off Charlotte street was one of the venues.

At the station, I Videojo a piece on the new chip thieves. there is a growing trend in thefts of memory cards and hard drives, particularly if your card is top of the range e.g. 112mb.

My colleague however catches the zeitgeist. What influence will the web have on the newspapers, such as The Sunday Times, The Telegraph and The Guardian.

It's worth a visit to see for the social history of the web and:

1. what the newspapers said
2. videojournalism in 1994

Videojournalism 1994

Found this made in 1994 which I have dumped on viewmagazine.tv.

It's about youth crime - something I have covered extensively in my reporting career.

It got me looking at my tape stock and there, betas, A1 tapes and the likes, are hundreds of video stories that are sitting idly around.

But hey what's the point I think looking resigned.

500 vid stories that's not overly surprising since at Channel One we would often cut two stories a day, so if you worked 250 days of the year ....

Anyhow this report sits between VJ for TV and Gonzo.

If it looks dark, that's because the gamma goes all pear shape when compressing so a few areas appear more dark than they looked when transmitted.

The camera I used was the Beta BMW300 - huge washing machine of a camera - appropriate if you're a designated camera operator but a bummer if you're a VJ with a Vinten tripod and tapes to carry.

Cost, between 15-30,000 UKP. That was about 45,000 USD. They would later come down to about 8000 UKP. Large part of the greenbacks went on the camera lens alone.

Did I tell you the story of a colleague of mine doing a really nice shot on a bridge overlooking the Thames and the plate on his tripod slipped and woops 1000s of pounds of camera fell into the Thames, probably there today.

Any how here's the link
VIDEOJOURNALISM 1994
Crime, Crime, Crime. If you go out to London today you'll be in for a big surprise. The first of three reports on London's under current crime problem.