Thing 18. YouTube & Other Online Video

I normally go to YouTube so that my two year old daughter can watch the Wiggles, an Australian children's musical group. She simply loves the songs and dance! What I find a little alarming is that even at a tender age of two it is very hard to get my daughter to stop watching these clips. If she had her way, she would continue watching all day. This can be addictive and there are a lot of very inappropriate videos on YouTube as well. But then there are also very good ones on it as well.




The video that I am posting from YouTube to my blog is a very interesting piece about how global warming is affecting every part of the world, including a Sherpa village in the mountainous regions of Khumbu, Nepal. What is interesting to me is that it is a piece done by Al Jazeera English, which is a news channel that is not available in the US.

YouTube is easy to navigate but consumes a lot of bandwidth so it's imperative that videos are viewed during "non-rush" hour Internet traffic. I had to pause the streaming first and wait for the whole video to download so I could view it without stops.

A Library can use YouTube to advertise its services and programs to a wide audience. And it is probably one of the few ways to reach the younger generation!