After a preparation from over a year, the Videovortex conference took place from January 17-19, 2008. Here at the Institute of Network Cultures we’re very glad with the outcome. The project already started in Brussels, on October 5, 2007, with a one-day conference, co-organized by Argos (video documentation). It then moved on as a series of exhibitions in the Amsterdam ‘Montevideo’, the Netherlands Media Arts Institute. Now we’re ready to take it elsewhere. Most likely we will produce the fourth (free) INC reader about the state of the art in online video that will come later in 2008.

You can read reports of each session on the collaborative Masters of Media blog of the University of Amsterdam students. One of them, Anne Helmond, did a perfect job as a photographer. You can find her fli collection here in the flick pool. The video and audio archive of all lectures will become available shortly.

A key element of concept, the database nature of online video, didn’t work out as Geoffrey Bowker wasn’t able to make it due to personal circumstances. We’ll keep that for next time. The Amsterdam edition had a strong emphasis on art practices and online aesthetics and less so on the Henry Jenkins-type fan culture, with which YouTube usually is associated. The event showed that we’re in the midst of the video online boom. It was impossible to keep track of the different platforms and channels that are out there. That’s a good sign and shows that it was justified to use the event subtitle: ‘responses to YouTube’. Online video culture has been in the making for a decade but turned into a mass practice only one or two years ago. Videovortex asked the question what the specific characteristics of online video are, different from television, offline video or film. Was will Onlinevideo? It’s early days for the development of critical concepts, but we made a good start!