Hey guys, today I thought I would get kind of meta and talk about vlogging.
You may already know that a vlog is a video blog.
I don’t always cringe when I say that word, but I cringe when I’m explaining it to people.
Like I am now.
I attempted to vlog for my first time at VidCon this year.
VidCon is a conference for people who love online video held in Anaheim, CA
every summer since 2010. This was my second year in a row attending.
The first day of VidCon fell on my birthday and
I spent that day and the entire weekend by myself, away from anyone I knew, but I had such a good time.
All my vlog footage, however, was clumsy and awkward.
I took all the wrong opportunities to talk to the camera, I rambled for ages about irrelevant
things, I had all the wrong camera angles and kept panning for some reason.
I wandered the expo halls like a lost child.
I even tried to make hotel room tour but managed to make that footage boring too.
But vlogging struggles aside, these were the highlights for me:
I was on the creator track, so I had access to panels, where I got to listen to my favorite Youtubers
share some of the wisdom that they've gained from working in online video so consistently for so long
The topics that they talked about and their perspectives were so diverse and so valuable for me.
I also had a great time at the Nerdfighter night concert series, where I saw Hank Green,
who’s pretty much responsible for the existence of VidCon, perform with his band The
Perfect Strangers and it reminded me how smart, funny, and contagious lyrics can be (and definitely
inspired an upcoming video).
Failing to take into account my shyness, I decided to try to create a montage of
my favorite Youtubers telling me their favorite word at the moment.
Because...English?
Unsurprisingly, I didn’t have the courage to approach most of the awesome Youtubers
I saw. And I saw so many.
But I did come up to three of them and, bless their hearts, here are their favorite words:
Chocolate. I love how it sounds: "chocolate" -- it just makes you thin k of, like, thick, sweet, dark chocolate.
Bombastic. I feel like the word fits exactly what it means. "Bombastic!"
Cognoscente. A person who has expert knowledge or acquired taste in a particular area.
I just like the way it rolls off the tip of my tongue.
Besides popular Youtubers with huge followings, I met a ton of new creators and a ton of Youtube fans.
But some of the best conversations I had were with industry people.
And in general, I found myself having more grown-up business talks
and fewer fangirl moments than I did last year.
Last but not least, there was the creator keynote.
This is where they bring out some of the most prolific online video creators and they each
share a little talk and it’s always so inspiring.
They usually have some announcements toward the end
and this year, Hank Green announced the launch of the Internet Creators Guild and the product director
at Youtube talked about some awesome new creator-supporting features that Youtube is rolling out.
In summary, VidCon is fun and vlogging is a lot harder than it looks.
But I’m going to keep working on it and hopefully keep getting better so that
next time, I can put up an actual vlog instead of sitting here complaining about my crappy footage.
Watching vlogs is a great way to expose yourself to more English.
I recommend the following four Youtubers who are skilled at vlogging and actually talk in their videos:
For North American English, Casey Neistat, who's arguably the king of vlogging,
and Lilly Singh, also known as "iisuperwomanii"...or just "superwoman."
For British English, I recommend Ben Brown and Louis Cole, also known as "funforlouis."
That’s it for today, let me know if there are any vloggers you watch and what you like about them
As always, I’m here to answer your questions and provide any clarifications that you need.
Don’t forget to subscribe using this button or the one below this video and until
next time, take care.