Forget 2007 Online Video. This Guy’s Looking at 2008.

Jason Glickman, an Internet advertising veteran with expertise in emerging interactive technologies, was a little late to predict 2007. So the CEO of Tremor Media decided to predict online video for 2008. Read his predictions in MediaPost’s Online Video Insider.

Here are his predictions with my commentary:

1. Video goes vertical.
Surely vertical sites (specialized content by specific interest areas) will emerge, but remember we heard that same prediction in 2000 with web content. Even today the bulk of content is consumed from a few major players. For example, numerous health sites formed around specific prevalent disease areas, for instance, but WebMD is still the gorilla.
2. Professionally produced content online surpasses amateur content.
True. But amateur content will grow exponentially as it finds niche markets via distribution channels that never before existed.
3. $12 billion of TV budgets move to online video.
Almost all of the predictions of online spend end up being overstated, so I’ll stay out of this one.
4. TV is a box–one of many.
I agree that online video will be consumed more and more in portable ways. It’s happened with music, and commuters will be viewing video instead of newspapers.
5. More political advertising online than TV.
Oh I can’t wait for that.
6. Video search will make sense.
I want to believe this will settle in 2008 but the reality is that it will still be in its infancy. It’s a tough nut to crack. Making video searchable is like trying to make text searchable with a TRS-80 and 56K modems.
7. Video blogging will cross the chasm.
They’ll cross the chasm and there will be a significant thinning of the herd. We don’t need 200 new Rush Limbaughs.
8. Video communities.
This is perhaps the most interesting prediction. I don’t think we can anticipate the texture of online video community in 2008 anymore than we could have predicted YouTube in 2004.

His closing thought: “2008 will be the year when video becomes the language of the people’s Internet.” Amen to that.