Using wearable tech to film YouTube is going to be the new “taping songs off the chart show”
by Martin Belam, February 9, 2015 OK, probably not, but here goes…
So I’ve been getting a glimpse of the future of wearable tech because my 5 year old daughter decided to spend her Xmas money on a Vtech watch like this.
The main things she is interested in are taking photos and worrying about the battery life. I suspect she has internalised battery life panic from several years of me saying “No you can’t play with daddy’s phone, it’s about to run out of battery.” *shakes fist at Apple*
But I spotted her doing something unexpected with it. She was watching a pop video on YouTube on the laptop, then got her watch out and started videoing it.
It makes sense of course. Having her own copy of a song that she can watch on her wrist any time, instead of hoping that one of her parents are going to give her access to the laptop.
So there you go, using wearable tech to film YouTube is going to be the new “taping songs off the chart show” for the 21st century.
But there’s something else to the tale too.
Because when I related it at work I said “it seems like piracy is a deep-seated human activity”
Rob Manuel immediately pulled me up on that – suggesting that the copyright industry had totally got its tentacles into my mind if I was describing that as “piracy”.
He’s right.
All my daughter is doing is trying to move a song from one medium to another. To get it to keep on a device she can control. It’s the most natural thing to do with technology in the world if you are 5 year old.
by Martin Belam, February 9, 2015 I do live blogging, news stories and quizzes at the Guardian, and help cover Eurovision and Doctor Who for them too. As a journalist and designer I’ve spent over twenty years building digital products for the likes of Sony, the Guardian, the BBC, the Natural History Museum, Arts Council England and Reach (formerly Trinity Mirror). You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com. Sign up to get my blog posts sent to you via email.
My two year old had suddenly started I “take a picture of it” whenever I have my phone on and something interesting is being displayed. This despite me rarely taking photos on my phone. He is obviously a copyright stealing piece of filth and not someone who is trying to remember interesting things.
“HOME RECORDING-YOUTUBE-VIDEOS-OFF-THE-TV-ONTO-A-WATCH IS KILLING MUSIC”
Or, y’know, not.