YouTube and the NetLibrary

I think it's really interesting to recall that there once was a time when people didn't know anything about YouTube. It's such a central part of our collective social conscious that I forget sometimes that it hasn't existed forever. I know 6 and 7 year old kids who not only know about YouTube, but they know how to search for videos and watch things. I realize that this isn't an ideal age for surfing YouTube, but still--it's just as much a part of their internet use as it is mine. The amount of things you can find on YouTube is incredible--I've personally searched for music videos, sports clips, clips from TV shows that I watch, a few World of Warcraft promotional videos, and a few Battlestar Galactica montages of key moments between Starbuck and Apollo (in case anyone is also a viewer, I was really annoyed and bothered by the way their relationship was "resolved" in the series finale). But still, I don't doubt that the extent of movie clips posted on YouTube cover an enormous amount of material.
For the purposes of this blog, I opened up YouTube with the idea that I might try and search for something that I've never searched YouTube for in the past. Difficult to do, but I managed to think of something. Tornadoes. Weird, I know. But I had just been watching the weather channel, and I had to think hard about something that I have never looked for on YouTube before. And I actually found some really amazing videos. I also learned that they have tornadoes in Canada. Maybe I'm a little stupid, but I had no idea they had tornadoes there. Apparently they have pretty bad ones. Anyway, here's a video of a tornado from 2004:



I thought this video was kind of awesome. I love that you can see the tornado starting! I'm a secret fan of the movie Twister, and for a short while in high school I wanted to be a storm chaser like Helen Hunt's character. Ever since, I've been a little geeky-excited about tornadoes, so if you're not as big a geek as I am, indulge me a little?

I also looked at using NetLibrary, which seems like a great service. My library is not a participating member, so I had some trouble setting up an account for myself just so that I could get a good look around, but I think I'm ok with it. Even though I see the appeal of and am impressed by the technology of things like the Sony Reader and the Kindle, I know that I'll always prefer my books in hard copy format. I like holding my books in my hand and touching the covers and feeling the paper. Total nerd, but it's true. When I say that I love books, I'm not talking about the audio kind.