YouTube. From the sublime:
To the ridiculous:
I know I've praised the virtues of YouTube on this blog to the point where many of my posts are mere links or embedded clips of fun shit I've found there recently. But last night, as I was watching the entirety of Eat the Document, the never-released documentary of Bob Dylan's 1966 boo-laden electric tour through Europe with The Band, I had an epiphany: This shit ain't gonna last forever.
Corporate overlord Google has already caved to pressure from corporations like Viacom, which forces the site to pull any of its copyright protected content, such as "The Daily Show." I figure we might only be a year or two away from a complete blackout from so much of the wonderful, pirated stuff that makes YouTube the best place to kill a few hours with some time-travel to see all of that stuff you've always heard about but never had the money -- or connections -- to buy.
Which is why I've begun to save YouTube videos to my hard drive with SaveTube. That way, when the bottom falls out of this free-for-all era, I'll still be able to check out a 23-year-old Robbie Robertson grooving like mad before a show in which he and the guys play some of the most urgent, rollicking music ever inflicted on a hostile audience completely missing out on the significance. They were witnesses to a seismic shift in the history of rock and roll. For the rest of us, it's time to capture it before its gone.
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