I haven’t written properly on this blog to date, but today I’m in the mood to vent my spleen a little. You may know I have been working with the Town Mill Bakery these last few weeks creating a series of films telling their stories through a series of one to two minute shorts.

You see, today I came across this internet video:

Lyme Regis branching out on to the exciting information super highway? I think not. Here’s why:

For a start, the video is four minutes long. I don’t have four minutes to spare sitting down, listening to relaxing music and finding out very little about Lyme Regis and why people keep coming back. As far as I’m aware, people keep coming back for the community, the activities, the history, the fine dining and so forth. All that video is is four minutes of pretty clips cobbled together. There is no story, it’s just nice. One could argue that’s ideal for the older generation who want a relaxing holiday in a coastal town…

But why are these videos on the internet then? Surely you aren’t going to be effectively appealing to your demographic if you’re displaying your advertising material targeted at older people on the internet. And the website doesn’t help their cause either. The title reads “VISIT-DORSET.TV – DISCOVER A DIFFERENT SIDE”. What exactly is different about this video? It was so traditional and mainstream I nearly fell asleep through it. Lyme should be attracting relatively young couples to experience what it has to offer in the way of dining, activities, arts and craft and music. The rest of the website seems funky enough: I have no qualms there:

The video simply does not convey the message this website is trying to get through, in my eyes. With the Olympics coming to Portland and Weymouth, the whole idea of this new media marketing is to bring something different to the local communities, to show them in a different light. This does nothing for me.

I also find it strange that this was posted on Facebook. Surely the material in the video does not appeal to the average Facebook user? But that’s another matter.

I personally think the people who made the video are laughing all the way to the bank here. They haven’t challenged anything or brought anything new or interesting to the public domain…