On Sat, Mar 14, 2015 at 3:53 PM, Jan Ainali <jan.ainali@wikimedia.se> wrote:

Just an idea, for the part on how to edit with VisualEditor, make several short videos with distinct themes instead of one long video covering it all. Not only will it be easier to record and edit, it will be easier to reuse if you a question like question "How do I add a source with VE?" and you can just point them to that video rather than handing them a 30 minute video and trying to remember at what time that part starts.

Strong +1. The shorter a video is, the more people will watch/listen to it.
I'd recommend 30-90 seconds as the ideal target, with ~4 minutes as the second ideal target, and ~10 minutes as the maximum. Anything longer than that, could be broken up into chunks, and should be, Because:

A) less "time-commitment" for viewers (it can kindle the enthusiasm of clicking "oh, just one more!", rather than "oh god, another entire hour-at-once!"),
B) it allows multiple shorter videos to be embedded in a page of text,*
C) it has much more potential over the years ahead, for us (all) to update/improve/adapt/fork/subtitle/remix/etc each segment of it, in every wiki that it is wanted.

The text of the accompanying page could be:
* A concise version of the video(s), in bulletform list. I.e. "Slide-show presentation" style. With just keywords, and the clickable links to whatever the video is describing.

* Or, a match of the video(s) content, for people without video-options

* Or, a more elaborate/extensive/complete version of the video(s) content. E.g. our full Policy/Guideline/MoS/Essay/Help/etc pages themselves!

(Re: screencasts, I replied to the earlier thread related to this, but didn't CC-all, sorry! See
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/education/2015-March/001273.html )

--quiddity