Lies, Damn Lies, and Videolyzer

Videolyzer, created by Virtualpoltitik friend Nick Diakopoulos advertises itself as a tool designed to help journalists and bloggers collect, organize, and present information about the quality (i.e. validity, reliability, etc.) of online videos. Currently in beta, Diakopoulos would nonetheless like to see the tool used during this election season, when online video that shows gaffes, confrontations with the electorate, and signature moments from the podium is being disseminated according to the power laws that govern YouTube. Diakopoulos explains the rationale of the site as follows:

It makes it possible to evaluate and make sense of things like comments, claims, and sources as they relate to the video. Users can comment and annotate pieces of the video (called "anchors") to provide a more fine-grained description of the information in the video. The interface also incorporates a tightly integrated transcript of what's spoken in the video to make it easier to navigate the dense information there. Finally, Videolyzer allows for collaboration among many people. Users can build off of each other's annotations and rate each other in a form of distributed vetting and peer-evaluation.