• Red Sox to Produce It Gets Better Online Video

    Cracking open the Boston Globe yesterday (yes, I still read a physical newspaper on weekends!), I was pleased to read that our home town Red Sox will be the latest major league baseball team planning to create an online video in support of the "It Gets Better Project." If you're not familiar with It Gets Better, it's an organization started last fall by columnist Dan Savage to show support for lesbian and gay youth who often suffer harassment.

    It Gets Better has quickly become a textbook example of how powerful user-generated video can be when directed toward a particular goal. Thousands of It Gets Better videos have been produced, including many from celebrities. I've watched a sample of them and they range from the amateur level all the way to some very slick productions. The key is that the videos convey the producer's passion and authenticity in a way no other medium could.

    As the Globe article describes, in the Red Sox case, a petition was started by a 12-year-old fan who collected over 10,000 signatures to help spur the Red Sox on. It's a great story, and further shows how omnipresent online video has become in our society. No doubt many other organizations will be trying to emulate It Gets Better's success with video to help raise awareness for their cause as well.