Has lengthy Sigur Ros concert coverage replaced subversive short-form clips on Current TV?

In other words, is US television’s first intrepid citizen journalist network gradually jettisoning its user-generated videos, in favor of a content format ubiquitous elsewhere on TV? 

If you tune into Current TV today – from SuperNews and Vanguard Journalism, to The RottenTomatoe Show and InfoMania - an increasing number of professionally produced half-hour shows seem to be replacing Current’s original viewer-created content concept of randomly selected five to ten minute so-called video Pods.

So, how come viewers appeared to have lost at least some of their original voice on Current TV?

First off, what started as the first 24/7 “citizen journalism-meets-YouTube” channel on regular television, it never did fully rely on audience-provided video. It just didn’t need to in order to be relevant.

Instead, the collaborative video network relied on an innovative by-viewers-for-viewers mix of short-form video clips, peppered with professionally produced segments anchored by Current’s own young journalists.

Behind all of this sat the idea of democratizing television. Well outside of one-size-fits-all commercial TV media, by inviting viewers to create (at least part of) their own programing, everyone with a topic and a camera can capture and expose what they (not mainstream media) considers truly relevant to themselves and their peers.

The result? A young-and-social news and entertainment television experience – uniquely smart and engaging!

In comes the new Current TV. Yet, this one seems increasingly about vertically-themed blocks of 30-minute programming, rather then the previously dominating short-form pods.

The result? The citizen journalist network now appears somewhat akin to MTV (back during its “Real World” days), mixed in with a faster, more intrepid version of CNN (Christiana Amanpour meets Anderson Cooper, if you will).

Why the format change?

My guess: In a world were media has been elevated (or reduced, depending on who you ask) to simple bits and bytes, assembling snack-size viewer videos to a more compact program format may seem at first counter-intuitive – yet it makes perfect sense.

For one, user-generated video has matured and become a stand-alone genre – a programming format in itself.

To that point, CNN recently integrated its own user-generated programming under the iReport moniker. At least for some of their shows, CBS and FOX News now also amalgamate their regular programming with viewer-submitted media.

Of course, then there is the one question everyone in user-generated video is being asked: How do you build and monetize a sustainable business model based on, of all things, mere video snacks?

Last year, investment bank BearStearns estimated user-generated video giant YouTube would gross roughly $90 million by year-end 2008. At between 60 and 80 million unique viewers a month, about 750 million for the year, YouTube’s short-form video hardly seems a windfall, at least when measured in incremental revenue.

Of course, Current is not YouTube . In fact outside their shared interests in short, user-generated videos, they couldn’t be further apart.

Rather than relying on YouTube-style Web banner and in-stream video ads, Current captures its revenues just like any other US TV network would – carriage fees, plus advertising monies from commercial spots sold during its programming.

To that end, by now reaching 51 million TV households every month, Current’s incremental revenues are well ahead most user-generated video sites currently online.

Hence, if traditional long-form TV giants such as CNN, CBS, and others are increasingly cozying up to user-generated short-form video clips, well, then Current TV’s reverse response – bundling its short-form video archive into standard 30-minute TV formats – may make perfect sense.

Note to Current: Just don’t loose your original edge. Be sure to remain uniquely smart and engaging!

Yours truly, a fan.