Television uses “expert in a box” video links pretty routinely, but they use high-tech connections set-up and run by technicians. Some technology news websites like c/net.com feature video interviews. Podcasters or vodcasters as they might be called, routinely use Internet video.

Are most reporters thinking of Internet video when they set up interviews? In J schools are experts invited into classrooms via Internet video, modeling how to do Internet interviews? What percentage of interviews do J students do online, in lieu of in person or by telephone?

There’s a story in Wired, Legal First: Marine Court Martial Uses Live Internet Video by Marty Graham, about using Internet video to question witnesses who were on ships, going into combat, and generally unavailable to provide testimony in court.

The case involved the killings of 24 civilians in Haditha, Iraq, and the problem facing the tribunal was how to take testimony and allow cross-examination of witnesses who can’t be in the courtroom. There is interesting give and take on how video testimony differed from face to face witness testimony in court and several experts weigh in on the pros and cons of video testimony (is someone making faces behind the camera?)

Using Internet video testimony allowed all the parties to watch witnesses who might be dead in battle at any time. Watching the witnesses body language and facial expressions is as important to lawyers and judges as it is to reporters. But I wonder how many reporters think of Internet video as a tool like the telephone?

With the inexpensive and ubiquitous tech tools available today, reporters can produce this kind of interview for a website, take stills from the video and use them in a print story, and enhance an edited and polished story by putting the whole interview online for viewer/users who like transparency. Are you thinking like this? Should you be thinking like this? With the hordes of amateurs taking to this enthusiastically, maybe professionals should give it a try.

Tags: internet+video, courts, news, reporting, vodcast, podcast