13 minute read
Academic Video Online (AVON
doi:10.5260/chara.22.2.5
Composite Score: HHH 1/4
Reviewed by:
Thomas J. Beck Auraria Library, University of Colorado Denver, Denver, Colorado Date of Review: August 12, 2020
<thomas.j.beck@ucdenver.edu>
Abstract Academic Video Online (AVON) is an Alexander Street database. It presents an extensive collection of videos on a variety of topics and from numerous sources. Some of the most popular topics are American History, Anthropology, Black Studies, Counseling and Therapy, Music and Performing, and Science and Engineering. Popular sources include BBC Landmark, CNN, Film Platform, PBS, and Sony Classic Pictures. Many other topics are also available in this database, ranging from Art and Architecture to Fashion Studies to World Music, and from World History to Hawaiian Studies to Cooking. Additional sources include CBS, Third World Newsreel, Mayo Clinic, American Academy of Pediatrics, Nippon News, and FilmRise. The visual and audio qualities of the videos on offer here are excellent, they are easy to navigate, and include transcripts.
Videos can be browsed by topic or source, or searched for using a single search bar, which allows the user various filtering options. The search and filtering options here produce useful results, though the number of those can vary considerably depending on the search done. However, the search options available can be confusing to the user, due to the unexplained separation of the database into groupings of videos, Channels, and Collections (see User Interface/Navigation/ Searching for more information). As a consequence, users may not be able to use the database most effectively, and/or appreciate the full scope of material available here.
Pricing for this database can vary considerably, as it is based on FTE, budget, and the number of prospective users. No more specific pricing information is available from the vender. The licensing agreement for this database, on the other hand, is relatively standard in its length, structure, and content. The quality and quantity of AVON’s content is high and should appeal to a wide variety of students and faculty in various disciplines, though users will have to learn AVON’s search idiosyncrasies, which can cause confusion.
Pricing Options Pricing is determined by institution size (FTE), budget, the number of prospective users, and the number of sites served. Consortia pricing is also available. Please contact the vendor for pricing specific to your institution. Individual titles can be purchased from this database (instead of subscribing to the entire database content) in most instances, but not all, depending on publisher restrictions.
Product Overview/Description This database is a grouping of approximately 67,000 streaming videos on a wide variety of subjects. These videos are grouped into Channels, which can be films from a publisher or that deal with specific topics, events, or persons. Alexander Street, the vendor for this database, refers to all of its databases as Collections, and AVON subscribers can access a number of other Alexander Street databases in addition to AVON itself. This may be confusing to users, in that a grouping of videos within the database can be a Channel, or an entirely different database, i.e., a Collection. These other databases include American History in Video, American Newsreels in Video, and several others, and all are automatically included in a subscription to AVON (i.e., they don’t need to be subscribed to separately).
As already mentioned, channels can relate to topics, persons, or events, such as LGBT Studies, Anthropology, Science & Engineering, Dance, George Washington, Harriet Tubman, American Civil War, and many more. Others are source (i.e., publisher) or category based, including Documentary, A+E Networks, Annenberg Learner, and 360VR video (i.e., films where, per the database, “a view in every direction is recorded at the same time, shot using an omnidirectional camera or a collection of cameras”).
Windows users will find AVON works best with Firefox, Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, and Microsoft Edge. For Mac users, Firefox, Chrome, and Mojave will work best. It won’t support DRM playback on iOS devices or in Safari (which at this time only effects their titles from Sony Pictures Classics). Using VR headsets such as Google Cardboard or Daydream to playback 360 VR videos is only supported on Android devices. This database offers unlimited concurrent access to authorized users. Those researching any variety of subjects can make use of it, including high school and college/university students and faculty.
User Interface/Navigation/Searching The landing page for this database is bright and engaging, but can be somewhat confusing to use. There is a single search bar in the upper right-hand corner of the page. From there the user can search using one or more key words, and narrow the search to Current Channel, All Videos, or All Channels. A search for “criminal justice” limited to All Channels, for example, will produce a list of 192 channels (as of August 12, 2020). The channels are sorted by relevance, and the results list displays the name of each, as well as the number of videos there. Results found at the top of the list are on point for criminal justice, with channels like Criminal Justice Studies, Criminal Justice and Public Safety in Video, American Justice, and Scenes of Crime. Those farther down the list, however, are not so obviously relevant, such as Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., Latin America Studies Collection, and Chemistry, though it’s possible to envision a situation in which these might relate to the topic in question. If this search is resubmitted with the limitation changed to All Videos, it produces 2,496 videos (again, as of August 12, 2020). These were on point for the subject queried, throughout the results list, with video titles like History of American Criminal Justice, Criminal Justice Professionals, The Battle for Justice, and Criminal Court Process and Procedure. Resubmitting the
above search with the limitation Current Channel would of course produce various results, depending on the channel selected.
Once a results list is produced it can be sorted in a variety of ways, depending on whether the original search was limited to All Videos or All Channels. The sorting options for the former are subject, publisher, person, content type (e.g., documentaries, performances, interviews, etc.), language, and release date. The options for the latter are subject and channel type (e.g., series, field of interest, organization, genre, etc). If a search is limited to Current Channel, the sorting options will be the same as those for All Videos.
In addition to the search bar, the user can find videos by browsing. The Menu tab in the upper left-hand corner of the database’s landing page presents these options. Users can browse by Channel or Collection. Both are listed alphabetically, by subject for the former and by collection name for the latter. Lists of channels can be sorted by popularity, channel type, subject, publisher, person, content type, language, and release date. Channels themselves can also be sorted by all of these, with the exception of popularity and channel type. The collection listing can’t be sorted at all. The various channels on offer cover a wide variety of topics, ranging from American history to supply chain management, and from education to sport. These channels are clustered into broad subject groupings, like Art and Architecture, Fashion Studies, Psychology, Theatre, and several others.
Within each grouping are a number of channels, each containing multiple individual films. For example, the subject grouping Cooking includes the channel Cooking Techniques and Utensils, which contains over 400 videos, such as Cooking Fundamentals, Chef vs. Science: the Ultimate Kitchen Challenge, and Cake Decorating. When a film is selected, either by searching or browsing, its picture will generally be clear and its audio quality good. Once selected, a video will start playing automatically in full screen mode, with English closed captioning on. At the bottom of the screen, the title of the video is clearly visible. From various points on the screen the user can select one or more of the following options: adjust picture quality (to 480p, 360p, 270p, or 240p) and audio quality (240p-1080p); turn full screen view on/off; turn closed captions on/off; make clips from the film (and/or view those already made); share via social media, a permalink, or embed code; imbed the film in an LMS or other website (by copying a permalink or an embed code); or generate a full citation of the video (in APA, MLA or Chicago). Also available are the full details of the film, including an abstract, release date, director, genre, discipline, and much more. Users can also access a keyword-searchable transcript of the film.
Critical Evaluation Current Channel, All Videos, or All Channels searches are all relatively effective and provide useful results. However, those results can vary greatly from one to another, as is the nature of searches that target individual titles (videos), as opposed to those that target groups of titles (channels). These are all basic searches, in that they apparently assume a Boolean AND search for all terms entered. No advanced search option is available, though several sorting options are accessible after a search has been executed.
The problems these three searches present has less to do with functionality and content, than with confusion on the part of the user as to what a Channel is versus a Collection. Most users won’t know this difference, and because the landing page defaults to a Current Channel search, those users may understandably assume that whatever search they do in that channel is all AVON has to offer! Alexander Street needs to rework this landing page to better present and explain these search options. That aside, AVON’s video content is extensive, varied and of high quality, and its search mechanisms can be effective once understood.
After a search is performed, the user can sort results in variety of ways, depending on the type of search done. These can include sorting by subject, person, publisher, channel type, content type, language, release date, popularity, relevance, or title. Once a film is selected, the user can adjust its picture and audio quality, change screen size, insert or remove closed captions, make or view clips from the film, and share, cite, and/or imbed it in an LMS or other website. The picture and sound quality of these films is generally good, if not excellent. Despite AVON’s above-mentioned search idiosyncrasies, it often produces useful results and can potentially be of use to students and faculty working at different levels of study and in a wide variety of subject areas.
Competitive Products Films on Demand, from Infobase, offers thousands of streaming videos on a variety of subjects, as does Kanopy (though this resource has a reputation for being high cost). Other multidisciplinary options with extensive collections include New Day Films, Docuseek, and Filmakers Library Online (also from Alexander Street). Per Alexander Street, Films on Demand has some of the same providers as AVON, including PBS, BBC, CNN, A+E Networks®/History Channel, Dow Jones/WSJ, California Newsreel, Bloomberg Media, Annenberg Learner and others. However, AVON has many other publishers not found in Films on Demand, like FILM PLATFORM, Sony Pictures Classics, Milestone Films American Counseling Association, Stanley Milgram Experiments, 60 MINUTES, Microtraining Associates, Juno Films, for Dummies, Cine Ojo and more. Regarding Kanopy, Alexander Street maintains they share the providers PBS, Shout! Factory, Pragda, Collective Eye, California Newsreel, Cinema Guild, Giant Pictures, Monument Films, Oscilloscope, Music Box, Documentary Educational Resources (DER), and some others. However, they maintain AVON’s collection is over two times the size of both Kanopy and Films on Demand, and as such is a better resource. They also maintain that AVON has no overlap with New Day Films or Docuseek, and that 100% of the content in Filmakers Library Online (also their database) is already in AVON. Of course, this overlap analysis it provided by Alexander Street about its competitors, so potential subscribers to AVON should feel free to reach out to those competitors to confirm the information above is correct!
Purchase & Contract Provisions The vendor for this database is Alexander Street, and it uses the same licensing agreement for all of its resources. This agreement is slightly more than 4 pages long, and its conditions are fairly standard. Authorized Users for public libraries are library staff, residents of the library’s “reasonably defined” geographic area, and walk-ins. For schools/ academic institutions, those users are currently enrolled students, faculty, staff, visiting scholars, and walk-ins. Access to the database must be made via a secure network and with authentication, and remote access is allowed. Access to non-subscribing institutions or users is prohibited. Also, the ever popular Limited Warranty and Disclaimer of Warranty and Limitation of Liability clauses are present, as well as standard sections on termination for breach and remedial action. In addition, there’s a section on audio and video files (something especially relevant to this database). These files are (naturally enough) delivered to authorized users via streaming ser-
AVON Review Scores Composite: HHH 1/4
The maximum number of stars in each category is 5.
Content: HHHH This database is an extensive collection of multidisciplinary, closed captioned, streaming videos. Users can a adjust a film’s picture and audio quality; adjust screen size; make and/or view clips from a film; share it via social media, a permalink, or embed code; imbed the film in an LMS or other website; or generate a full citation of it. The video and audio qualities of these films are generally excellent.
User Interface/Searchability: HHH The browse functions in this database are straightforward, and the search functions can be effective if used properly. However, the latter are not necessarily intuitive and can be confusing to new users.
Pricing: HHH Pricing varies substantially, as it is based on institution size (FTE), budget, the number of prospective users, and the number of sites served. A subscription to this database will most probably be more economical for institutions with low FTEs, and less so for those with high ones.
Purchase/Contract Options: HHH This contains a number of standard provisions found in other such agreements and offers no apparent cause for concern.
vice, and the customer and users are prohibited from downloading or otherwise copying them. The customer must ask the permission of ProQuest’s licensor and/or the copyright holder for any public presentation of these, other than reasonable classroom and educational use. There’s also a clause that isn’t always found in other like agreements, U.S. Government Restricted Rights. This deals with U.S. Government rights to use, modify, reproduce, perform, release, display, or disclose computer databases or software, or technical data. All of the above-mentioned provisions are, as already mentioned, generally standard ones, and where not standard are not a reason for concern. Nevertheless, potential subscribers should read this agreement with care before signing it, and if at all possible, with the assistance of an attorney.
Contact Information
Alexander Street, a ProQuest Company
99 Canal Center Plaza, Suite 200 Alexandria, VA 22314 Phone: (800) 889-5937 E-mail: <https://support.proquest. com/#submitcase?prod=Alexander%20 Street&cat=Authentication> Producer URL: <https://alexanderstreet.com/> Product URL: <https://alexanderstreet.com/products/academicvideo-online> Primary Category: Multidisciplinary (or interdisciplinary)
Type of product being reviewed: Streaming video
Target Audience: Secondary; General public; Undergraduate (including community colleges); Graduate/Faculty/Researcher
Access: Subscription
Authentication This database can be authenticated in a variety of ways, including IP, Proxy, Shibboleth, Open Athens, username/password, and library barcode.
About the Author
Thomas J. Beck is a Teaching & Learning Librarian at the Auraria Library, at the University of Colorado Denver. He provides library instruction to students in a classroom setting and in-person reference to library users. He also develops subject research guides for assigned subject areas and is one of his library’s liaisons to campus faculty working in the said areas. Prior to working at the Auraria Library, he was a reference librarian at the Englewood Public Library, Englewood, CO from 1996-2000. He obtained his Bachelor of Arts Degree in History from the University of Colorado at Denver in 1985 and his MLS from Emporia State University, Emporia, KS, in 1995. n
