arzuro wrote:I could start one about how otakus never get laid, but it would probably prove less interesting, or at least productive. Seriously, I feel like I'm having a good discussion here. One interesting question - all though it does have bit of a hen or egg character (even though the hen obviously came first) - is whether people who are searching for a way to express their thoughts turn to amv because of obvious benefits (a pretty supportive community, the possibility of starting small, only altering a few aspects of the original, and working with things one likes anyway) or people just start messing with amv's and discover something that encourages them to be creative. What do you think?
Are you asking why people started making AMV's in the first place? There has been a thread about this topic... but, in general making amv's is a pretty easy way of expressing oneself. The anime and the music may not be yours but the editing of the two is and just having that one token item (The editing part) is usually enough to satisfy ones need to express themselves. Whether they choose to show that or not also depends on many factors ("I love my vision, but nobody else will understand it so I will keep it for myself", "I Love my vision, and I think others may like it as well so I will let others watch it", "I Hate my vision, but I think others might enjoy it if only for the comedy value it entails so I will release it" etc etc etc) Lotsa factors...
Making AMV's is a great benefit whatever the reason one does it for, because it is a more personal thing. You have nobody over your shoulder telling you how to edit your vision, or display it to whatever song your doing it to. Then again you only have so many tools to work with to display that stuff that you want to create. And again, most of those tools come from other people's work, not yours.
Music Video's on the other hand have to deal with the constraints of the Production crew, the dancers, the other musicians that help them create the music they heard in their head, the production budget, and so on. Each of these factors could change the original idea or warp it into something else that becomes acceptable to the person that wants to make it in the first place. In many ways the freedom to create that specific MV that you had in your head is robbed by these different varients.
AMVer's are bound by the limits of what they have, those that make Music Videos are bound by those that help create ones vision. And vice-versa.
The biggest difference right now between the two forms (Besides one being anime and the other Non-anime) is that AMV's tend to be more synching based and MV's tend to... well, not be synched well at all. From the way you talk you seem to like the latter then the former in the stuff you watch. You will find stuff like that in some of the AMV's on this site but they don't tend to be the most popular here since you can find that stuff on TV... This is probably not the best way to explain it, but I'm tired and need to get some sleep.
(Oh, and I'd ignore Kthulhu, I don't think those posts will be here long. Although he does remind me of a funny "The Daily Show" skit right now...)