As more and more AMVs are added to a-m-v.org's database, sifting through the thousands and thousands of submissions becomes more difficult. Searching for a good Beck AMV or, god forbid, a good Advent Children AMV is almost a needle-in-the-haystack endeavor.
Yes, you can look at star ratings and such, but the search is still rather touch and go and ratings don't tell the whole story. Quality, little-viewed videos, particularly of older anime series, are easily overlooked by new AMV enthusiasts who really have no clue what they're missing. I personally would watch far more AMVs from a much wider range of anime if I was presented with a convenient, reliable way of tracking them down.
That said, I wonder if there is an interest in a new VCA category - the "best of the best" AMVs for each and all series/OAV/movies, etc. used: the best Naruto video, the best FLCL video, the best Hellsing video, etc. Yes, there would probably need to be a multi-series category (or several), but I think this kind of contest/ranking is workable. Toss in multi-editor projects, for good measure.
This kind of award opens the door to recognition for many AMVs that are not currently in the spotlight, but still should be applauded for a very specific achievement - the best use of a particular series/OAV/movie etc.
Perhaps after the initial bout of determing "the best ever," in each subsequent year voting could proceed much like it does for other VCA categories, with nominees narrowed down to a final few - the winners in each category would then be evaluated against the standing best and named "best ever" accordingly. First, second and third "best ever" undermines the whole "best of" concept, and looking up previous years' nominees would easily provide all the runners up.
I realize that there are a few serious problems with evaluating all the AMVs out there, particularly the first "best of" round. Should a two-star AMV to some obscure series be named "best of" for lack of decent competition? Can the various types of AMVs (comedy, drama, action, etc.) really be fairly judged against one another? On whose head does the responsibility for gathering the hundreds of series/OAV/movies used lie, if someone out there has to whittle down the field to get the ball rolling? I've got possible solutions to these issues, but I'm sure other people do as well, so I won't go any further right now because those of you out there who hate reading long posts like this one are already pretty annoyed - if indeed you made it this far. *inserts smiley to grab the attention of the easily-distracted*
Again, just throwing this out because everyone should be in the "his/her AMV is better this his/her's" mood right now; just offering a fresh view of how all the AMVs out there can be handled as their number grows year after year and the old rating systems become less and less capable of providing AMV watchers with a large pool of quality videos.
