Lights! Camera! Action! Get a Job!

Just a few years ago, colleges took the technological leap into the 21^st century by accepting online applications from prospective students. Now those students are graduating from colleges nationwide and looking for jobs. And they are replacing the traditional paper resume with the video job resume.

It's simple. Just sit yourself in front of a video camera and speak. List your accomplishments, your job experience in chronological order, and don't forget to mention that you can make references available upon request.

What kind of edge might video resumes have over written ones? If you're articulate, well-dressed and intelligent, proponents say, that would clearly come across in a video resume. Let's face it - many written resumes end up in the trash, don't they?

Aleksey Vayner tried his hand at a video resume, which was posted on Google's YouTube. The video included clips of Vayner lifting weights, playing tennis, skiing, ballroom dancing and breaking a pile of bricks in half with a karate chop. But Vayner, who used the video to note that "failure cannot be considered an option," spawned an avalanche of ridicule, and mock videos. His video on YouTube, however, has been viewed a whopping 478,000 times -- and counting.

On the opposite side of the spectrum is the video \resume posted by a charming would-be director, Manolo Celi, generated a heap of praise from viewers. (See link)

According to eSchool News, the Millennial generation is turning to online services like WorkBlast.com and ResumeBook.tv, or posting videos on sites like YouTube, then simply emailing links to employers. Some video resumes show the job applicant speaking directly to a camera, and others are mock interviews. Some applicants include clips or visuals of their work and extracurricular activities.

Some employers support the idea of video resumes, since paper resumes often don't give prospective employers a realistic picture of the applicants. At the same time, skeptical employers argue that resumes only help them to weed out unqualified applicants, and that most people are hired based on face-to-face interviews anyway. They also note that viewing videos is a lot more time-consuming than reading paper resumes. At ResumeBook.tv, applicants are instructed to keep their videos to a maximum of three minutes long.

Nick Murphy, operations manager with WorkBlast LLC, told eSchool News that video resumes aren't meant to replace more traditional job-search tools, but can often tell employers more about a candidate's personality and value.

"It's an opportunity to learn a great deal about people," he said.