Solutions like the Newtek Video Toaster allowed small businesses and serious hobbyists the chance to mimic the more expensive hardware and software solutions that populated larger video studios. Many small producers did incredible work with their makeshift video rigs. But putting together video content usually required a bit of luck and duct tape. Now, video is plug and play. Computers are cheap and almost too fast for what we need.
Hard drives are big and speedy.
Digital camcorders make it easy to dump high quality video into a computer with a single cable. One company trying to stake its claim in the growing market of desktop video is Apple Computer. And it's a pretty wide claim at that. On the lower end, Apple offers the free and simple to use iMovie digital video editing application. Final Cut Pro editing and special effects package.