It's bad enough watching the holiday videos of friends and family, but trawling through other people's? It's the new way to research your next trip...

A growing number of websites, hoping to emulate the success of video streaming site, YouTube.com, are hosting travel video content and sorting it by destination.

Shaky camerawork, bizarre commentary and blurred footage abound, but there's also some real gems to be found. Find the right video and you can have a sneak preview of your holiday destination, resort or even hotel, before you go, or get inspiration on where to visit when planning as trip.

With so much choice, how do you see the wood for the trees? We can't guarantee what you'll find on these sites, but here are some of our favourites...

Starting with the granddaddy of video sites, Youtube.com, there's plenty of travel content if you're prepared to wade through the also-rans. The "travel and places" category hosts a range of videos from the sublime to the ridiculous, but you can use the keyword search within the category to narrow your findings to a particular location. Some of the content is professionally shot and some of it is si unprofessional you can barely figure out what's going on, but dedicate some time to your search, and a decent amount of bandwidth, and you could find some real gems to inspire your holiday.

The Ski Club of Great Britain launched Skitv.co.uk, a site dedicated to snow sports, this month. The content is great for winter sports enthusiasts but sadly not free, and requires either Ski Club membership or an annual fee of £10 for unlimited viewing. Video content includes ski and snowboard beginner tutorials, as well as powder and mogul tips, plus a history of skiing film, fitness tips and footage from ski and snowboard events. The Ski Club is promising fresh content every week and will add more resort guides as the season progresses.

Turn Here is a website of short, location-based films. Its design is clean, with links by destination, although much of the content is from the US, and a lot of the non-US stuff is from InterContinental Hotels. Nevertheless, there's a fun Tokyo video shot by Allen White, with some emotive bar, restaurant and street scenes, among the gems.

Virtual Tourism makes up for in content what it lacks in aesthetic design - the site has video and text on the world's greatest sites and locations. When you click on a link, like Iguasu Falls, a window opens showing an aerial shot of the waterfalls, which you can switch to a map, using Google Maps technology, and a link to a video, usually taken from Youtube or Google Video. Sites include the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, the Giza Pyramids in Egypt and Angkhor Wat in Cambodia. Alongside the imagery is a short piece of text about each site.

Travelistic is a Youtube for travel with over 100 videos, although it is likely to grow quickly. Most videos are professional, shot by tourist boards and television producers, with only a small amount of amateur holiday footage. The latest videos are highlighted on the homepage, with related content listed below, or you can search for video by destination. One video producer is "Thirsty Traveller", who's professionally trips to Peru's Festival of the Sun, where he ate guinea pig, and Munich's Oktoberfest, where he carried, and drank, a lot of beer, are popular. Wannabe TV stars also abound, like 25-year-old "Tiffany B", whose videos are mostly from the US. Videos come with cheesy, but sometimes informative commentary.

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