I knew sites like YouTube and the various search engine video offerings were taking off, but I became convinced they were headed mainstream when I started getting a lot of press releases about specialty video sites. Like Petfinder’s new PetVideo.com (http://petvideo.com/ ), which features video about — you guessed it — pets.

When I first read the press release I groaned, thinking of endless “America’s Funniest Home Video” stuff where cats fall off the back of chairs, dogs skid all over slick kitchen floors, etc. (Whee.) Instead, PetVideo aims to educate pet owners.

There’s a nav for video by category on the left side of the page, with topics including cat and dog training (with several subcategories), food and nutrition, and health. (If you are looking for funny animal videos, there’s also an “Incredible Pets” category with a “funny” subcategory. Don’t miss the beagle who spins for his dinner.)

Each subcategory (13 videos for litterbox training alone!) Contains extensive descriptions of the video, its rating, and the number of times it’s been viewed. The video pages themselves (videos load very quickly!) have an area for comments and a space for you to rate the video. The user-submitted videos vary, but the ones created by PetVideo seem to be between 1 and 2 minutes long and are nicely produced.