As Father’s Day approaches, it is the perfect time to reflect on the fundamental shift in the role of men in parenting. As father’s continue to take back paternity and become empowered in the raising of their children, four dads from Austin, Texas have made their mark in the complex world of parenting and online video. The parenting video network DadLabs – Taking Back Paternity has rapidly become the father go-to site for parenting tips, advice and a healthy dose of humor.  With a blend of video, social media and fatherhood, DadLabs has built a strong parenting community and their fans stretch from coast to coast proving that our dads know dads.

So who are these super dads? Whether expecting, new or veteran, these socially networked fathers play a more active and creative role in the lives of their children, than the average father. The most active online fathers are expecting fathers, called “due dads” by DadLabs, they are almost thirty years old. Most of these due dads are college grads and, according to demographic data retrieved by TubeMogul from onsite Viddler video plays on dadlabs.com, live in cities like Astoria (NY), Austin (TX), New York (NY), Louisville (KY), Houston (TX), Chicago (IL) and Washington (DC).

When it comes to the health of their families, most of the DadLabs dads are actively involved in keeping up to date with all the current issues and ways to improve their children’s health. This is particularly evident in the grocery shopping with half the DadLabs dad becoming the primary grocery shoppers for their families. Grocery shopping has been a mother exclusive domain for quite some time.

“Working and stay-at-home dads are all becoming much more active in the lives of their children and are interested in learning what it takes to be a great dad,” says Clay Nichols, co-founder and co-host of DadLabs. “We want to provide dads with the most honest, informative and entertaining information and support all through our guy-colored lenses.”

These fathers are not your typical men when it comes to media consumption. The DadLabs dad watched less than 15 hours a week of television compared to the average of 40 hours. When it comes to Internet usage most spend at least 10 hours a week and up to 20 hours on average. A lot of this time is spent doing research on parenting topics, and getting sports and financial information and watching videos on dadlabs.com. By far the most popular DadLabs video of all time is a very informative Lounge episode called, “What Makes a Great Babysitter”, in which a panel of parents talk about what they look for in a baby sitter while enjoying a cold beer.  

The websites that have sent the most traffic to dadlabs.com are mega-parenting sites like babyzone.com and babycenter.com, which offer a wealth of parenting information but lack the understanding of fathers. A  many of the DadLabs dads visit is parenthacks.com, a collection of practical parenting tips and, of course, hacks.

 “DadLabs is the most focused and unique online video resource that is for dads by dads,” says Paul Kontonis, CEO of For Your Imagination, executive producers of DadLabs. “They are everymen and are smart about how they approach their site, their audience and their content and we’re proud of the network’s value to fathers.”

Most importantly, DadLabs gears their resources and social community for a Web audience, serving up content in small, easily digestible pieces, perfect for the dads that are spending less and less time watching traditional television.  With over 250 short form online videos, DadLabs has covers the most important and frequently discussed parenting issues for fathers. DadLabs videos have been viewed over 2 million times and won the 2008 Yahoo! Video Best New Uploader Award since its relaunch in late 2007. New episodes can be seen on www.dadlabs.com as well as popular online video sites such YouTube, Viddler, Yahoo! Video and iTunes.