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I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

jeffgeerling.com

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Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#51

Post by haraball »

rym_ wrote: post #7

I get so frustrated with the idiotic thumbnails on youtube video these days. I am sure it's all optimized for the maximum number of clicks/views but if I see a still that looks the way it does at the bottom of this page I generally just don't watch it on principle.

Youtube is painful to use without certain add-ons for me. For this specific issue I'm happy using "Clickbait remover for youtube": https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/clickbait-rem...

Another good one is "DF YouTube (Distraction Free)": https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/df-youtube/

Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#52

Post by musingsole »

nzach wrote: post #45
geerlingguy wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Believe me, I had a nice discussion yesterday with my sister (who helped me take pictures for the thumbnail), and we both agreed it's one of the dumbest things about current YouTube... The thing is, from all my own A/B testing, a face vs. no face will automatically get 20-30% more views (all else equal). And an exaggerated face, a bit more than that.

If you ever have the time I would like to read a blog post with this data and some comments about your perception towards this issue. I have no trouble understanding why this happens on "entertainment" videos, but this issue on technical videos seems a bit strange to me.

> this issue on technical videos

This is still entertainment. Technical info dressed up as entertainment, but still entertainment. Clicks reign supreme.

Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#53

Post by jjk166 »

geerlingguy wrote: post #24
rym_ wrote: post #7

I get so frustrated with the idiotic thumbnails on youtube video these days. I am sure it's all optimized for the maximum number of clicks/views but if I see a still that looks the way it does at the bottom of this page I generally just don't watch it on principle.

Believe me, I had a nice discussion yesterday with my sister (who helped me take pictures for the thumbnail), and we both agreed it's one of the dumbest things about current YouTube... The thing is, from all my own A/B testing, a face vs. no face will automatically get 20-30% more views (all else equal). And an exaggerated face, a bit more than that.

I honestly wonder which came first, the viewer preference or the algorithm.

Like are there people out there that see a whacky face in the thumbnail and think "Oh that's a video I want to watch!" and the algorithm just got trained on that?

Or did whacky faces just resemble something (from the algorithm's perspective) that was briefly popular and then a positive feedback loop of algorithm recommends it -> gets popular -> algorithm updated to recommend it more often.

Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#54

Post by foodstances »

geerlingguy wrote: post #24
rym_ wrote: post #7

I get so frustrated with the idiotic thumbnails on youtube video these days. I am sure it's all optimized for the maximum number of clicks/views but if I see a still that looks the way it does at the bottom of this page I generally just don't watch it on principle.

Believe me, I had a nice discussion yesterday with my sister (who helped me take pictures for the thumbnail), and we both agreed it's one of the dumbest things about current YouTube... The thing is, from all my own A/B testing, a face vs. no face will automatically get 20-30% more views (all else equal). And an exaggerated face, a bit more than that.

But why is view count the only metric you care about? How about getting fewer views but more engagement, with viewers that want to see the content but are turned off by the stupid thumbnails?

Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#56

Post by JKCalhoun »

Aeolun wrote: post #38
nzach wrote: post #9

I was the only one expecting to see a cluster with 100+ units?

Nope, that was what caused me to click. If someone told me they stuck 4 $1000 disks in a PI I wouldn’t have bothered :/

Seeing what a Raspberry Pi can do still has me clicking through.

Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#57

Post by PragmaticPulp »

hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #21
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #3

The headline buries the lede: It’s a NAS build that uses expensive SSDs. I’m looking forward to the day that I can retire my spinning-disk NAS, but at $700 per 8TB SSD I think it’s going to be a while before they’re cheap enough that I want to take that leap. Like this article concludes: Using a Raspberry Pi for an SSD NAS is a huge waste. There are plenty of low-power Mini-ITX or smaller x86 boards with substantiall…

> I’m looking forward to the day that I can retire my spinning-disk NAS, but at $700 per 8TB SSD I think it’s going to be a while before they’re cheap enough that I want to take that leap. It's not just the price - SSDs are not a good choice for long-term storage, especially if they're not powered up continuously.

In practice, I don't really care about those SSD limitations.

Modern SSDs last long enough that I can cheaply upgrade in 5 years to something else before any of the drives likely fail.

If one or even two drives fail, I'm covered by Raid-Z2.

Continuously powering solid-state drives is really not a big deal. The 10 Gigabit ethernet adapter in my NAS would probably have more idle power draw than 6-8 idle SSDs combined. The entire system barely pulls 20-25W at idle.

Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#58

Post by afavour »

foodstances wrote: post #54
geerlingguy wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Believe me, I had a nice discussion yesterday with my sister (who helped me take pictures for the thumbnail), and we both agreed it's one of the dumbest things about current YouTube... The thing is, from all my own A/B testing, a face vs. no face will automatically get 20-30% more views (all else equal). And an exaggerated face, a bit more than that.

But why is view count the only metric you care about? How about getting fewer views but more engagement, with viewers that want to see the content but are turned off by the stupid thumbnails?

Because the video includes paid promotion and YouTube does not reward fewer views with more engagement.

(and if we're honest if you really do want to see the content then depriving yourself because of the contents of the thumbnail feels very self-defeating)

Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#59

Post by geerlingguy »

jjk166 wrote: post #53
geerlingguy wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Believe me, I had a nice discussion yesterday with my sister (who helped me take pictures for the thumbnail), and we both agreed it's one of the dumbest things about current YouTube... The thing is, from all my own A/B testing, a face vs. no face will automatically get 20-30% more views (all else equal). And an exaggerated face, a bit more than that.

I honestly wonder which came first, the viewer preference or the algorithm. Like are there people out there that see a whacky face in the thumbnail and think "Oh that's a video I want to watch!" and the algorithm just got trained on that? Or did whacky faces just resemble something (from the algorithm's perspective) that was briefly popular and then a positive feedback loop of algorithm recommends it -> gets popular…

I've discussed this with my brother a bit (he's a neurologist, though not a specialist in vision), and he seems to think part of it goes back to our brain's instinct to react more to 'face' than other stimuli. Therefore thumbnails with a discernible face will do better.

And on top of that, an expression outside of "stock photo smile" will stand out more, and if you combine that, plus a catchy title that piques your interest, and have a video that can back it up, it will do a lot better than just having a video that has good content.

Re: I built a $5k Raspberry Pi server (yes, it's ridiculous)

#60

Post by dekerta »

jjk166 wrote: post #53
geerlingguy wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Believe me, I had a nice discussion yesterday with my sister (who helped me take pictures for the thumbnail), and we both agreed it's one of the dumbest things about current YouTube... The thing is, from all my own A/B testing, a face vs. no face will automatically get 20-30% more views (all else equal). And an exaggerated face, a bit more than that.

I honestly wonder which came first, the viewer preference or the algorithm. Like are there people out there that see a whacky face in the thumbnail and think "Oh that's a video I want to watch!" and the algorithm just got trained on that? Or did whacky faces just resemble something (from the algorithm's perspective) that was briefly popular and then a positive feedback loop of algorithm recommends it -> gets popular…

I think people's eyes are just naturally drawn to faces, so more people end up seeing the thumbnail among the grid of other videos, and are more likely to watch the it as a result
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