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How I spend less time on YouTube

pawelurbanek.com

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Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#201

Post by mkaic »

gowld wrote: post #131
mkaic wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gen Z programmer here. Can confirm that video content is by far the best way I learn new information and skills. I think having grown up with the modern internet has shaped my brain in a way that makes it so video feels more natural than it might for folks even 10 years older than me. It's definitely fascinating to look at the effects the internet is having on society over longer time periods.

Are you sure it's not just that video content "feels" like you are leaerning even when you aren't? This is a documented phenomenon that underlies "infotainment".

I'm sure. The work I do on a daily basis is comprised of at least half skills i learned from videos, and that percentage is even higher for my hobbies.

Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#202

Post by mkaic »

asdff wrote: post #158
mkaic wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gen Z programmer here. Can confirm that video content is by far the best way I learn new information and skills. I think having grown up with the modern internet has shaped my brain in a way that makes it so video feels more natural than it might for folks even 10 years older than me. It's definitely fascinating to look at the effects the internet is having on society over longer time periods.

It just seems so slow to me. Here's another 15 minute video of what could be a three minute blog post. Be sure like comment subscribe!

I watch most videos at triple speed or above. Takes some getting used to, but my brain got accustomed to it over time and now I can watch 3-4 times more youtube than everyone else in the same amount of time!

Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#203

Post by jl2718 »

scoutt wrote: post #31

> Am I the only one who launches YouTube just to watch a single tutorial and ends up devouring dozens of fine-tuned recommendations? I'm hitting 40 next week, and seeing others asking for recommendations of videos on "programming a microcontroller" (or programming related) is something I can't understand. One day I sat and watched some of the videos they were recommending, and in most of them there were a person talk…

YouTube is the best place for instruction because everything in text now is just marketing. YouTube gives creators a way to profit from genuinely useful content, even if it’s not the best medium for it.

Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#204

Post by thekevjames »

aeternum wrote: post #159
avgDev wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't true. Once you know cars enough, the same thing applies to car repair. I just need the torque specs for the bolts, I don't need or want to watch a whole video.

Most people aren't car experts

Most people aren't software engineers, either.

Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#205

Post by cambaceres »

I have gone from spending at least an hour a day on YT to basically nothing in just the past weeks. The reason for this is that YT removed the dislikes count. The like vs dislike ratio was the only way to know the quality of a video before watching it, and after getting really used to that it feels like a totally waste of time to watch random videos just because yt recommends them.

Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#206

Post by mdrzn »

GaylordTuring wrote: post #164

My big problem with YouTube recommendations isn't that they're so good that I get sucked in; it's that they're so bad. I would happily spend more time on the site watching interesting videos if they only would show up in my recommendation feed. Instead, I get recommended the same old crap, all coming from a small set of the same video categories over and over again (except for the occasional America's Got Talent or a…

Lately YouTube started proposing "Wanna watch something new?" and offered me a tab "New to you" with only videos from creators I've never watched before.

That was a good change of pace for once, instead of showing me videos I've watched less than a week ago.

Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#207

Post by medstrom »

jen729w wrote: post #170
asdff wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It just seems so slow to me. Here's another 15 minute video of what could be a three minute blog post. Be sure like comment subscribe!

As always, ‘it depends’. I know he’s not YT strictly speaking but I love learning from Wes Bos. But the first time I watched him I was like holy shit boy, slow down! I thought it was terrible. Then I learned some more, which got me to the stage where I knew what the hell he was on about, and now I love him. Information at its maximum density.

It's always better if they speak a bit too fast, since you can pause at any time to digest what was said.

Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#208

Post by skilled »

It's sad knowing that YouTube has done very little to optimize its browsing UI and the algorithm has remained largely stale over the years. As such, it's hard to enjoy the platform beyond the absolute necessities of watching a tutorial, podcast, or catching up on news.

Re: How I spend less time on YouTube

#210

Post by saurik »

dncornholio wrote: post #124
scoutt wrote: post #31

> Am I the only one who launches YouTube just to watch a single tutorial and ends up devouring dozens of fine-tuned recommendations? I'm hitting 40 next week, and seeing others asking for recommendations of videos on "programming a microcontroller" (or programming related) is something I can't understand. One day I sat and watched some of the videos they were recommending, and in most of them there were a person talk…

Always text over video. When people say they prefer video, they don't know better, haven't actually been learning anything or are extremely lazy. For example, to do a gradient in Gimp, you should know a few shortcode keys. Now how do I look up which key to use again? Load the video and keep fiddling with the player until I hit the right moment where he explains this little detail? It's extremely annoying to look up a…

This has got to be the worst example you could have used: clearly video is better for this, right? You are talking about a sequence of steps in a GUI... sure, the least important one of those steps might have a keyboard shortcut, but that would be something you'd find later (and I don't think anyone is suggesting replacing a quick reference card with a video) and isn't a "learning" step. A textual description of this is going to be extremely awkward, attempting to describe dialog panels and icons and explain the semantics of color choosers... even the process of actually using a gradient tool is something that involves angles and lines and mouse placement: it isn't some abstract transform or fill, it is something that has a required direction semantic.

I am 40, I learned to program using physical book instruction manuals, I absolutely love reading things, and yet it just feels so obvious that if I want to learn how to use a gradient tool I would want a video. If I couldn't get a video I would want an animation. If I couldn't get an animation I would want a flip book of screen shots. If I couldn't get a flip book of screen shots I would tolerate some illustrated prose... but if you couldn't even get me the illustrations I am frankly at an age where I simultaneously know that life is short and yet there is virtue in patience and so I would work on something else until I could find a video (or another human to show it to me in person, which would probably be the best option) rather than waste my time trying to interpret someone describing a purely graphical concept using text.

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