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> Where I get uneasy is how quickly SmarterEveryDay seems to have > switched from a YouTube channel about explaining things into a > YouTube channel about sto

by emsign 5y ago

> Where I get uneasy is how quickly SmarterEveryDay seems to have > switched from a YouTube channel about explaining things into a > YouTube channel about stoking "Big Tech" fears as a way to sell > apps. The latest video is title "Is Your Privacy An Illusion? > (Taking on Big Tech) - Smarter Every Day 263". This has been a trend with YouTube science communicators and educators for a while now. They're getting hired by companies to basically produce an ad in the style of their regular videos. Physics Girl did a video in cooperation with Toyota praising Toyota's hydrogen powered test car, telling her audience that hydrogen as a passenger car fuel has a future while ignoring the fact that every car manufacturer including Toyota has given up on it and favoring Lithium battery packs instead. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hghIckc7nrY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hghIckc7nrY It was an odd move from her to hype Hydrpgen cars but her audience caught on to it quickly in the comments. Which prompted her to make a follow up video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWAO3vUn7nw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWAO3vUn7nw where she's trying to save what's left to save for the hydrogen cause. Veritasium did it too. In which Derek Muller created nothing short of a propaganda piece for driverless cars and not even just an ad for the Waymo service in particular. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjztvddhZmI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjztvddhZmI This gives me the same vibe as those doctors promoting cigarettes smoking against coughs in the 1950s and 1960s: Here's a professional often someone who is highly regarded as being objective and impartial who is basically leaving out crucial information to push something either a product or an idea onto their audience that is either outright harmful or not holding up to its promises. In both these cases it was promoting a technology that isn't working out quite as intended. Green hydrogen in commuter cars is way too expensive and impractical to be able to compete with Lithium-Ion battery powered cars that can simply be plugged in at home, where you charge it with your own solar power or energy you get from a renewable energy company. Green hydrogen fuel which is impossible to come by right now would be way more expensive than green electricity you can currently get at home. Self-driving taxis hardly work at all in most commute situations and if they do, it's only in very restricted ways. Within confined neighborhoods and they are prone to fail due to unexpected situations and practical jokes by pedestrians. So much so that Google and other companies have all given up on these kind of services for the time being. These are two examples of products that either do not exist (and never will in the form they are being promoted) or are a horrible choice for most of their viewers. So why promote them? Answer is the companies pay them to promote them. That's the real reason these influencers lie about why this stuff is cool and why it's the future. But they're simply bullshitting us by leaving out the issues and shortcomings and by not talking about the bigger picture of the market situation for these 2nd or 3rd tier technologies. They are trying to help them survive against the more established and more promising competitors. The key issue is promoting products that are not wise for YOU to buy or vote for right now. They say it's about choice, but they try to trick their viewers to choose or vote for something that when considering all facts you'd not want to choose. ("Why You Should Want Driverless Cars On Roads Now" - Wait, really? Is my neighborhood and commuting route suited for driverless cars right now??) If the companies do it that's fair, they struggle for their survival, but these are content creators who base their brand on being scientific and trustworthy. So that's an issue, they gamble their credibility and millions of their followers trust them to say the right thing, even though their viewers might be more vigilant and educated to call bullshit as well, so there's hope this will not become a regular thing. Tom Nicholas did a video about this trend: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CM0aohBfUTc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CM0aohBfUTc

gopiandcode 5y ago
I think the worst example of this that comes to mind was the video by Veritasium on genome sequencing, which was just a glorified ad for those companies, and completely glossed over the privacy concerns (I mean, literally every interview that he had about the topic was with a person who had a monetary incentive to downplay the consequences). I thought it was particularly funny that he chose the running case study for the video as the use of genomic data to catch a serial killer (a real won't someone think about the children moment), but somehow "forgot" to mention that the killer was a police officer, and thus would have also had access to any genomic data available to the police, and potentially have abused it to avoid detection, find more victims etc.
PragmaticPulp 5y ago
> This has been a trend with YouTube science communicators and educators for a while now. They're getting hired by companies to basically produce an ad in the style of their regular videos. In this case, the SmarterEveryDay personality is the cofounder of the 4Privacy app.

by emsign 5y ago

gopiandcode 5y ago

I think the worst example of this that comes to mind was the video by Veritasium on genome sequencing, which was just a glorified ad for those companies, and completely glossed over the privacy concerns (I mean, literally every interview that he had about the topic was with a person who had a monetary incentive to downplay the consequences). I thought it was particularly funny that he chose the running case study for the video as the use of genomic data to catch a serial killer (a real won't someone think about the children moment), but somehow "forgot" to mention that the killer was a police officer, and thus would have also had access to any genomic data available to the police, and potentially have abused it to avoid detection, find more victims etc.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago

> This has been a trend with YouTube science communicators and educators for a while now. They're getting hired by companies to basically produce an ad in the style of their regular videos. In this case, the SmarterEveryDay personality is the cofounder of the 4Privacy app.