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Tom Scott’s work stands out as some of the best examples of how interesting and valuable web content can be. In a sea of short derivative junk-food content, he

Tom Scott’s work stands out as some of the best examples of how interesting and valuable web content can be. In a sea of short derivative junk-food content, he made things that i honestly learned from, without demanding more than 10 minutes of my time a week! There’s of course a lot of people also doing the same sort of great content, but it does feel like a slowly dying breed. Tom definitely deserves an indefinite break though. If/when he goes back to short form web video, I’ll be happy to watch again! :)

Waterluvian 3y ago
I agree! But the thing is— I’ve got about fifty Tom Scotts in my subscription list. I’m perplexed by doomsaysers’ laments about the state of online educational media. I’ve got far more high quality content for a huge variety of topics than I’ve ever had before. My theory is this: your favourite hobby store expands and adds one more aisle of fantastic products and five aisles of garbage. You’ll likely perceive quality as having gone way down. In a limited sense, sure: it might be in the way. But it didn’t replace the good stuff.
- keepamovin 3y ago
  please share your sub list it'd be fascinating! :)
- jwestbury 3y ago
  > My theory is this: your favourite hobby store expands and adds one more aisle of fantastic products and five aisles of garbage. You’ll likely perceive quality as having gone way down. This is actually something which is borne out by research, though in a slightly different context. Niro Sivanathan at the LBS has studied how arguments are presented, and essentially, recipients of arguments engage in an averaging function instead of an additive function, when evaluating strength -- adding one weaker point to a pair of very strong points actually detracts from the perceived strength of an argument. It would not be at all surprising if we did the same sort of thing in different contexts, such as the example you gave here.
- phillryu 3y ago
  Yeah but the burden is now on you to sift through the garbage to find the good stuff, especially since it's mostly mixed together in recommendations or search results etc. It feels more limited to me the other way around, like yes we have added some more good stuff, but good luck finding it. If my favorite hobby store kept on expanding and expanding and the ratio of great stuff to garbage kept going down, I would definitely perceive the overall quality as being well into some death spiral.
  - brucethemoose2 3y ago
    This affects the other end too. Quality niche creators are partially motivated (and sometimes supported) by viewers. The bigger the sea of garbage they are swimming against, the less inclined they will be to start or continue.
    - Eisenstein 3y ago
      People are motivated by viewers, but once it gets above a certain amount I think it becomes a different motivation. When I write things on reddit on a specific topic subreddit that have few posts in it, and those things get a few upvotes, I am more motivated to continue than posts in huge subs which get boatloads of upvotes. Because in order to get those one or two important ones, you need to know something specific and valuable, but to get thousands you have to find a way to appeal to a lot of people in a broad way. Trying to chase the broad appeal will lead, in my experience, to a downslide where content gets less and less useful and more pop-culture oriented, or it becomes outright fraud or manipulation.
  - kbenson 3y ago
    Is it really on you to sort and sift, or is it on you to find a good guide? In the hobby store example, there are other people around to ask, and I think that is similar as well. The future is more content, not less, so finding mechanisms to cope with that is well worth the effort.
    - withinboredom 3y ago
- georgesimon 3y ago
  Are those fifty Tom Scotts all competing with each other to become 'experts of the week' on the same topics in slightly different ways? (that's what my 5 or 6 Tom Scotts do) I wish YouTube channels could be viable by following the Periodic Videos model - stick to a single domain but keep it fresh by improving on old content.
  - graypegg 3y ago
    Dr. Brady Haran really hit this perfect balance with his channels. Each one has a perfect niche.
- graypegg 3y ago
  That’s a good point, it’s the absolute numbers that give a bad impression. I think the main thing tainting my feeling about the whole situation is TikTok/Reels/Shorts content. Feels like the sort of video I like just can’t exist in that sort of format, and it’s a pretty over-emphasized format currently. (at least in the YouTube app) still though, so many cool and interesting things to learn online from interesting folks! :)
- JoBrad 3y ago
  I’ve also been watching Tom Scott since he started, and love his content. I’ve put a few others that I enjoy below, that also produce what I consider to be high quality and entertaining content. Mind sharing any others? Nile Red Nick Zentner Practical Engineering Real Engineering Ivan Miranda Joe Makes Tom Stanton Veritasium Numberphile Deep Sky Videos Objectivity (Honestly all of Brady’s channels are great) 3Blue1Brown CGP Grey Undecided with Matt Ferrell The B1M Kurzgesagt Scott Manley PBS Space Time Deep Look Looking Glass Universe Institute of Human Anatomy Smarter Every Day Be Smart (formerly Its OK to be smart) I’ve also recently started watching Scam Nation, which is a walkthrough of various magic tricks, in a relaxed setting. It’s not as dense as some of the others, but very good.
  - nudin 3y ago
    - Stefan Milo – Archeology, mostly the human evolution. [1] - Adam Ragusea - fern [1] I have the desire to list him here 10 times in a row – definitely my current favorite!
  - c54 3y ago
    Applied Science Ze Frank Asianometry Premodernist Integza
    - moffkalast 3y ago
      There are just so many great educational/maker channels, here's a bunch more that are least known on my list (in no particular order): Not David iforce2d Chronova Engineering Posy SuperfastMatt Michael Rechtin AlphaPhoenix Hyperspace Pirate Nicholas Rehm James Biggar Casual Navigation Kraut Spanning Tree Geo History EgyptologyLessons Carl Bugeja electrosync Historia Civilis Jeremy Fielding there oughta be Andreas Spiess
      - graypegg 3y ago
        Posy!! I can't believe I forgot him on my list! +1 Same with casual navigation! Have I ever worked on or piloted a boat? No. But will I watch little 10min explainer videos about bilge pumps and anchor chains? Definitely.
- napierzaza 3y ago
  [dead]
- kragen 3y ago
  the problem i have with educational youtube is that it's competence porn. it's quite satisfying to watch lyle peterson, kiwami japan, grandpa amu, nigel braun, grant sanderson, andy george, or xyla foxlin working through the problems involved in creating something, to the point that hours spent getting satisfied that way displace the far more effortful hours required to work through those problems myself. but i don't gain skills by watching someone else work through problems (or, in the less praiseworthy cases, glossing over problems); at best, i might get an idea to try out, or a feeling of inspiration, or a declarative, factual understanding of a particular mechanism—a kind of understanding which still requires exercise to convert into knowhow. but it's much easier to just click on another video and vicariously enjoy someone else's stunning competence than to close the window and struggle with my own worse, sometimes it isn't actually competence. yesterday i watched a video where a guy made opaque soda-lime glass and convinced himself it was a better refractory than his insulating firebricks because he was, among other things, confused about thermodynamics, confused about different material properties, confused about the composition of waterglass, confused about the composition of garden lime, and confused about the temperature of his oxyhydrogen torch (and, I suspect, in significant danger of blowing his foundry to kingdom come) watching porn or sex tips videos won't make you a great lover. neither will reading alt.sex.wizards fifty tom scotts is ten hours a week of, basically, watching porn. i spend more time than that on watching the youtubers listed above and others; what if i spent that time on deliberate practice instead? ten hours a week of etudes might not get you into juillard, but pretty soon you're better than the average garage band member where do you get your etudes or katas, and how do you judge your success on them? textbooks are pretty okay for that, and it's possible to make youtube videos with exercises in them, but those aren't the videos that become youtube hits. and i think it runs counter to the nature of the medium: not just memetic fitness, but also the effort gradient for both creators and consumers
  - kragen 3y ago
    *juilliard
  - coeneedell 3y ago
    It’s interesting to hear your perspective. I personally have had the opposite effect from watching these people on YouTube. I find it highly inspirational and I’ve gone out and made interesting projects on my own without them. Not all educational content needs to be structured like school, in fact most of it shouldn’t. With this stuff it just needs to humanize the process, so you can see the process for yourself, and follow it for yourself.
- DanielHB 3y ago
  Educational youtube is modern age what Discovery Channel documentaries used to be And they are better, way better
  - graypegg 3y ago
    Part of me misses watching Daily Planet after school. Mythbusters on weekends. How It’s Made too! There’s some gems from that channel in the 00s that got me excited about engineering. I definitely wouldn’t sell them short either.
- libraryatnight 3y ago
  I have the same feeling. I was sad to see Tom be done, but I'd also prefer that to watching his quality decline, and as you say - I have a lot of Tom Scotts that come up in my feed. Tom's excellent, but there's other people, and no doubt some new people inspired by Tom will enter the space. I do worry that too many garbage aisles might mean people choose the garbage and never make it beyond, pushing non-garbage into a greater and greater minority.
- j45 3y ago
  Helping more people create videos sustainably is a definitive challenge

Waterluvian 3y ago

I agree! But the thing is— I’ve got about fifty Tom Scotts in my subscription list. I’m perplexed by doomsaysers’ laments about the state of online educational media. I’ve got far more high quality content for a huge variety of topics than I’ve ever had before. My theory is this: your favourite hobby store expands and adds one more aisle of fantastic products and five aisles of garbage. You’ll likely perceive quality as having gone way down. In a limited sense, sure: it might be in the way. But it didn’t replace the good stuff.

keepamovin 3y ago
please share your sub list it'd be fascinating! :)
jwestbury 3y ago
> My theory is this: your favourite hobby store expands and adds one more aisle of fantastic products and five aisles of garbage. You’ll likely perceive quality as having gone way down. This is actually something which is borne out by research, though in a slightly different context. Niro Sivanathan at the LBS has studied how arguments are presented, and essentially, recipients of arguments engage in an averaging function instead of an additive function, when evaluating strength -- adding one weaker point to a pair of very strong points actually detracts from the perceived strength of an argument. It would not be at all surprising if we did the same sort of thing in different contexts, such as the example you gave here.
phillryu 3y ago
Yeah but the burden is now on you to sift through the garbage to find the good stuff, especially since it's mostly mixed together in recommendations or search results etc. It feels more limited to me the other way around, like yes we have added some more good stuff, but good luck finding it. If my favorite hobby store kept on expanding and expanding and the ratio of great stuff to garbage kept going down, I would definitely perceive the overall quality as being well into some death spiral.
- brucethemoose2 3y ago
  This affects the other end too. Quality niche creators are partially motivated (and sometimes supported) by viewers. The bigger the sea of garbage they are swimming against, the less inclined they will be to start or continue.
  - Eisenstein 3y ago
    People are motivated by viewers, but once it gets above a certain amount I think it becomes a different motivation. When I write things on reddit on a specific topic subreddit that have few posts in it, and those things get a few upvotes, I am more motivated to continue than posts in huge subs which get boatloads of upvotes. Because in order to get those one or two important ones, you need to know something specific and valuable, but to get thousands you have to find a way to appeal to a lot of people in a broad way. Trying to chase the broad appeal will lead, in my experience, to a downslide where content gets less and less useful and more pop-culture oriented, or it becomes outright fraud or manipulation.
- kbenson 3y ago
  Is it really on you to sort and sift, or is it on you to find a good guide? In the hobby store example, there are other people around to ask, and I think that is similar as well. The future is more content, not less, so finding mechanisms to cope with that is well worth the effort.
  - withinboredom 3y ago
georgesimon 3y ago
Are those fifty Tom Scotts all competing with each other to become 'experts of the week' on the same topics in slightly different ways? (that's what my 5 or 6 Tom Scotts do) I wish YouTube channels could be viable by following the Periodic Videos model - stick to a single domain but keep it fresh by improving on old content.
- graypegg 3y ago
  Dr. Brady Haran really hit this perfect balance with his channels. Each one has a perfect niche.
graypegg 3y ago
That’s a good point, it’s the absolute numbers that give a bad impression. I think the main thing tainting my feeling about the whole situation is TikTok/Reels/Shorts content. Feels like the sort of video I like just can’t exist in that sort of format, and it’s a pretty over-emphasized format currently. (at least in the YouTube app) still though, so many cool and interesting things to learn online from interesting folks! :)
JoBrad 3y ago
I’ve also been watching Tom Scott since he started, and love his content. I’ve put a few others that I enjoy below, that also produce what I consider to be high quality and entertaining content. Mind sharing any others? Nile Red Nick Zentner Practical Engineering Real Engineering Ivan Miranda Joe Makes Tom Stanton Veritasium Numberphile Deep Sky Videos Objectivity (Honestly all of Brady’s channels are great) 3Blue1Brown CGP Grey Undecided with Matt Ferrell The B1M Kurzgesagt Scott Manley PBS Space Time Deep Look Looking Glass Universe Institute of Human Anatomy Smarter Every Day Be Smart (formerly Its OK to be smart) I’ve also recently started watching Scam Nation, which is a walkthrough of various magic tricks, in a relaxed setting. It’s not as dense as some of the others, but very good.
- nudin 3y ago
  - Stefan Milo – Archeology, mostly the human evolution. [1] - Adam Ragusea - fern [1] I have the desire to list him here 10 times in a row – definitely my current favorite!
- c54 3y ago
  Applied Science Ze Frank Asianometry Premodernist Integza
  - moffkalast 3y ago
    There are just so many great educational/maker channels, here's a bunch more that are least known on my list (in no particular order): Not David iforce2d Chronova Engineering Posy SuperfastMatt Michael Rechtin AlphaPhoenix Hyperspace Pirate Nicholas Rehm James Biggar Casual Navigation Kraut Spanning Tree Geo History EgyptologyLessons Carl Bugeja electrosync Historia Civilis Jeremy Fielding there oughta be Andreas Spiess
    - graypegg 3y ago
      Posy!! I can't believe I forgot him on my list! +1 Same with casual navigation! Have I ever worked on or piloted a boat? No. But will I watch little 10min explainer videos about bilge pumps and anchor chains? Definitely.
napierzaza 3y ago
[dead]
kragen 3y ago
the problem i have with educational youtube is that it's competence porn. it's quite satisfying to watch lyle peterson, kiwami japan, grandpa amu, nigel braun, grant sanderson, andy george, or xyla foxlin working through the problems involved in creating something, to the point that hours spent getting satisfied that way displace the far more effortful hours required to work through those problems myself. but i don't gain skills by watching someone else work through problems (or, in the less praiseworthy cases, glossing over problems); at best, i might get an idea to try out, or a feeling of inspiration, or a declarative, factual understanding of a particular mechanism—a kind of understanding which still requires exercise to convert into knowhow. but it's much easier to just click on another video and vicariously enjoy someone else's stunning competence than to close the window and struggle with my own worse, sometimes it isn't actually competence. yesterday i watched a video where a guy made opaque soda-lime glass and convinced himself it was a better refractory than his insulating firebricks because he was, among other things, confused about thermodynamics, confused about different material properties, confused about the composition of waterglass, confused about the composition of garden lime, and confused about the temperature of his oxyhydrogen torch (and, I suspect, in significant danger of blowing his foundry to kingdom come) watching porn or sex tips videos won't make you a great lover. neither will reading alt.sex.wizards fifty tom scotts is ten hours a week of, basically, watching porn. i spend more time than that on watching the youtubers listed above and others; what if i spent that time on deliberate practice instead? ten hours a week of etudes might not get you into juillard, but pretty soon you're better than the average garage band member where do you get your etudes or katas, and how do you judge your success on them? textbooks are pretty okay for that, and it's possible to make youtube videos with exercises in them, but those aren't the videos that become youtube hits. and i think it runs counter to the nature of the medium: not just memetic fitness, but also the effort gradient for both creators and consumers
- kragen 3y ago
  *juilliard
- coeneedell 3y ago
  It’s interesting to hear your perspective. I personally have had the opposite effect from watching these people on YouTube. I find it highly inspirational and I’ve gone out and made interesting projects on my own without them. Not all educational content needs to be structured like school, in fact most of it shouldn’t. With this stuff it just needs to humanize the process, so you can see the process for yourself, and follow it for yourself.
DanielHB 3y ago
Educational youtube is modern age what Discovery Channel documentaries used to be And they are better, way better
- graypegg 3y ago
  Part of me misses watching Daily Planet after school. Mythbusters on weekends. How It’s Made too! There’s some gems from that channel in the 00s that got me excited about engineering. I definitely wouldn’t sell them short either.
libraryatnight 3y ago
I have the same feeling. I was sad to see Tom be done, but I'd also prefer that to watching his quality decline, and as you say - I have a lot of Tom Scotts that come up in my feed. Tom's excellent, but there's other people, and no doubt some new people inspired by Tom will enter the space. I do worry that too many garbage aisles might mean people choose the garbage and never make it beyond, pushing non-garbage into a greater and greater minority.
j45 3y ago
Helping more people create videos sustainably is a definitive challenge