3 ms·

That's hard though, because I agree, but then also some of my favourites do a mix that I enjoy, and it just happens that they discovered the mix before I discov

by OJFord 2y ago

That's hard though, because I agree, but then also some of my favourites do a mix that I enjoy, and it just happens that they discovered the mix before I discovered the channel I suppose. If people followed that as a rule, I wouldn't get to watch Clough42 doing electronics one week, 3D printing the next, and then attaching it to a milling machine or something and testing it out. I wouldn't get to see Marius Hornberger pause woodworking to do a load of electronics/printed/mechanical upgrades to his drill press, or 3D print parts for dust collection, or build a new machine. I suppose there is Matthias Wandel's approach of the 'main' channel being kept mostly pure woodworking (but still machine builds, wood strength tests, wooden mouse maze experiments) and then a 'random stuff' second channel for the electronics, more experiments, Lego, recently metal lathe, etc.

lolinder 2y ago
Yeah, this is fair. I do think that changing your mix is much more risky than just having a mix. There is also a difference between what you're describing and the "my whole life" blog, which is that the mixes themselves form a proper category. It's not a woodworking channel that takes a pause for philosophical musings, it's a maker channel that happens to spend a lot of time on woodworking. My guess is that the "my whole life" blog doesn't work well for developing an audience because the sum total of all of your interests is unique or nearly so—there will be very few people who actually want to read about every one of your hobbies and interests. If you want to connect with people you need to identify a subset of your interests that are shared as a set by many others.
zrobotics 2y ago
I would argue that clough42 does fit a niche where all the videos are on a topic, in his case it's doing very ambitious projects/modifications that the average home-shop person wouldn't attempt. Another example would be nighthawkinlight, who does a wide range of projects but with a strong home-shop/diy science bent. If either of these channels started posting stuff like cooking or video essays, I would potentially unsubscribe. Those are both things that I also subscribe to, but having the different things all on one channel makes it too unpredictable what kind of content I'll be clicking on. For a blog, many of the same rules apply. A blog relies on more external links into the content than a YouTube channel, but you still want a consistent theme. If I click a blog from here or another site, if the content is good I'm likely to read other articles and either bookmark/rss/subscribe via email. If the articles are a mishmash of topics, then I'm less likely to want to engage further since I don't know what I'll be getting. And you want that dedicated core group for a blog to be successful, since those people are the ones who will start posting links to your stuff on other sites. An example from HN that comes to mind is brr.fyi, I know I'm not the only person who subscribed to his email notifications, since everytime I've gotten an email I've also seen the article posted to HN, so other people have been following and have been faster at posting the new article as a HN story than me.

by OJFord 2y ago

lolinder 2y ago

Yeah, this is fair. I do think that changing your mix is much more risky than just having a mix. There is also a difference between what you're describing and the "my whole life" blog, which is that the mixes themselves form a proper category. It's not a woodworking channel that takes a pause for philosophical musings, it's a maker channel that happens to spend a lot of time on woodworking. My guess is that the "my whole life" blog doesn't work well for developing an audience because the sum total of all of your interests is unique or nearly so—there will be very few people who actually want to read about every one of your hobbies and interests. If you want to connect with people you need to identify a subset of your interests that are shared as a set by many others.

zrobotics 2y ago

I would argue that clough42 does fit a niche where all the videos are on a topic, in his case it's doing very ambitious projects/modifications that the average home-shop person wouldn't attempt. Another example would be nighthawkinlight, who does a wide range of projects but with a strong home-shop/diy science bent. If either of these channels started posting stuff like cooking or video essays, I would potentially unsubscribe. Those are both things that I also subscribe to, but having the different things all on one channel makes it too unpredictable what kind of content I'll be clicking on. For a blog, many of the same rules apply. A blog relies on more external links into the content than a YouTube channel, but you still want a consistent theme. If I click a blog from here or another site, if the content is good I'm likely to read other articles and either bookmark/rss/subscribe via email. If the articles are a mishmash of topics, then I'm less likely to want to engage further since I don't know what I'll be getting. And you want that dedicated core group for a blog to be successful, since those people are the ones who will start posting links to your stuff on other sites. An example from HN that comes to mind is brr.fyi, I know I'm not the only person who subscribed to his email notifications, since everytime I've gotten an email I've also seen the article posted to HN, so other people have been following and have been faster at posting the new article as a HN story than me.