It's a tool like anything else. I learn SO MUCH from Youtube. Watching someone DIY something where they show all the steps, makes it so accessible. I then learn from them and create some really intricate things from different domains without any formal training. I'm talking car repairs, electrical engineering, woodworking, metal work, gardening, 3d printing. The list goes on and on.
I don't understand, why isn't Youtube social yet. By that I mean why can't I subscribe to other recommendations by creator of the channel Posy or Martijn Doolaard or Sisyphus 55.
I mean these creators can create their personal recommendation streams (of other videos they liked) and some weighted combination of those items could enter my recommendations. This feature is present in Soundcloud.
That does sound like it could be interesting, however it also sounds like it could be horrible. Just because I subscribe to a creator doesn't always mean I align with their views on everything, so could fill my feed with junk.
I guess it would have to be another setting along with the subscription flag.
It's true... but such an awful double edged sword.
I have quite a bit of experience as an auto mechanic, and love using youtube to find footage of something I'm considering doing or some item I'm considering buying. Just the effort+time savings alone is a game changer. Previously I would download FSMs for something I was considering acquiring to see what it's really like to work on / maintain / something of the internals, to minimize risk of buyer's remorse.
However, most the videos I find of people DIYing things are utter trash when it comes to actual guidance. The readily available footage of internals and failure modes is super valuable, but most these videos will do more harm than good when actually listened to. It's a whole lot of the blind leading the deaf. And the youtubers generally speak authoritatively about things they're clearly doing incorrectly to anyone experienced.
We had the same problem in the web forums era, but the conveniently accessible instructional video format strikes me as far more problematic. At least in the web forums it was entirely a conversational text format, so you were already in the context of reading comments, and the discussion would usually call out idiots immediately front and center. In the youtube videos, especially viewed on mobile, the comments are something you must seek out past the ads, must mode switch from watching tv to reading something, and are usually filled with morons anyways.
The major problem with relying on YouTube content for general automotive diagnosis and repair is that it doesn't tend to be general purpose. It's always "how this one guy fixed this one problem on this one car." A video could have a title like "Fixing a 2002 Toyota Corolla that won't start" but all it shows is the guy jumping right into replacing his fuel pump. There can be many other reasons that a 2002 Corolla won't start, but you're going to have to search through 100s of other videos to find the one that exactly matches your car's root cause, which you don't know until you diagnose it yourself.
The repair steps tend to range from so-so to excellent. The diagnosis steps are almost always very lacking.
Or they "fix" their issue by replacing the fuel pump, but totally neglected to point out what actually fixed their problem was the clogged pick-up sock they incidentally replaced while replacing the fuel pump. And never even looked inside the tank to address, let alone identify, their real problem.
Seen this kind of thing play out on YT too many times to count.
I could see that. Some times I'll also use it to gain consensus from a few different creators. The best ones will show when they fail so its a learning experience for everyone.
Expect a full-on slop tsunami, with people running bots that first generate half facts and outright hallucinations from Gemini, and then generate a visual tutorial for it to post to YouTube.
"For the DIYer, a tutorial on strengthening beams. Step 1: rub glue on them."
I used to think this. But over time everything just became infomercials.
'Ok lets install these parts from 123 parts'
I hate it. I refuse to volunteer to be subtly (or not so subtly) manipulated by Youtubers.
All the music production people are suddenly revealing tools they use, that oh wow, I'm so lucky, are going on sale for black friday. Weird that I've never seen them use these 'goto' tools ever before on their channels. Hmmm.
Google figured out how to get all those creators to work for free, to put a nice coat of paint on their fascism Trojan horse. It's a tool of oppression, masquerading as a tool of expression.
