Ask Lemmy

What was the animated youtube channel that was someone rant blog? Started fine because it was about harmless stuff like shopping carts and shit, but they went on a break and came back in the middle of covid ranting about vaccines and restrictions. Under something?

Mark Rober

He's been going harder and harder into the Mr Beast format, and it's off-putting. I'm still subscribed for now, but I almost never watch his videos unless the topic seems interesting.

I no longer get excited about a new Veritasium video.
I also don't get excited when the title and thumbnail change 5 times in a week.

pretty much all of the ones that got bought out by PE. the biggest offender of that in my realm is veritasium

AvE used to be good but a while back starting saying dumb right wing political stuff. not dumb because it was right wing, to be clear. just that it was right wing and also was dumb. I still have thisoldtony though, he's better anyways. AvE mostly just had funny quips with a bit of knowledge. ToT has funny scripts and a lot of knowledge.

Scotty Kilmer was always a character, but I stopped watching years ago because idk I guess he just started putting out crappy clickbait content? idr

most Minecraft channels simply ran out of content to produce. the best two, to me right now, are mahjongblonsky and bigbooty17

what else... there's a ton of those informational sciency type channels that I no longer like because they're just too big budget trying to appeal to too many people. smartereveryday lost appeal to me — though I cannot say if quality has declined. it just lost appeal to me. mark rober, similar situation. haven't seen a video from either of them in a year, but been phasing it out for several now. I disliked when a bunch of channels did promo stuff with the US military, too.

oh, MKBHD — turned into a shill for excessive-tech-having cars. at least he made a separate channel for automotive content. I think? still, another situation of somebody speaking in your area of knowledge — I couldn't take him seriously or hear the shitty opinions any longer. as a counter, UnderDunn made a separate channel for his automotive content, and while not my favourite stuff to watch, it's not shill crap like MKBHD.

I tried scrolling through my YouTube subscriptions to see what other channels fit the bill, but I've already unsubscribed from them...

Lunduke and Sabine Hossenfelter took similar paths downward towards more money in the rage economy.

I don't know if they degraded over time, but I unsubscribed from SmarterEveryDay because 1.) he kept trying to slip religious BS into videos and then I couldn't unsee his whole generic youth pastor schtick, 2.) he kept posting weird Physics Girl health update stuff. It just lost me. Not for me. I feel like the glory days of vsauce are also well behind us.

Not sure if this counts, but CGP Grey. The frequency of the videos was always a joke, but the most recent video is a 3 month old paywalled vid of an early preview for a video still unreleased publicly. I still enjoy the videos when they're released, so it's not the quality, but the channel is clearly on autopilot. I hope everything's ok with him and maybe he's just using YouTube as passive income now that he hit it big?

The only one that I unsubbed to pretty fast was the 8bit guy. I generally enjoyed his videos and then in one of them, he had a fairly rare IBM PC and for some reason, he sticks a screwdriver into the power supply and blows a component.

But what really turned me off was when footage of him turned up on Reddit, taken by himself, of shopping in a place like Costco with his assault rifle on his back. I think he was taking pleasure in scaring some of the customers too.

(I think I've remembered that correctly)

Anyway, never went back to his channel after that.

EDIT: I found this Reddit page where someone asked what he did. Didn't realise that was 5 years ago now!

MKBHD, Linus, Most of the tech reviewing kids who got money and then hired an entire staff and in lots of cases also bought up really good solo YouTubers.

Motherfcking Casey Neistat. He was never an amazing person, his exploitation of his wife’s ass in thumbnails and being comfortable with click bait titles always felt off. But he’s a masterful propagandist and videographer until I saw him waving Israeli flags at pro Palestine protests during a filmed documentary.

Binging with Babish - used to be a fantastic set of recipes and takes on cooking that I really enjoyed trying to make, then got into the serious money and jumped the shark, both in "I bought my brother a Tesla/fulfilled a fan dream" and "this week we're using this dehydrator" ways (that meant I just wasn't going to be able to even imagine using the techniques and knowledge on show).

Everything on YouTube apart from niche special interest content creators has gone to shit because all these high viewership channels got bought out by private equity.

It's been a while, but AvE. Dude used to be some chill guy who would take apart tools or do some deep dive into a manufacturing process. But then the covid nation attacked and all of a sudden the guy is sprinkling an opinion in here and there that made me say, eh, and then the Canadian trucker thing happened and dude was all in on that shit. AvE was the first thing I ever donated money to on patreon and the first one I yanked my monthly from because the content had changed to something it once wasn't.

Pretty much any channel once they make it big. I have watched so many channels that just starts out as a person in their basement, or bedroom and make great but simple content. Then they catch on, get a lot of subs and starts making content for the algorithm instead of their existing viewers. They go full time, hire an editor, a cameraman etc. And the content moves further and further away from what made it good to begin with.

A turning point is usually when they quit their dayjob and go full time, that's when the pressure to perform well really begins.

Some exceptions of course, like LGR and Explaining Computers, who just keep chugging along solo. And I still enjoy them because of it.

Linus Tech Tips. It used to be good informative content. After they moved from the house in particular it started to really ramp up the clickbait. It just didn't feel like it was still about technology. It felt like it was about whatever gags they could throw into technology related videos.

The all the controversies happened after I had already unsubbed. Yeah, I don't know how people still engage with that channel.

In my opinion Game theory has degraded quite a bit, partly because they grew too big and started bumping out more and more content on multiple channels which in my opinion saturated quite a bit. It doesn't help that there exists now long form video essays that go much more indepth in certain aspects of games and other forms of entertainment. MatPat leaving did also leave huge void that they can probably never fully replace.

Jimquisition or now rebranded as 'Stephanie Sterling' channel has also degraded quite a bit albeit there are some highs here and there. I liked their game coverage and loved the "Squirty Plays" and "Jimpressions" where they played and made fun of numerous sloppy games but they seem to no longer make them (maybe twitch? but I don't watch Twitch). But Jimquisition has become quite repetitive with its ramblings and I don't really care all that much about any of the LGBTQIA+ or wrestling stuff. Still following the channel though for those better videos that do occasionally pop up.

Similarly YongYea is one of those channels I've started to watch less. It's one of those channels that try really hard to please the audience by telling them what they want to hear instead of having more nuanced takes. Not only that many of his videos are overly long while providing very little substance. Nowdays I prefer Bellular News and Second wind more, and If I ever watch YongYea i'll ususally just jump a head in the video immediately when I hear him start rambling instead of focusing on actual news.

This may be hot take but Hbomberguy has degraded not necessarily in the quality but in the quantity department. I'd much more prefer smaller more concises videos more frequently than 1-3 hour long mega essays that get realeased like every other year. While many of these can be bangers I am not sure if they're overall worth the wait. These could at least be split to multiple smaller videos to spread out the content a bit and make them easier to digest. It's also huge risk if the topic is not something that doesn't interest you all that much. Similar could be said about ActionButton a.k.a Tim Rogers who took more than 2 years? to make 9 hour video about La Noire? Which I can't be bothered to watch because it's age restricted in youtube which would require me to log in.

Braille Skateboarding. Dude shut it down without letting his team know beforehand because he'd fallen deep into Scientology.

MKBHD. He used to be, IMO, the best tech channel out there. The reviews were honest, well produced, and held companies' feet to the fire. The old MKBHD poked fun at the companies' shortcomings (I specifically remember him telling iPhone users to add a widget - then going "oh, wait..."). The new MKBHD interviews Tim Cook and doesn't properly question any of the BS he speaks.

LTT comes across as someone who simultaneously wants to be a boss and also do nut taps in the locker room. He himself admits he sucks at PR and then does PR solo style anyways or with Luke held hostage. He often takes things personally when it's actually a really good opportunity to show growth and standards, but I swear he misses the mark every. Single. Time. This behavior also corroborates the feelings of a staff member who left because someone higher up was creepy to her and wasn't ever confronted because that's the environment Linus fostered. You can't be a boss that's always joking because sometimes it's serious, and when it's serious, it's not always personal.

MKHD Always seemed like a bit of an Apple shill, but I gotta say it just got worse and worse. It's like he was shopping for himself and once he became a millionaire everything seemed like it was cheap if it was at all novel. He also handled that app launch insanely badly and seems like the type of dude to be impressed by anything a tech bro presents to him.

Berm Peak completely similar vibes. He's rich, so crazy expensive bikes and accessories are almost always a great deal because they're in his budget and high quality.

Ethan Klein I honestly don't know why I ever liked him apart from the copyright lawsuit with Matt Hoss. I appreciated the goofs, but for some reason it took me way too long to see that some of those people in no way shape or form deserved that treatment. Patrice Wilson for example, not to mention later when he devoted his entire life to hate watching Hasan and Hasan-adjacents while being incredibly deceptive about his and his wifes views on Israel. I ditched him before all that, but man what a massive shitshow he turned his channels into.

EEVBlog got high on his own supply. He's always been a bit snobbish, especially about sub par equipment that he already made up his mind about before opening, but I saw him talking about running for office with some dogshit platitudes that mean nothing like, "Dave'll take it apart and fix it all" and seemed very defensive when people were asking what his platform actually would be. God complex vibes from all that.

Gus Johnson because he treated his ex like crap and ran from accountability, and is now sneaking back into YouTube through his and his brother's account without ever really addressing his failures. He just wants everyone to move on and accept him again.

Cody Ko handled the fallout of sexual assault allegations horribly and is best friends for life with a known rapist, putting that relationship above everything. Gross guy, but before all that came out he was just a funny immature frat guy with a lot of jokes and good reactions. Major failure to meet the moment.

Scott Kilmer - just shitty political takes eventually wore me down.

AVE - shitty political views and then talking about teaching his daughter racist nursery rhymes was the final straw for me.

Not sure how many of you will know about Tom from the Geowizard channel, but I recently learned he's a reform voter (UK's trump-style party, Nigel Farage) and honestly I was kinda devastated. Took me completely by suprise too, considering he never talked about anything political and the nature of the content and his actions would've never suggested it. In hindsight there were a few small tip-offs that I brushed out as him being a bit old-school/rural and not very plugged in to internet culture and modern no-no's. I found out by listening to an album he recently released and one of the songs is about the replacement theory conspiracy...

I find most channels will degrade once the creator makes Youtube their full-time job. Afterwards, it's all about selling products, donations, sponsors, and memberships.

Survival Lilly and SirSic and two channels that come to mind.

This is VERY recent but NetworkChuck. He's such a great speaker and his videos were good intros into tech (Linux, networking, etc.) but with practical applicability. I liked that he skewed family-friendly and family positive, and some of the solutions he presented were from his perspective as a father. He was never shy about him being religious and being religiously involved. Imo 100% wholesome.

This year, several weeks of his videos were paid sponsor content for very corporate Cisco BS. Then, he comes back from that and it's AI stuff that's kind of a strech for a typical home user.... Then "I'm going to end my videos in a prayer". I unsubscribed right there.

I saw Markiplier do a lets play for some indie roomba game many many years ago, he proceeded to have an almost religious experience, and I was like "fuck yeah, this guy gets it"

Fast forward and he promotes shit like No Mans Sky and TikTok, I automatically unsubscribe from anyone and everyone who promotes TikTok, and he's got this whole survivorship bias like "ANYONE can make a successful movie or webseries. Anyone! A Heist with Markiplier was only like $30,000 dollars production value... well, okay, thats a lot of money, but still!"

He's lost touch with reality and now he's just another salesperson.

Another one that's kind of downhill is Kurzegast, their recent AI video was really hollow and vacant of all the reasonable criticisms about AI and its immediate effects, some people have theorized that channels like theirs are being sponsored by a company called "Control AI" to muddy the waters and move the discussion away from things like holding companies accountable.

Donut Media. They got bought out by an investment company and then all their videos became Buzzfeed style listicles.

Cinemassacre, for a couple reasons:

1. The character of the AVGN is based on Mike Matei, not James Rolfe. James is mainly a horror movie nerd, and Mike is the gamer. As toxic as Matei can be about gaming, When Mike left, part of the Nerd left with him.

2. They expanded to more recent games. It was inevitable, but it really killed the last personal touch the series had. The AVGN Earthbound episode is a great outlier, because you can tell that James wanted to make it and had at least some connection to the game. Most of the episodes now, he's reviewing games he has no connection to, using a script written by someone else.

Game Grumps, for similar reasons. Dan stopped being familiar with the games they played, so he stopped offering as much input. During Covid especially, he would order in food and just eat for half of the episode. They pivoted to not really marking the number of an episode in a series, thus making it harder to follow a series. Then they started releasing longer episodes and doing stuff like the 10 Minute Power Hour. I originally was drawn to the fact that you could watch an episode of GG or play it as background noise and still get some good laughs or vibes. That kinda went out the window, and so did I.