And why did you stop watching them?
That Canadian tech guy. It has some good content, but that whole drama with the ex-employees stinks of a toxic workplace, and I don’t want to support that. Plenty of other good tech-related content that I still follow - Level One Techs, Gamers Nexus, Hardware Canucks, Hardware Unboxed, JayzTwoCents.
Fro Knows Photo - used to have some good content years ago when I watched it, but started becoming more and more annoying, with clickbait thumbnails on almost every video.
SMoD - a good source for getting to know new/unknown bands in the doom/stoner/sludge metal realms, but unsubbed after the scandal.
stef sanjati. she was the first trans person i saw irl and got me the courage to come out.
i only dont watch cause shes not a youtuber anymore :(
I was a Nas Daily fan back then. I just got bored of him over time, not to mention how insanely corporate his videos feel now.
Most beauty “influencers”
I watched them before they were “influencers”, and then I couldn’t trust the products they were using or recommending.
Upisnotjump. It’s just not my thing anymore
TotalBiscuit
This one hits hard. “Gaming YouTube” isn’t the same without him, I don’t watch many gaming videos nowadays
Still miss him
My interest in gaming plummeted after he passed.
I was also in this position, there is so much gaming content out there but the whole state of journalism seems to have really fallen off.
Last year I discovered MinnMax though and some of my faith has been restored. They are a community funded group of journalists and enthusiasts who run a weekly ~3 hour podcast about games and the industry. They are mature, lucid, insightful, and also pretty funny. They’ve also been doing a yearly best-of list for a long time which is a good jumping off point if you want to dip your toe in. Definitely recommend for anyone interested in gaming and the industry.
Especially this week.
Same here, friend. Still hits me every now and then when I see a Steam game with a recommendation from his curator page. Doesn’t happen too often these days, but still the occasional older game I haven’t picked up yet goes on sale.
… Fuck
A big loss. I’m still wondering what happened to his family since then. I heard they got out of the USA?
I’ve understood the dogs got new owners, Genna moved to South Korea.
What about the kid?
I can’t remember hearing anything about him, I also couldn’t find anything with a quick search yesterday.
I’ll never forget him for introducing me to dungeons of dredmor, the game is the bad roguelike, but I don’t know if I ever would have gotten into roguelikes without it
I’ve never heard anyone else mention Dungeons of Dredmor! That’s the game that taught me how much I loathe total randomness in roguelikes. Without it I wouldn’t have discovered Dwarf Fortress, Cataclysm, and a host of others where your skill actually matters, so even though I hated DoD I’m glad I picked it up after TB’s video.
(And the artist of Dredmor later ended up on the development team of my literal favorite game ever, Starsector. Weird how things turn out.)
:(
Guy was a legend, I bought Terraria because of him. His voice and style was amazing. Rest in piece!
Lindybeige was a formative part of my early nerd life. Unfortunately he’s a conservative and it’s a big part of his personality. I do totally agree with him about the British pound being superior to the decimalized euro though. I would literally beat someone to death if it would give me the opportunity to rearrange the values of dollars, quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies into something based around a highly composite number like 240 or 360
Absolutely. I never cared for his political stuff. Get that shit out of here. Just geek out on historic stuff, but please no more misogynist social darwinist garbage…
@ThisIsAManWhoKnowsHowToGling look at what they took from us
@Fundamentallylazy @ThisIsAManWhoKnowsHowToGling
Okay, that chart is, like, 5 difference systems of measurement pretending to be one unit of measurement. The imperial system is bad, but it’s not quite as bad as that chart.That said, I like how most imperial units are at a scale that feel nice. Like, most things you measure in feet are no more than 10 feet long, most things you measure in yards are less than a dozen yards long. Also, it’s nice that at 0° F you know road salt isn’t gonna work.
@Shkshkshk @ThisIsAManWhoKnowsHowToGling I work in the US for a company that has mostly European presence, and one of my key software tools was written for metric units, and they decided long ago not to bother properly supporting imperial units. So I am always looking for good conversion charts for our US production; this is by far the most intensely cursed chart I have found.
Ask a Ninja.
AvE after he went full crazy
Yeah, wanted to comment exactly that. You could literally watch him become crazier with every upload. At first I did overlook the odd comment, but he eventually went full nutjob and I had to unsubscribe.
Wait what did I miss?
Anti-vax, supported the trucker rallies, called Trudeau a Nazi
It’s interesting to see how much of Canada has bitten the American onion over the past few decades.
Very much same here.
Yeahhhhhh, I used to recommend his channel to young engineers and techs because of how thorough he was at explaining the how and why of mechanisms. I don’t anymore which is a shame because he was knowledgeable.
Breaking points, their geopolitical analysis is out right misinformation
Who do you watch now? I thought Breaking Points was ok.
I’ve been watching Majority Report with Sam Seder. Watched Breaking points since they were on the Rising with The Hill. Something just started to slowly change with them when they broke off. There’s the constant Ad’s (which is understandable, but was excessive), segments hidden behind a paywall, personalities started to change after surgery then Kyle Kulinski got heavily into the mix including romantically. I don’t know, just seemed the show started to take over the lives of the hosts, Sam and Emma have been a breathe of fresh air on Majority (even when Emma drinks a little too much lol). The show is their job and Sam is pretty professional, decent daily live show with clips of segments also being uploaded.
Kinda moved away from milenial political talking heads after them.
They turned out same shit as boomer teeveee jisr packaged for modern audience.
Fediverse comment section under fake new articles provides better coverage imho.
Any good examples off the top of your head?
Stopped watching after early ukriane war coverage.
I watched Linus Tech Tips, and NCIX Tech Tips before that. My wife and I were discussing how the level of information was tanking but the production quality was great, then GN released their video a few weeks after we stored watching LTT and I unsubsidized.
NCIX Tech Tips: Special Victims Unit
Contrapoints and PhilosophyTube were two big ones. I’d still watch Carlos Maza if he produced anything, but he hasn’t in like two years, so…I’ll include him, too.
Contrapoints and PhilosophyTube were two big ones
Care to share why you stopped watching their channels? Because without context, the only potential reason that comes to mind is that they’re both trans women…
That’s not exactly wrong, but it’s not the only reason. I’ve never been particularly interested LGBTQ+ issues, and Contrapoints’s transition first was kinda like, “K, I’m glad I’m learning about this stuff, I guess, but I have other interests.” After all, what drew me to both in the first place were their philosophical analyses and how they applied it to social issues. They were important to me for how they showed me how philosophy can be used, as opposed to DarkMatter5555 (I think that’s his name. Also, add him to the list), who I also used to watch, but that dude never grew out of the same stale template of animating god and the angel and regurgitating the most basic atheistic ideas.
So, my purpose in watching them was to learn how to apply principles to reality with a little learning along the way. But when they started focusing in on their transition, I just dropped off.
Contrapoints’ latest video is a very good one you might find interesting. It’s sort of a PhD in video form, very deeply researched. The topic is heterosexuality, framed through the Twilight stories. It’s long and pretty meaty
The hot wings first we feast channel
It’s entertaining but I got tired of the premise
After the DJ Khaled episode I knew nothing else would be as entertaining for me so I stopped there
Eh, I’d argue the recent Conan episode is pretty insane and hilarious. Much more so than Khaled.
The DJ Khaled one was him just completely embarassing himself unintentionally. Funny because he’s so full of himself. Conan’s was funny, but you knew it was going to be before watching because it’s Conan
Yeah, but you already knew DJ Khaled’s was going to be stupid and embarrassing before watching because it’s DJ Khaled.
I feel like, if they ditched the hot wings, it would still be a good interview.
I get what you’re saying, but the eating and the spiciness of the wings actually contribute to the quality of the interview.
-
Eating a meal with someone is disarming and contributes to the relaxed, ungaurded nature or his guests.
-
Consuming spicy food, particularly extremely spicy food or spicy food in great quantity releases endorphins which.
So while yes the eating/reacting to how hot the sauce is does interrupt the flow of the interview somewhat, it does help him get good/candid answers for his guests.
So while his research team is outstanding and he’s a talented interviewer in his own right. The hot wings do serve a role in the interview as more than a clickbaity gimmick.
-
Northernlion. He’s still a cool person in my books, but the moment he started actively trying to maximize revenue is when he began to lose his appeal to me. Nick’s - RockLeeSmile’s - departure was the first warning bell, but I stuck with him for a long while after that.
I completely get it, though - he wants to ensure a good future for his family.
I’m still subscribed to him, but I have definitely not been watching him as often as I used to, and I couldn’t exactly say why. I will say that The Library of Letourneau scratches the itch when I have it because it’s just edited content of the best parts of NL.
deleted by creator
CGPGrey. I even listened to his podcasts.
For someone who tried to sell productivity tools at one point, he was very unproductive.
Also, given what happened with Standard and Nebula, I got to say I side with Nebula over him.
I still watch his main videos (when they actually happen…), but with a much higher degree of scepticism than I used to. And I stopped listening to his podcast (singular…).
My disillusionment with him started with a few issues with his videos. The blatantly ridiculous “royal family is good actually” video. The less obvious but no less egregious touting of Guns, Germs, and Steel. The AI techbroism of his automation video. Then he just killed off the podcast with no explanation, leaving his cohost Brady to put out a note saying “yeah we’re just on hiatus for now”. Over 4 years ago that was. There was the fact that he sided very vocally with Kurzgesagt in the CoffeeBreak drama, despite CB obviously being in the wrong at every step of the way.
Then the final straw where I was no longer willing to say I was a fan of his was when he did a video about some missile silo in America, in which he used the name of a submarine-based missile instead of a land-based missile at some point. Shortly afterwards he put out a massive mea culpa video saying it was a “catastrophic” error that he could not live with himself for, and that he holds himself to too high a standard to let that stand. All while still not acknowledging the problems with those earlier videos. So one nitpicky detail gets a massive hullabaloo and a retraction, but fundamental flaws in the underlying thesis of the video gets nothing? Give me a break.
What drama, and if sided with Kurzgesagt when they were in the right as you say, what is the issue?
Oh whoops! My mistake! I’ll edit the above comment to fix that. It was Kurzgesagt who was in the wrong.
The drama was (to copy/paste an earlier comment, because it’s rather lengthy):
It started when a YouTuber whose channel is called Coffee Break reached out to Philip of Kurzgesagt as part of a video he was doing into the flaws of popular science communication. Specifically, about some significant errors in K’s video on Addiction. Instead of agreeing to collaborate, or even giving a simple “not interested, sorry”, K took an instant accusatory tone, claiming CB must have been making a “gotcha” piece. CB and K agreed that they would talk more about the matter to try and assuage K’s concerns, but K kept stalling while working on a retraction video, at which time K took down the video that was the impetus for this discussion (shortly after, as one of those aforementioned stalling efforts, having said “I never could bring myself to take it down”, claiming it would be “cruel and unnecessary” to do so—funny, considering in his AMA attempting to spin the story, he said “I was really stressed out about the addiction and the refugee video for years. Being finally open about my mistakes and deleting them felt like weight leaving my body.”). The Refugee video was also taken down along with the Addiction one that CB was interested in.
K claims to be interested in science communication. But here, he decided to make the selfish decision to do what he thought would protect his own personal brand through duplicitous means. He got ahead of the story that falsely assumed was coming, and put up a pre-emptive response to that. Now, CB isn’t entirely blameless. In response to the above, CB put out a rather hot-headed reaction to the whole incident. He didn’t follow up with K to try to understand what had happened; he lashed out in anger at K’s self-righteous arse-covering video.
And then CB started getting harassed. K called out CB, and many of K’s friends (other very large, powerful YouTubers such as CGP Grey and Philip de Franco) made very public statements to their audiences attacking CB. It ended up forcing CB into taking down his video, deleting a whole heap of tweets explaining what happened, and putting out an apology. Perhaps it was an apology that CB should have indeed made, but the need for an apology from K was much, much greater. And one never came. K used his larger platform to spin the narrative so that his large audience, and now also the general public who becomes aware of this, almost all take his side.
Incidentally, here’s the video that CB was working on at the time. Hari, the scientist discussed in the video whom K worked with on his video discussed earlier, communicated very well with CB on it.
Thanks for the great breakdown, it sounds vaguely familiar. I remember K’s retraction bit and I follow Philip DeFranco. Disappointed he landed on the wrong side.
For what it’s worth, Philly D is someone I could have answered the original question with too. Not for any spectacular reason like the above—I had already stopped watching him before that occurred. For me it was just finding his focus was too much on sensationalist pop culture news rather than news reporting that interested me. He wasn’t doing anything wrong, it just wasn’t right for me.
Yeah he definitely can veer too much into that stuff for a time. I strongly dislike his thumbnails and titles but I feel he has to do that to compete but I do like his content, some days just less than others.
I only ever saw that Royal Family video of his, and it was enough for me never to seek out any more.
Have you seen this response video to Grey’s Royal Family one?
i love Shaun’s videos, but this is one of my favorites. the way he “negotiates” with the royal family is just chef’s kiss.
I haven’t, but I will definitely watch that, thanks! 👍
I found his video on FPTP Binary political systems video to be logically flawed and I think it ultimately caused more harm than good. It’s irritating to see people reference it in political discussions today. That eventually convinced me to stop giving him views.
Yeah, it’s weird, CGPGrey videos used to be the most must-watch of all YouTube for me and I subscribed to his Patreon at one point. I listened to Hello Internet loyally and I was even unhurt about how it ended. I still think he’s an interesting guy and would follow his stuff again but he doesn’t seem to be doing anything of interest to me any more.
What happened with Standard/Nebula?
I responded to someone else, but there is a reason why Grey isn’t a part of Nebula.
his videos started getting sparse/boring
What happened? I’ve never heard of it
Him and Kurzgesagt were helping to build an organization for YouTubers with the current CEO. The first talent signed on was Wendover and Real Engineering.
Grey and Kurzgesagt were rather inactive partners when they should have been more active and were trying to build a much more exploitative company instead of what Nebula became. It is vague on how they left, but they left and the company became better for it.
Sorry, do you mean the current CEO of Nebula or of YouTube?
Nebula
So Nebula got rid of him (which would seem to coincide with his drop in output)?, Kurzgesagt seems to be doing just fine in comparison.
I didn’t like his take, “solving” traffic nescitates the use of self-driving cars. Can’t have traffic without cars, it’s as simple as that. We need public transport, not more shit to spend our increasingly scarce money on.
