Veritasium: A Story of YouTube Propaganda

What Hacker News said

Recommends alexb_ · 2022-03 · on “Kodak factory tour: How does Kodak make film? [video]”

This video may be worth a watch: [this video] Side note: I don't really agree with a lot of his other videos. Yet I am sharing this one, because I believe it's worthwhile and am not taking his other videos into account for a context that doesn't matter :)

Recommends AlexandrB · 2023-07 · on “Entropy: The Most Misunderstood Concept in Physics [video by Veritasium]”

I was quite disappointed by his video on self-driving cars. It presented a very one-sided view and felt like a puff piece (and, indeed, it was sponsored by Waymo). Tom Nicholas did a good job breaking down the problems with it: [this video]

Recommends TaylorAlexander · 2023-12 · on “Veritasium: The SAT Question Everyone Got Wrong [video]”

You may be interested to see this critique of Veritasium which cooled my views on the channel significantly since I saw it: [this video]

Cites runarberg · 2021-12 · on “I bought 1000 meters of wire to settle a physics debate [video]”

For me Veritasium lost all his credibility capital by the way he responded to Tom Nicholas’ video about YouTube sponsorships using Veritasium as a case study[1]. In stead of approaching the debate calmly (or better yet, simply ignoring it) he came to the comment section way too defensive, like a lot, basically calling Tom a lair and a bad actor. Actually that is not quite true, Veritasium lost a bunch of his credibility capital when he made the sponsored content for the self driving cars. I never watched that video as I spotted it was basically and ad and was reluctant to watch his new stuff after that (though I did). 1: [this video]

Cites mrtksn · 2022-07 · on ““EVs aren't the only answer”: Toyota scientist on the future of cars”

> I'm hardly an expert on this subject What are your opinions based on? I've seen some some "propaganda science" videos, which were essentially Tesla fanboys defending Tesla's choice for some reason. IMHO, nothing ever is that one dimensional. Obviously those who invested in PHEV or something else will defend that point and I can't see how one can be correct and the other can be the wrong choice when all come with pros and cons. Did Intel made the wrong choice x86? Did Apple made the correct choice with ARM? Isn't it possible that at different stages of maturity of the tech and the market the "correct choice" can be different? Lately I'm very annoyed of the science and tech propaganda on You

Cites foerbert · 2022-07 · on “Ask HN: YouTube Channels for the Intellectually Curious”

> I don't know what to tell you if you believe Thunderf00t's "debunking" is more valuable than your own viewing of any given channel. I wasn't very inclined to view Matt Ferrel's videos much in the first place. I was too leery of the way they were presented to consider it worth my time to investigate further. I was wondering if I was missing out, but never decided to really try to find out first-hand as it just wasn't worth it to me. It was at that point that I saw Thunderf00t's video, and I decided to see what his take was. As you note, I'm a bit wary of Thunderf00t as well. I don't watch his videos often and when I do I ensure to remain a little more actively critical. Based on what I saw

Cites ummonk · 2022-09 · on “Did GoogleAI just snooker one of Silicon Valley’s sharpest minds?”

Veritasium's video in particular: [LINK] It was critiqued by Tom Nicholas: [this video] Most notable was Snazzy Labs' own comment in the replies to Tom Nicholas' video which descriped their experience participating in the Waymo sponsored reviews: [this video]

Critical emsign · 2021-10 · on “SmarterEveryDay's 4privacy can, and cannot, meet its goals”

> Where I get uneasy is how quickly SmarterEveryDay seems to have > switched from a YouTube channel about explaining things into a > YouTube channel about stoking "Big Tech" fears as a way to sell > apps. The latest video is title "Is Your Privacy An Illusion? > (Taking on Big Tech) - Smarter Every Day 263". This has been a trend with YouTube science communicators and educators for a while now. They're getting hired by companies to basically produce an ad in the style of their regular videos. Physics Girl did a video in cooperation with Toyota praising Toyota's hydrogen powered test car, telling her audience that hydrogen as a passenger car fuel has a future while ignoring the fact that ever