The worst thing about online learning is that everything has become a video. Every code tutorial. Every design tutorial. Nobody actually writes out a guide anymore. It's just "hey guys welcome to my tutorial" and watching 10 minutes of content that isn't remotely relevant...
Post
Replies:
0
@Daojoan I agree. I usually put extra time into searching for text-based alternatives to these videos 
@Daojoan I only recently started realizing that more often than not, people are surprised to find that for the presentations I give, there usually is a full text written version, and that the references are links to actual text resources.
@Daojoan I can't agree more! I in particular do best learning through text and am good at scanning a document quickly to find what I need. I hate watching videos produced by amateurs with annoying speaking habits who spend the whole video drawing imaginary circles with their cursor around the menu item they are talking about!
@Daojoan I dont know if is this or that Discord replaced so many forums, that many problem solving answers and learning material is not searchable or will get lost forever.
@Daojoan A guy I now work with documents internal procedures by linking to YT vids. I'm about ready to rewrite all our wiki pages
@Daojoan
But every information is repeated 5 times, to get the 10 minutes video filled up.
With garbage.
@Daojoan Ugh, so true! I hate watching long videos when I just want quick steps. Give me a simple guide please — my brain can’t handle all that fluff!
@Daojoan Really annoying
But luckily I have found an exception for coding: 
Codecademy
No video, just text and coding exercises. Directly on their platform. You code following the exercise, it corrects you and you can test yourself directly on their platform
I have a love/hate relationship with them: I love the fact that it is practical, no 30 minute video course, but the pace is really slow.
But if you want to tackle a new topic in coding, it's just great
@Daojoan
Heartily agreed! While -some_ things benefit from video (like "How do you take apart this thing?", though well made photos do the same), most things really don't need a video and bad voice over.
FWIW, there is this script:
https://github.com/obra/Youtube2Webpage
which converts YT videos to a series of screenshots along with the subtitled text. I have not tried it, so I don't know how well it works.
Or if you do find a written tutorial, it's written by AI, so you can't trust it.
@Daojoan true. I wouldn't mind so much if they didn't pad it out so much with useless ramblings just to stretch the useful bit.
@Daojoan I blame the platforms (Coursera, Udemy, etc). They all enable mediocre quality video peddlers to make a fair amount of money.
A course-creation/monetization platform that didn't rely on video would probably be beneficial.
@Daojoan I like the use of #video as very short clips embedded in a text narrative or instructions, along with still #photographs.
As used by the @bbc in the early days of the Web.
Stills are often best for showing which part is where, video is a good way to see how someone skilled does a particular tricky move, words convey #structuredinformation, and best printed.
@Daojoan Very much agree. I'm a visual person, but in the sense that I scan a well organised text much, much faster than a rando with a webcam can explain it.
@Daojoan all compounded by the fact that the vast majority of people uploading instructional videos are *monumentally fucking shit* at instructing. Teaching is a skill, and most people who try to do it just leave you wanting to punch them repeatedly for being so obliviously bad at it
@Daojoan and the first two minutes telling you how "we're gonna jump right into it."
@Daojoan but on the plus side: you can use the YouTube "ai" to turn the video into a longer-winded text full of errors!
@Daojoan Videos are so slow! I’d rather read quick steps than watch someone talk forever. Where’s the simple guide when you need it?
@Daojoan That is so true. I believe it's all about two factors, the easier "stream of thought speaking" (against writing a correct text) and the desire to show off themselves, before any technical content
@Daojoan it sure does look like that a lot of times, you are right. Awful...
"How to save your Google Doc"
00:00 Why digital files need to be saved
07:24 A history of save icons
23:32 Formats used by different office tools
31:56 Famous errors caused by not saving files
58:45 Saving files in Google Docs
And all to say "they save automatically".
Like and subscribe!
@Daojoan I so much dislike this fact, stopping and starting and going back over the video, the irritations like voice tone and speed, the digressions and emotional notes, ugh, please, just express the knowledge in clearly written form.
The video is interrupted by an advertisement every few minutes. Very irritating.
@Daojoan My own experience is that if you maintain a technical blog then bots will turn that into video anyways. One of them was kind enough to mention my unique username, and so I found it when doing an egosearch for that page to send someone a link.
@Daojoan Absolutely agree. To everyone making tutorials, DON'T START WITH YOUR LIFE STORY!, just get to the point.
It should be noted that they got it from somewhere; user manuals are also almost always paragraphs or pages of barely subject-adjacent slog before getting to anything the the thing does & even then it's somehow over- & underexplained at the same time.
There's a reason teaching is something you train for; it's actually pretty difficult to do well.
@Daojoan
Truly the pivot to video is complete.
One of the worst things about this timeline.
@Daojoan forget code, it takes me *forever* to learn video games now for the same reason.
@Daojoan forget code, it takes me *forever* to learn video games now for the same reason.
@Daojoan Big part of the problem is how they monetize information. A video forces you to "stay", whether 5 mins or less. A text, like others commented here, is more difficult to monetize. I miss the old days of the internet when it was truly about sharing knowledge and info, far away from metrics and clicks
@Daojoan drives me nuts. I can skim text and pick out the necessary info in seconds, but video takes *forever* even at 3x speed where they sound like rabid chipmunks
@Daojoan oh god I hate this. This ten minute video could have been two or three sentences. I am not going to subscribe to your channel, I only came here to find out how to replace my car headlight bulb - I do not want to be notified when you post more car videos!!
@Daojoan it also doesn’t help that people are discouraged to write because LLMs will just swallow it up and use it for themselves.
