Comment by kragen | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kragen | Hacker News Reader

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the problem i have with educational youtube is that it's competence porn. it's quite satisfying to watch lyle peterson, kiwami japan, grandpa amu, nigel braun, grant sanderson, andy george, or xyla foxlin working through the problems involved in creating something, to the point that hours spent getting satisfied that way displace the far more effortful hours required to work through those problems myself. but i don't gain skills by watching someone else work through problems (or, in the less praiseworthy cases, glossing over problems); at best, i might get an idea to try out, or a feeling of inspiration, or a declarative, factual understanding of a particular mechanism—a kind of understanding which still requires exercise to convert into knowhow. but it's much easier to just click on another video and vicariously enjoy someone else's stunning competence than to close the window and struggle with my own

worse, sometimes it isn't actually competence. yesterday i watched a video where a guy made opaque soda-lime glass and convinced himself it was a better refractory than his insulating firebricks because he was, among other things, confused about thermodynamics, confused about different material properties, confused about the composition of waterglass, confused about the composition of garden lime, and confused about the temperature of his oxyhydrogen torch (and, I suspect, in significant danger of blowing his foundry to kingdom come)

watching porn or sex tips videos won't make you a great lover. neither will reading alt.sex.wizards

fifty tom scotts is ten hours a week of, basically, watching porn. i spend more time than that on watching the youtubers listed above and others; what if i spent that time on deliberate practice instead? ten hours a week of etudes might not get you into juillard, but pretty soon you're better than the average garage band member

where do you get your etudes or katas, and how do you judge your success on them? textbooks are pretty okay for that, and it's possible to make youtube videos with exercises in them, but those aren't the videos that become youtube hits. and i think it runs counter to the nature of the medium: not just memetic fitness, but also the effort gradient for both creators and consumers

I definitely agree that these sorts of videos have the potential to be a poor substitute for the real thing. Sometimes I notice that I've spent all my time watching videos about stuff I'm interested in and not actually doing the stuff I'm interested in. On the flip side though, as another commenter mentioned, they have the potential to serve as motivation too. For example, when I'm learning a particular technique on guitar I'll intentionally watch or listen to performances that exemplify what I want to learn in order to remind myself of how great it'd be to play that and of why I'm training. I find it helps boost and sustain motivation. Of course it can't be the only thing I do, but when I can't practice (much) on guitar because, say, I'm eating lunch and need both hands, I can loop some Paul Gilbert or EVH performances and get fired up for the next practice session.

You might be unfair to yourself in the sense that not all hours are created equal; some hours were never going to be productive hours, and so if you can immerse yourself in a subject with some easy-to-watch videos, that might be better than trying to force productivity where none is available.

    the problem i have with educational youtube is 
    that it's competence porn. it's quite satisfying

It's a balance we all need to find, for sure -- competence porn vs. actual practice.

I think it's only a problem when you fool yourself and/or hurt yourself.

Late in 2023 I started watching some streaming coders (a thing I did not know existed) and I've found it beneficial. Definitely exposed to some things I wouldn't have been otherwise.

It’s interesting to hear your perspective. I personally have had the opposite effect from watching these people on YouTube. I find it highly inspirational and I’ve gone out and made interesting projects on my own without them. Not all educational content needs to be structured like school, in fact most of it shouldn’t. With this stuff it just needs to humanize the process, so you can see the process for yourself, and follow it for yourself.

The particular problem I have with your reply is it is half wrong.

Textbooks tend to be filled with crap themselves. I have a feeling you're judging the contents of 'educational' textbooks rather than the corpus of all textbooks.

Next, you are not an island. You need both things, insight from other people that are learned in said thing your attempting and practice. If you practice without the insight you're going to waste most of your life accomplishing something you could have learned from someone else in a few minutes.

these are good points

I completely agree with this observation. In fact, you can use this to your advantage to save time. During the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021, Blizzard released "Classic" World of Warcraft and I had this huge itch to play the game. I satisfied it by watching YouTube videos on Classic WoW instead.

Did I waste time watching WoW YouTube videos? Yes. Did I save much more time by tricking my brain into thinking I was playing the game when I actually wasn't? Yes!

Similarly, Doug DeMuro quirks videos have saved me millions (which I do not have) on 80s and 90s dream cars.

That Porsche 928 or Lamborghini Countach or the ultimate teenage dream Vector W8? Fun to look at the videos but realistically it would not be fun to own and maintain one.

Going to the symphony is similarly “competence porn.” It does nothing for your musical skills, but it’s a joy.

There is nothing wrong with entertainment for entertainment’s sake.

Perhaps. But I wonder how much of this completely passive entertainment was in our ancestral environment? Before 50 years ago, the percentage of all humans who had ever experienced the symphony was so low it was essentially zero. Perhaps the boredom is integral to good living?

I think of it more like learning a language. Yes, you have to put the effort in and learn your grammar and basic vocab yourself - but in conjunction you want to immerse yourself into hearing experts speak it. Watching a film you fancy with subtitles or another audio stream is still mainly entertainment, but it's making you better. Every person who's picked up an instrument has done so, so they can play something they heard and enjoyed.

Also - I don't need to master something. I like the messing about. Occasionally you'll later stumble across a problem you'd accidentally learnt the answer to - and that's gratifying, but it was never the point.

>what if i spent that time on deliberate practice instead

Well yeah. What if I spent all the time I spent on various types of consumption on deliberate practice. I'd be some kind of wizard by now.

There's nothing specially bad about these kinds of video in that respect.

*juilliard

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