Hey e14 Members who YouTube

Question

I was wondering if any of you were talking about the current kerfuffle in the news surrounding youtube partner program changes. Before drafting this note, i decided to search for youtube and see if there was already a conversation underway.

So I searched for youtube and the most recent poste i found was from gam3t3ch titled, Youtube is the Devil which is ironic becase he posted it over 9 months ago.

I digress.

So members and Top Members I know many of you have channels (a short list is posted below). I'm wondering what your thoughts are on what YouTube is doing to the small/just starting channels? If you have a youtube channel - why did you start it up? How does it feel to have your hopes and dreams of being the next PewDiePie snatched cruelly from your hands?

Or do you just enjoy making videos?

signed,

just curious

a short and very incomplete list:

https://www.youtube.com/user/workshopshed Andy Clark - Workshopshed

https://www.youtube.com/user/TheBreadboardca Peter Oakes - The Breadboard

https://www.youtube.com/mayermakes - Clemens Mayer

https://www.youtube.com/user/fvdbosch - Frederick Vandenbosch

https://www.youtube.com/user/thewestcoasthippie Nico teWinkel

https://www.youtube.com/user/enricomiglino/about Enrico Miglino

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJ00i4FLwZG6IZmTGP0xIvg Ravi Butani

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_CEc_vC8-i7gta98km5Qvg Charles Gantt

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCJvsxwgHKCZqt9q7MM5QtA Cabe Atwell

https://www.youtube.com/user/TheBiglesp Les Pounder

mcb1 · Answer

I don't make videos, and I prefer that instructional videos don't exist.

While they are great for some stuff, you can't cut and paste from them, you can't easily include code, and if you're trying to remember that instruction where you tweak x, it's much harder to find in a video.

I tend to also find most presenters seem to like the sound of their own voice, and tend to be much longer than required.

I've watched the PSOC series and I've lost track of how much repeating or acknowledging how great the product is.

Another issue that plagues many is the quality ... you either have extremely large file size or are left with struggling to see what's going on.

I'm aware that not every video falls into this category, but without careful production or post production, the excellent content can be lost in poor quality.

Cheers

Mark

ntewinkel · Answer

I've been using YouTube mostly to share videos with others, rather than for the purpose of it being a channel on its own. I haven't actually checked the history of my channel for a while, so it was funny to look back and see it. But yes, it's unfortunate that they are changing it, as it reduces the chance of anyone ever getting a bonus through a short-lived viral video. They already had a threshold of views needed, so I wonder why they upped it so far out of reach now. " 4,000 hours of watchtime within the past 12 months and 1,000 subscribers. " is not something I expect to achieve anytime soon! I made a total of 67 cents last year, so losing that revenue stream is not going to impact me much On the bright side, a lot of YouTube videos will become a lot less annoying to watch now! -Nico

peteroakes · Answer

Wow. We're do I start. These are all very interesting stories Do I YouTube... yes indeed. Quite alot in fact but not close to some of the bigger channels like EEVBlog I have about 23K subs and even when I was less than 10k I made about 300$ a month. Now I make the same... go figure. Just enough to cover the internet acess. I never started the channel to make money though. It was to help folks with trouble shooting and share some of my knowledge so I don't get into it for profit. My videos are typically 30 to 60 mins long and very detailed. I hate abreviated videos that show that something can be done but never enough on how. I like running long going projects as Jan and othes will know but now I also get a few companies sending me cool stuff to review or use in my projects. In most cases there not valued enough to justify the time so it's good I don't do it for profit. It's a retirement hobby for me. Ok. Gotta dash. I'll Continue this later

balearicdynamics · Answer

(entering in the discussions after a while of silence ) IMHO videos are very useful to explain how something has been done, no matter if it includes moving parts or not. There is also a sort of psychological impact I think; self certification and demonstration that what we describe has been really done and works. In the specific context of electronics, making of etc. as we are involved here in E14 community it is very difficult to find something that has no movement at all! At leas a button, a LED, a light should be, if some current passes in our circuit. By the other side instead I have great difficulties to follow the video tutorials - I can recognize this a limit - I see the video as an instrument to illustrate what is, how does it works and the progress reached at a certain milestone in a project. At least this is the logic I follow making videos. As a possible suggestions, I can add the videos - except in some rare cases - should not be long than 3 minutes. If this time seems too short, think to a spot, telling a story and advertising a product in just 30 seconds or less. Enrico

jw0752 · Answer

It is perhaps a reflection of my age but I like the videos from time to time for entertainment but I find them quite lacking for education. Over all I am very much in agreement with mcb1 . When I want to learn something I look for something I can print or for a book.

John

Sean_Miller · Answer

My son and I have the channel Raising Awesome . On the surface it is a Maker channel spanning carpentry, welding, PCB design, mech electronics, auto mechanics, music, engineering, etc. However, its underlying theme is teaching life skills with life lessons to my son from age 9 to 19. So, occasionally, we won't build anything but focus on a life event that we learned from. We start each main video with a Principle to live by. These are various principles I have learned over the years that I want to bestow to my son. The intent is to hit 365 principles although our pace is off to do so by the time he launches to the world. We did not monetize our site until curiosity got the best of me when we had a chance to do a guest video for EEVBlog. I turned it on and found that you can make about $1 per 1000 views. Within a week, YouTube sent the note that I would no longer be eligible for monetization. I immediately turned it back off of my videos. I thought I jinxed it for everyone. So, for me, the channel is to provide a chronicle of raising a child from 9 to 19 instilling awesome skills and life lessons and capturing it to video. It serves as "home movies" and reference for him once he has launched to be his own man. But we hope it serves as strength to tired parents at the end of the day to at least spend 8 minutes doing something truly unique with their kids to help set them apart from the emerging crowd. What keeps us on YouTube versus just private videos is comments from someone that says we helped them out such as in the video where we show how to fix a gear shifter back light with LED light strips. This took a $600 dealer repair to about $10. If we ever do grow enough for monetization in the future, we'll probably turn on the ads primarily to turn it right back around for ads for the channel. The long game however would be to sell a desk calendar aimed for kids and college students and perhaps a book - but I'm a horrible marketer so it probably won't happen. See ya', Sean

gpolder · Answer

I mainly agree with mcb1 , I only use videos when I want to show some dynamic behaviour. Youtube is a convenient way to add videos to element14, most videos I add to my reviews or blog posts are hidden (unlisted) on youtube. Few of the larger ones are listed on my channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkNenIjxchqMqJsHcTQsbbw Gerrit.

Jan Cumps · Answer

I deleted my channel on the day I reached 1000 subscribers. I got a dispute with them on that very day and I don’t need disputes in my hobby.

gam3t3ch · Answer

For those that do YouTube and don't meet the requirement now make sure to enable Monetization your account again then option 4 will give you your stats once you do so it will show something like this below, as you can see I got a while before I actually hit the target but the main thing is to get that enabled again on your account so when it happens you wont miss out on actually making something again.

Sean_Miller · Answer

Does your camera allow you to change to a mode that changes the frames per second captured? A different FPS may capture better.

cstanton · Answer

YouTube recently changed being able to turn on monetization, you have to have 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 view hours in the past 12 months, else you can't turn it on.

ntewinkel · Answer

I got the "sorry you no longer qualify" email this morning too. They say it's due to abuse. I can just imagine the next wave of abuse will have loads of people running loads of instances watching videos to meet the hours!

thehwcave · Answer

Hi Kelly, I recently started a youtube channel, mostly to share experiences and knowledge on electronics. I don't care that none of my stuff will ever get viral so making any money through youtube is not an issue for me. As for content, I am sympathising with mcb1 in that certain "how-to" vidoes would be far better in a document / blog format to allow cut&paste and reading at convenient pace (instead of continuously having to hit pause and rewind). That is one of the reasons why I joined element14 to be able to use whichever format works best for a topic. Obligatory plug for my channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuetPVsxXASwEfA6vYtsHTg

thehwcave · Answer

I know what you mean. I normally use a Logitech 920 to do my YouTube videos, but it is very difficult to capture a scope, (RIGOL DS1054Z). It helps somewhat turning the brightness up on the scope, change to manual aperture control on the camera and of course the camera has to be on a tripod and aligned to the scope (no angle horizontal or vertical). It also helps to darken the room. Because this is all so troublesome to setup, I lately changed to DSRemote which is a free remote control software for the RIGOL scopes. It does a good job replicating the scope screen on a computer which I then screen-capture as video with voice over using vokoscreen (another free program). I am using Linux, but I guess these or similar are available for Windows too. The biggest drawback of that method is that you can't see any on-scope measurements other than the frequency counter. Also, at least on my version, if you start changing settings on the scope, the picture on DSRemote is always correct but the displayed settings, eg horizontal timebase are not updated. You must instead use the "knob" on DSRemote to do the change, which updates both the scope and the remote display. Only, that control is not very intuitive and I much prefer changing things on the scope directly. So, there you have my method. If I need to do lots of changes or use of cursors and measurements, I setup the camera even if that takes 30mins to get right. For simple things, displaying a waveform etc, I use DSRemote.

Hey e14 Members who YouTube

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