He's reminds me a lot of early internet programmer forums, and he's VERY heavily influenced by british television culture. If you don't really like either or both of those things, he might seem a...
He's reminds me a lot of early internet programmer forums, and he's VERY heavily influenced by british television culture.
If you don't really like either or both of those things, he might seem a little off-putting. I think he can come off as a little self-righteous or "holier than thou" when it comes to some topics, but overall I think he does a really good job staying humble and trying to do the right thing.
Nope, I get on great with the background of his views and am usually interested in the topics he brings up but it's the presentation of the topics that is grating. It's like he has an attitude...
Nope, I get on great with the background of his views and am usually interested in the topics he brings up but it's the presentation of the topics that is grating.
It's like he has an attitude that his world view/intelligence is superior to others and that he is deigning to gift us with special knowledge. I am likely taking this slightly further than anyone else feels, but I get a weird vibe that his main motive isn't educating others, it's making sure you know he knew the information first?
His time on jet lag was unbearable, I couldn't watch it.
I know what you mean, I think I wouldn't quite take it as far as you, but I get similar feelings. I think a lot of it is the incongruity between him and the platform. He models himself a lot on...
Exemplary
I know what you mean, I think I wouldn't quite take it as far as you, but I get similar feelings. I think a lot of it is the incongruity between him and the platform. He models himself a lot on old school BBC presenters, where they might be affable and informal, but they'll never be personal. He's very carefully sealed off his professional and personal lives so that they don't interact at all. When you see behind the scenes, it still feels like he's "on", in his media persona, just a media persona that occasionally makes mistakes.
Meanwhile, the general culture of the YouTube platform is to be ever more personal. If you compare Tom Scott with people like Steve Mould or Matt Parker, they're still a similar brand of infotainment, but they regularly bring up their wives or kids or pets, even if they don't show them. Or you've got someone like Alec Watson who also maintains a deliberately artificial television look (with a studio, teleprompter, etc) but at the same time regularly talks about his family or aspects of his personal life. They're still all constructing personas for the camera, but they're deliberately infused with a bit of personal life, as befits the medium.
For me it becomes particularly noticeable when he does collaborations with other YouTubers (like the Jet Lag one, I imagine, although for a while he had a second channel dedicated to these sorts of videos). His style isn't bad (personally I don't mind it for his own videos, and I'm quite happy not to know about his personal life), but it's very incongruous with the platform he's on. So when he shows up in someone else's video, there's this weird disconnect that can come across as a kind of superiority act - it's like he sees himself almost as the presenter in the other YouTubers' shows, like an old BBC journalist being put in a new experience, reporting on it, and then leaving afterwards.
To be clear, I don't think that's how he really sees himself, I'm sure he's a lovely guy, but I think because of his chosen persona and the disconnect with the default level of intimacy that has become standard in YouTube, he can come across in this way. That said, I think a lot of his earlier stuff feels more personal, and the Technical Difficulties episodes are great, in part because I think he reverts back a little bit more to just chilling with his university friends. But I also get the feeling that that's not what he wants to be doing any more, at least not exclusively.
This is honestly a really thoughtful look into why Tom might come off differently than other YouTubers and even though I don't share the feelings of the person you replied to, it brought up some...
This is honestly a really thoughtful look into why Tom might come off differently than other YouTubers and even though I don't share the feelings of the person you replied to, it brought up some stuff I'd never noticed before in a way that makes me think. Kudos for that!
That may be your perception but I think you may be reading into things a little bit. It's totally ok to not like the guy, but your reasons seem a bit spurious, or at least unfair.
That may be your perception but I think you may be reading into things a little bit.
It's totally ok to not like the guy, but your reasons seem a bit spurious, or at least unfair.
Nah totally! Which is why I said I knew I was taking it further than others, but also that it's totally okay to just bounce off of someone else's personality for whatever reason! Voicing my...
Nah totally! Which is why I said I knew I was taking it further than others, but also that it's totally okay to just bounce off of someone else's personality for whatever reason! Voicing my clearly unpopular opinion is still good though and I appreciate everyone who made a comment.
If others enjoy him, then I'm okay with that, I just don't need to watch :)
Wow I really don't see that, to me it's quite transparent he's a presenter and he's telling me what he's learned on location/found on a topic. I dunno, maybe it doesn't impress me lol
It's like he has an attitude that his world view/intelligence is superior to others and that he is deigning to gift us with special knowledge.
Wow I really don't see that, to me it's quite transparent he's a presenter and he's telling me what he's learned on location/found on a topic.
Which of his media do you get that perception from? I did not see his appearance in Jet Lag, and I only occasionally watched his Youtube videos. I mostly became a fan of Tom through his podcast...
Which of his media do you get that perception from? I did not see his appearance in Jet Lag, and I only occasionally watched his Youtube videos. I mostly became a fan of Tom through his podcast Lateral.
I do not intuit your vibe of “making sure you know he knew the information first” at all. He definitely enjoys intellectual analysis and perpetuating that worldview as objectively correct. I don’t think that’s unique to Tom; I’d argue many scientists and academics hold their worldview is “correct” and are at least a little haughty in their discussion of that knowledge (myself included).
I did not see his appearance on Jet Lag, and it’s possible that he changes in that competitive setting under time pressure. I’ve found the best Jet Lag guests are the ones that balance enjoying the travel and when to focus on the game.
I typically do not consume his media, especially over the last couple years. I think it's maybe that instead of feeling brought along with his analysis of various subjects, the information feels...
I typically do not consume his media, especially over the last couple years.
I think it's maybe that instead of feeling brought along with his analysis of various subjects, the information feels handed down in his voice and word choice?
Again, these are my reflections and I only mentioned that personally I don't mesh with his persona. I'm not looking to be convinced otherwise. Unless I meet him in person to have my mind changed, I suspect this will remain.
I enjoy his YouTube content but I get what you're saying. His stance on not allowing the to be a subreddit to talk about his content always struck me as odd, I get wanting to have control over his...
I enjoy his YouTube content but I get what you're saying. His stance on not allowing the to be a subreddit to talk about his content always struck me as odd, I get wanting to have control over his content but not letting people discuss it isn't cool imo.
Honestly with how many Youtuber subreddits end up I totally understand this decision and line of thinking. And ibleedorange of all people, you should understand why someone wouldn't want to be the...
Honestly with how many Youtuber subreddits end up I totally understand this decision and line of thinking. And ibleedorange of all people, you should understand why someone wouldn't want to be the topic of discussion on reddit.
I don't feel that's his decision to make. If people want to talk about say, Trump, and he can just ban everyone from doing so, is that okay? I got a ton of hate and I was fine, I think it's funny...
I don't feel that's his decision to make. If people want to talk about say, Trump, and he can just ban everyone from doing so, is that okay?
I got a ton of hate and I was fine, I think it's funny that you bring up me as if I'm not completely aware of it. It still seems unnecessary to me even today.
What? I assure you I didn't mean it that way. I was saying I thought you would have more empathy towards someone wishing to stay out of reddit discourse because you had that experience, but I...
I think it's funny that you bring up me as if I'm not completely aware of it.
What? I assure you I didn't mean it that way. I was saying I thought you would have more empathy towards someone wishing to stay out of reddit discourse because you had that experience, but I guess I misjudged. Not everyone is so resilient to the hate.
I also think there's a pretty large gap between someone who is a politician making a massive impact on the world versus a YouTuber who makes fun little edutainment videos.
It's also not like he didn't want any discussion about him on reddit, he just didn't feel comfortable with having a subreddit dedicated to him after seeing a post that was speculating heavily on his personal life; something I can empathize with heavily. He requested that the moderators shut down the fan subreddit and they did so, he didn't force anyone to do anything. He wasn't trying to unilaterally censor discourse on the whole site.
Moreover, he wouldn't have been able to force anyone to do even what they did, much less this. You could start a Tom Scott subreddit tomorrow if you want. He couldn't prevent you from doing it,...
He wasn't trying to unilaterally censor discourse on the whole site.
Moreover, he wouldn't have been able to force anyone to do even what they did, much less this. You could start a Tom Scott subreddit tomorrow if you want. He couldn't prevent you from doing it, beyond asking you not to and doing what he's already done -- making it publically known that he doesn't want one to exist. The fact that there isn't one now is only because his fans by and large care more about his wishes than they do having a dedicated Tom Scott subreddit.
I also think there's a pretty large gap between someone who is a politician making a massive impact on the world versus a YouTuber who makes fun little edutainment videos.
I don't even think it has to be a massive impact for this difference to be salient. Even under US law, government officials cannot legally perform certain actions on things like social media that ordinary citizens can, because they have an obligation to not violate people's rights. There was a lawsuit over Trump blocking people on Twitter during his first term that found that the president isn't allowed to do so because it violates constitutional rights, which obviously isn't the case for your average non-government official blocking someone on Twitter. This is because even when it comes to the law, much less the softer stuff of "is this a good idea/the right thing to do or not", it's clear that there's a big difference between the actions of a private citizen and those of a member of the government.
It's always been something his fan community voluntarily complies with due to his wishes, though. He doesn't have the power to "not let" people start a subreddit -- otherwise there never would...
It's always been something his fan community voluntarily complies with due to his wishes, though. He doesn't have the power to "not let" people start a subreddit -- otherwise there never would have been one in the past. The mods of his subreddit willingly agreed to delete it in response to his request, which was in response to behavior on the subreddit that was inappropriately digging into his personal life. I think it's more than fair for him to respectfully ask people not to run a Tom Scott subreddit, and I think the fans and moderators abiding by his wishes in this respect willingly is the best case scenario for all involved.
I don't mind him as a person, but I do think he speaks very slowly, and yaps a lot. I was surprised people thought his videos were brief - I always found that they kind of dragged because he spoke...
I don't mind him as a person, but I do think he speaks very slowly, and yaps a lot. I was surprised people thought his videos were brief - I always found that they kind of dragged because he spoke slowly + yapped for ages before getting into the topic. He would have like an 8 minute video with maybe 30 seconds of actual content.
It's like he has an attitude that his world view/intelligence is superior to others and that he is deigning to gift us with special knowledge.
Definitely did not get those vibes. More I just find him kinda corny. Seemed down to eartht o me.
No, Attenborough is fine. I think it's two things: one, Attenborough has an inherently pleasing voice. Two, a documentary has less context switching. It has a topic, and it goes deeper into the...
No, Attenborough is fine. I think it's two things: one, Attenborough has an inherently pleasing voice. Two, a documentary has less context switching. It has a topic, and it goes deeper into the topic as it progresses. Because Tom Scott makes like 8-10 minute videos on different topics, every video has to start back from the beginning.
I feel like a lot of them are like
"Hi. Right now - I'm in a field somewhere in London"
pause
"You may be wondering, why is he in a field in London?"
car drives by
"That's an" - pause - "excellent question."
b roll footage
"London has some of the most field fields" pause "in the world".
cuts to footage of an a random public service worker "Well, I work at the bureau of fields. We spend a lot of time making sure fields are perfectly in line with the public's expectations of fields in the field of fields"
"But this field" pause "you may have noticed something different about this field." pause
"You probably already noticed it" pause
b roll footage of the field
"That's right" pause "this field is a different hue from other fields in London"
"Could it be because this patch gets more sunlight" pause, b-roll
"Or could it be that the soil is different?" pause, b-roll
"No, none of those."
cuts to public servant "So we had a great deal of challenges applying our field standards to this field, the field just can't field like the fields in northwestham, so we had to apply paint on the field"
You mentioning Radiolab was the catalyst for my understanding of this thread. I liked Radiolab for a while but when they presented something I had a little knowledge of, it became clear how much...
You mentioning Radiolab was the catalyst for my understanding of this thread. I liked Radiolab for a while but when they presented something I had a little knowledge of, it became clear how much editorializing was happening and it spoiled everything for me.
David Attenborough programs were almost certainly never as short as eight minutes, too. Even compared to most Youtube videos these days, as they've trended towards getting longer and longer, Tom...
David Attenborough programs were almost certainly never as short as eight minutes, too. Even compared to most Youtube videos these days, as they've trended towards getting longer and longer, Tom Scott's videos seem pretty brief by comparison to me. That and I also don't begrudge videos for being a bit longer due to the monetary incentives if I otherwise enjoy them.
I enjoyed this episode quite a bit. Well, at least I enjoyed the topic which I found very interesting, along with the details of how they actually make the bells and recycle the materials and deal...
I enjoyed this episode quite a bit.
Well, at least I enjoyed the topic which I found very interesting, along with the details of how they actually make the bells and recycle the materials and deal with the danger of it.
I'm not sure if I loved the way it was presented but it didn't annoy me so I'll definitely keep watching the show.
Jealous he managed to get such an up close look at somewhere I've wanted to go for a long time. I hope for the future of the foundry as over the years there's been a slow closure of all the others...
Jealous he managed to get such an up close look at somewhere I've wanted to go for a long time. I hope for the future of the foundry as over the years there's been a slow closure of all the others and without them the art of change ringing would be in trouble. As well as founding John Taylor take old bells whenever a tower is shuttered or a tower upgrades their bells and can use this stockpile to make full sets (often with a founded bell or two added) but there's no one else doing that.
Yeah, it makes me sad that so many similar arts, crafts, tradeskills, and traditions like this are slowly disappearing, or have already entirely disappeared, all over the world. I understand why,...
Yeah, it makes me sad that so many similar arts, crafts, tradeskills, and traditions like this are slowly disappearing, or have already entirely disappeared, all over the world. I understand why, since the demand for them is no longer what it once was, and even when there is still demand many of the traditional techniques they used are now "obsolete", but it still makes me sad.
Rather than create a new topic, I figured I'll continue this one. Tom released a longer format video on Youtube that talks a bit more about the upcoming series and his other ongoing projects:...
Rather than create a new topic, I figured I'll continue this one.
I read that in his voice. Just before my eyes passed "and", there was the slightest of pauses.
I must be the only person that finds him very grating, I can't describe it.
He's reminds me a lot of early internet programmer forums, and he's VERY heavily influenced by british television culture.
If you don't really like either or both of those things, he might seem a little off-putting. I think he can come off as a little self-righteous or "holier than thou" when it comes to some topics, but overall I think he does a really good job staying humble and trying to do the right thing.
The new video where he discusses it is a bit too on the nose.
Nope, I get on great with the background of his views and am usually interested in the topics he brings up but it's the presentation of the topics that is grating.
It's like he has an attitude that his world view/intelligence is superior to others and that he is deigning to gift us with special knowledge. I am likely taking this slightly further than anyone else feels, but I get a weird vibe that his main motive isn't educating others, it's making sure you know he knew the information first?
His time on jet lag was unbearable, I couldn't watch it.
I know what you mean, I think I wouldn't quite take it as far as you, but I get similar feelings. I think a lot of it is the incongruity between him and the platform. He models himself a lot on old school BBC presenters, where they might be affable and informal, but they'll never be personal. He's very carefully sealed off his professional and personal lives so that they don't interact at all. When you see behind the scenes, it still feels like he's "on", in his media persona, just a media persona that occasionally makes mistakes.
Meanwhile, the general culture of the YouTube platform is to be ever more personal. If you compare Tom Scott with people like Steve Mould or Matt Parker, they're still a similar brand of infotainment, but they regularly bring up their wives or kids or pets, even if they don't show them. Or you've got someone like Alec Watson who also maintains a deliberately artificial television look (with a studio, teleprompter, etc) but at the same time regularly talks about his family or aspects of his personal life. They're still all constructing personas for the camera, but they're deliberately infused with a bit of personal life, as befits the medium.
For me it becomes particularly noticeable when he does collaborations with other YouTubers (like the Jet Lag one, I imagine, although for a while he had a second channel dedicated to these sorts of videos). His style isn't bad (personally I don't mind it for his own videos, and I'm quite happy not to know about his personal life), but it's very incongruous with the platform he's on. So when he shows up in someone else's video, there's this weird disconnect that can come across as a kind of superiority act - it's like he sees himself almost as the presenter in the other YouTubers' shows, like an old BBC journalist being put in a new experience, reporting on it, and then leaving afterwards.
To be clear, I don't think that's how he really sees himself, I'm sure he's a lovely guy, but I think because of his chosen persona and the disconnect with the default level of intimacy that has become standard in YouTube, he can come across in this way. That said, I think a lot of his earlier stuff feels more personal, and the Technical Difficulties episodes are great, in part because I think he reverts back a little bit more to just chilling with his university friends. But I also get the feeling that that's not what he wants to be doing any more, at least not exclusively.
This is honestly a really thoughtful look into why Tom might come off differently than other YouTubers and even though I don't share the feelings of the person you replied to, it brought up some stuff I'd never noticed before in a way that makes me think. Kudos for that!
That may be your perception but I think you may be reading into things a little bit.
It's totally ok to not like the guy, but your reasons seem a bit spurious, or at least unfair.
Nah totally! Which is why I said I knew I was taking it further than others, but also that it's totally okay to just bounce off of someone else's personality for whatever reason! Voicing my clearly unpopular opinion is still good though and I appreciate everyone who made a comment.
If others enjoy him, then I'm okay with that, I just don't need to watch :)
Wow I really don't see that, to me it's quite transparent he's a presenter and he's telling me what he's learned on location/found on a topic.
I dunno, maybe it doesn't impress me lol
Which of his media do you get that perception from? I did not see his appearance in Jet Lag, and I only occasionally watched his Youtube videos. I mostly became a fan of Tom through his podcast Lateral.
I do not intuit your vibe of “making sure you know he knew the information first” at all. He definitely enjoys intellectual analysis and perpetuating that worldview as objectively correct. I don’t think that’s unique to Tom; I’d argue many scientists and academics hold their worldview is “correct” and are at least a little haughty in their discussion of that knowledge (myself included).
I did not see his appearance on Jet Lag, and it’s possible that he changes in that competitive setting under time pressure. I’ve found the best Jet Lag guests are the ones that balance enjoying the travel and when to focus on the game.
I typically do not consume his media, especially over the last couple years.
I think it's maybe that instead of feeling brought along with his analysis of various subjects, the information feels handed down in his voice and word choice?
Again, these are my reflections and I only mentioned that personally I don't mesh with his persona. I'm not looking to be convinced otherwise. Unless I meet him in person to have my mind changed, I suspect this will remain.
I enjoy his YouTube content but I get what you're saying. His stance on not allowing the to be a subreddit to talk about his content always struck me as odd, I get wanting to have control over his content but not letting people discuss it isn't cool imo.
Some background on the subreddit thing, because I hadn't heard this before.
Honestly with how many Youtuber subreddits end up I totally understand this decision and line of thinking. And ibleedorange of all people, you should understand why someone wouldn't want to be the topic of discussion on reddit.
I don't feel that's his decision to make. If people want to talk about say, Trump, and he can just ban everyone from doing so, is that okay?
I got a ton of hate and I was fine, I think it's funny that you bring up me as if I'm not completely aware of it. It still seems unnecessary to me even today.
What? I assure you I didn't mean it that way. I was saying I thought you would have more empathy towards someone wishing to stay out of reddit discourse because you had that experience, but I guess I misjudged. Not everyone is so resilient to the hate.
I also think there's a pretty large gap between someone who is a politician making a massive impact on the world versus a YouTuber who makes fun little edutainment videos.
It's also not like he didn't want any discussion about him on reddit, he just didn't feel comfortable with having a subreddit dedicated to him after seeing a post that was speculating heavily on his personal life; something I can empathize with heavily. He requested that the moderators shut down the fan subreddit and they did so, he didn't force anyone to do anything. He wasn't trying to unilaterally censor discourse on the whole site.
Moreover, he wouldn't have been able to force anyone to do even what they did, much less this. You could start a Tom Scott subreddit tomorrow if you want. He couldn't prevent you from doing it, beyond asking you not to and doing what he's already done -- making it publically known that he doesn't want one to exist. The fact that there isn't one now is only because his fans by and large care more about his wishes than they do having a dedicated Tom Scott subreddit.
I don't even think it has to be a massive impact for this difference to be salient. Even under US law, government officials cannot legally perform certain actions on things like social media that ordinary citizens can, because they have an obligation to not violate people's rights. There was a lawsuit over Trump blocking people on Twitter during his first term that found that the president isn't allowed to do so because it violates constitutional rights, which obviously isn't the case for your average non-government official blocking someone on Twitter. This is because even when it comes to the law, much less the softer stuff of "is this a good idea/the right thing to do or not", it's clear that there's a big difference between the actions of a private citizen and those of a member of the government.
It's always been something his fan community voluntarily complies with due to his wishes, though. He doesn't have the power to "not let" people start a subreddit -- otherwise there never would have been one in the past. The mods of his subreddit willingly agreed to delete it in response to his request, which was in response to behavior on the subreddit that was inappropriately digging into his personal life. I think it's more than fair for him to respectfully ask people not to run a Tom Scott subreddit, and I think the fans and moderators abiding by his wishes in this respect willingly is the best case scenario for all involved.
All things considered, I don't mind if others enjoy him and his content!
I don't mind him as a person, but I do think he speaks very slowly, and yaps a lot. I was surprised people thought his videos were brief - I always found that they kind of dragged because he spoke slowly + yapped for ages before getting into the topic. He would have like an 8 minute video with maybe 30 seconds of actual content.
Definitely did not get those vibes. More I just find him kinda corny. Seemed down to eartht o me.
That's definitely the British television presentor influence haha. I wonder if you have similar opinions on people like David Attenborough?
No, Attenborough is fine. I think it's two things: one, Attenborough has an inherently pleasing voice. Two, a documentary has less context switching. It has a topic, and it goes deeper into the topic as it progresses. Because Tom Scott makes like 8-10 minute videos on different topics, every video has to start back from the beginning.
I feel like a lot of them are like
"Hi. Right now - I'm in a field somewhere in London"
pause
"You may be wondering, why is he in a field in London?"
car drives by
"That's an" - pause - "excellent question."
b roll footage
"London has some of the most field fields" pause "in the world".
cuts to footage of an a random public service worker "Well, I work at the bureau of fields. We spend a lot of time making sure fields are perfectly in line with the public's expectations of fields in the field of fields"
"But this field" pause "you may have noticed something different about this field." pause
"You probably already noticed it" pause
b roll footage of the field
"That's right" pause "this field is a different hue from other fields in London"
"Could it be because this patch gets more sunlight" pause, b-roll
"Or could it be that the soil is different?" pause, b-roll
"No, none of those."
cuts to public servant "So we had a great deal of challenges applying our field standards to this field, the field just can't field like the fields in northwestham, so we had to apply paint on the field"
Haha this also sounds like the transcript from a Radiolab program
You mentioning Radiolab was the catalyst for my understanding of this thread. I liked Radiolab for a while but when they presented something I had a little knowledge of, it became clear how much editorializing was happening and it spoiled everything for me.
Haha are you paraphrasing this video? I love that one
David Attenborough programs were almost certainly never as short as eight minutes, too. Even compared to most Youtube videos these days, as they've trended towards getting longer and longer, Tom Scott's videos seem pretty brief by comparison to me. That and I also don't begrudge videos for being a bit longer due to the monetary incentives if I otherwise enjoy them.
Fair enough and all good!
The trailer and episode 1 are now also live on Nebula btw. (Released 7 hours ago.)
Episode 1 is now on YouTube:
I helped break a 142-year-old bell, and that's okay.
I enjoyed this episode quite a bit.
Well, at least I enjoyed the topic which I found very interesting, along with the details of how they actually make the bells and recycle the materials and deal with the danger of it.
I'm not sure if I loved the way it was presented but it didn't annoy me so I'll definitely keep watching the show.
Jealous he managed to get such an up close look at somewhere I've wanted to go for a long time. I hope for the future of the foundry as over the years there's been a slow closure of all the others and without them the art of change ringing would be in trouble. As well as founding John Taylor take old bells whenever a tower is shuttered or a tower upgrades their bells and can use this stockpile to make full sets (often with a founded bell or two added) but there's no one else doing that.
Yeah, it makes me sad that so many similar arts, crafts, tradeskills, and traditions like this are slowly disappearing, or have already entirely disappeared, all over the world. I understand why, since the demand for them is no longer what it once was, and even when there is still demand many of the traditional techniques they used are now "obsolete", but it still makes me sad.
Business Inside has a series called Still Standing that highlights similar "last of its kind" arts/crafts/trades/traditions: E.g. How One Of The Last Fez Makers In Cairo Keeps A 600-Year-Old Tradition Alive
I've never seen anything from him before (except the Jetlag one), but this was interesting.
Rather than create a new topic, I figured I'll continue this one.
Tom released a longer format video on Youtube that talks a bit more about the upcoming series and his other ongoing projects: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yz3lSKgz4q8
You know the planet is starting to heal when Tom Scott comes out of retirement...
I guess he was finally able to get down from the helicopter then?
For real. I watched this and just for a minute I felt like I was back in 2014.