Title essentially. Youtube’s algorithm is hot garbage, so I can’t search for anything anymore without a ton of AI slop and rage bait. So, who do you go to for actual good long form videos? Exposes, scandals, behind the scenes, documentaries, film, travel, transit, who do you recommend I follow?
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Epimetheus. High quality history videos on past and current civilizations. His hand drawn art is amazing too, he tries to stay very historically accurate. No theatrical narration, just a broad view of history. My favorite channel by far.
Dr Becky. Very very good science communication on astronomy and cosmology. She always sources the papers she mentions and excels at making you understand basic astrophysics. Best explanations of a very hard topic.
Angela Collier, another science communication more focused on physics and the epistemology of the field. I love her personal perspective on all the drama in physics (e.g. why Feinman is overhyped, why it’s still such a terribly sexist field etc.) though she makes it clear that it’s her channel and her opinions. Much more detailed explanations of physics but a little harder to understand.
City Nerd data driven showcase on why cars are bad for cities, usually in a top 10 of cities ranked by some metric of transportation.
Preface - I enjoy car stuff, so there’s more than a few car channels here:
- Legit Street Cars
- Deboss Garage
- David Freiburger (roadtrips)
- Louis Rossmann (when he does long stuff)
- DefunctLand
- Junkyard Dave
- Technology Connections (No-effort November is wonderful)
Crime pays botany doesn’t
the only thing i love more than that guy is that nobody in the comments can agree on what his name is
Haven’t seen it here yet, but it’s one of the greatest and most prolific YouTube channels about science fiction and the future… Science Fiction and Futurism With Isaac Arthur
Just FYI he’s got a bit of a speech impediment, but after like 2-3 episodes you don’t really hear it and the content is so fantastic. He’s a legit physicist and the President of the American National Space Society, so he’s very respected outside just creator circles.
Mostly history documentaries below:
- Fall of Civilization (takes forever to upload stuff, but it’s always superb quality)
- Kings and Generals (wars, historic battles and the context surrounding them)
- Study of Antiquity and the Middle Ages (several videos show the very likely migrations of different peoples in ancient times)
- Ancient Americas (north, central and south americas)
- Real Time History (most videos are ~27 minutes, but the Franco Prussian war is a whopping 6 hours and worth it)
This Old Tony - if you like tools, machines, and clever dad jokes. He’s the best.
Mr Sunday Movies/The Weekly Planet
Time Team Official
Cutting Edge Engineering
techieSMS, an Indian tech guy who has made all kinds of excellent walk-thru videos about DIY home automation, coding and related subjects.
I only really subscribe to two channels that focus on 20-30 minute videos and post on a pretty regular basis:
Technology Connections
Internet Comment Etiquette with Erik
Seconding Technology Connections. Great long form content
The longest videos I watch on YouTube, and I enjoy every minute of them.
Especially the dishwashers.
Seconding Internet Comment Etiquette. Information as art.
Do your research sheeple 8========D aaaand post!
8=========D That’s a rocket ship!
Pineapple Erik needs a comeback!
I love Technology Connections, but i do have watch at 1.75X or else it’s too long form for me.
There are two YouTubers who make videos 4+ hours long that you have to watch every minute of:
Sure but HBG is the only one who can make a viral 4 hour video.
Jenny’s last 4 hour video went more than viral, to be fair.
I love Jenny, so HBomberGuy would probably be good too
These two were my first thought! I’ll add that both cover a range of topics, Jenny does do a lot of videos around Star Wars, but also covers obscure films, and theme parks, wherenl HBomber runs the gamut from flat earth to vaccines to video games to plagiarism. Both are incredibly well researched and, in my opinion, offer very fair takes on the subject matter.
My same two!
Technology Connections
It might be worth adding that some people might find him (and similar long form content) verbose if they are not into the topics. I watch probably most of his episodes, but some people in my life don’t vibe with those. The same people did not appreciate the 7 color e-ink display I had been tinkering around with until I made it display a dog pic, so it’s also about how the topic relates to what you already like.
Did you see his latest video about algorithms? Best video so far this year imo
Yes, I figured that might have been part the trigger for the thread.
Angela Collier for commentary on physics. She has a lot of good commentary on the field itself (see her recent Feynman video), but also good science videos… that I usually lose track of about 3/4 of the way through, but I enjoy nonetheless.
I second Angela, informative, chill and kinda funny
My favorite video title of all time is still “alkaline water …with lemon”
Really loved her video on new Star Trek too, she has very similar vibes to Jenny Nicholson but has a lot of great science material too
She did Feynman dirty.
Crime related:
- https://www.youtube.com/@thisisMONSTERS/
- https://www.youtube.com/@redtreestories/
- https://www.youtube.com/@TruRedCRIMEVAULT/
- https://www.youtube.com/@BeyondEvill/
- https://www.youtube.com/@TheVillains./
- https://www.youtube.com/@StrangerStories/
- https://www.youtube.com/@diretrip/videos
Disaster related:
- https://www.youtube.com/@FascinatingHorror/
- https://www.youtube.com/@PlainlyDifficult/
- https://www.youtube.com/@USCSB/
- https://www.youtube.com/@ScaryInteresting/
- https://www.youtube.com/@DarkRecordsDocs/
Weird medical stories: https://www.youtube.com/@chubbyemu
Interesting economic vids: https://www.youtube.com/coldfusion/
Business and economics: https://www.youtube.com/c/Wendoverproductions/
Geopolitics explainer vids: https://www.youtube.com/@CaspianReport/
Theme park history: https://www.youtube.com/@Defunctland/
Interesting historical themed vids: https://www.youtube.com/@YoreHistory/
above and beyond, thank you!
We have similar taste in youtubers! If you enjoy those disaster related videos, I recommend Abstract (formerly Real Horror). Great production value and storytelling. She does all her own work as far as I know, so she doesn’t have a huge playlist to watch sadly. But the narration and setup really add a gravitas to the disasters that I feel the other youtubers are missing.
Has 9 videos and 0.5M subs, I feel they might be worth looking at!
If you’re into true crime, I highly recommend https://youtube.com/@thatchapter
Mike is a good storyteller and makes videos that aren’t just stock footage and images spliced together.
I guess I should have expected it, but I was hoping they were videos on how to do crime… ☹️
Lol. The Lockpicking Lawyer springs to mind 😁
recently, the guy who hooks up different toys to high voltage, causing thier hilarious “methy movements and spazzing out”
awesome comment! saved for later
Along with Technology Connections, Philosophy Tube, and Primitive Technology, here are my “must watch” subs
Climate Town - Excellent videos about climate change and environmental impact that are insightful and funny
Contrapoints - Well written and meticulous deconstructions of philosophical concepts in media, pop culture and society with a dry wit
Every Frame a Painting - Amazing content on film-making. No longer active, but if you haven’t seen it yet, lucky you, enjoy.
Pop Culture Detective - Interesting meta analyses of popular tropes in pop culture
Because I’m into historical clothing and fashion, Bernadette Banner and Abby Cox both do great videos on costuming, history and creating cool stuff
Love climate town. I hate that someone needs to waste their time disproving lies from the oil, gas, politicians and the like, but it does give me hope in the future that there are people like that out there.
Every Frame a Painting came back to life one year ago! He uploaded some new videos :)
Yes! It was such a pleasant surprise on my feed. Unfortunately they said they won’t be continuing because of Youtube’s enforcement policies around copyrighted material so those videos were meant to be a limited series.
Folding Ideas is fantastic
