I'm burned out - Every Linux video is the same. (Rant?)
 

Seems every Linux Youtube video is about one of 3 things:
1. "Let's review the latest version of x distro. Gosh it's great, because they added y feature and now the desktop's perfect! And since the desktop somehow makes the distro, it's all just fantastic!"
2. Top x commands you should know.
3. Top x apps you can't live without.
All this is great for beginners (and maybe some intermediates) to Linux.

I just watched a "7 reasons Linux is great for developers", because I like to code. It was a general list of stuff you'd spout to any potential newcomer to Linux, and not specifically relevant to development.

I'm feeling burned out. I look around for something new, but it's very rare to find a real deep dive into any particular subject area. Everything is just general rehashes with not much new material being generated.

There's also not much being published by the "big players", like Torvalds/Stallman, about the current state of Linux/opensource, or what the future might hold.

I don't mind reading. But sometimes I just want to lean back and watch. Any ideas?

#1 mistake, trying to learn Linux from Videos! 90% of everything on the internet is cr@p, but 99% of videos are cr@p. Source documentation form experts does significantly better, but while it may have pictures and illustrations it is rarely video.

#2 you are looking at OPINION pieces! Anything that says "best" is a judgement call unless it includes testing, metrics, and statistical analysis. Look for MEASURES rather than OPINIONS and you might feel more satisfied. I recommend HOW-TO articles and very professional and critical reviews that are comprehensive and performance based rather than distribution specific, but even most of those are really terrible.

#3 Try game makers toolkit on youtube if you are interested in video game software. There are a couple of others that I cannot think of at the moment, but gems are rare in the youtubeverse.

youtube my... :rolleyes:

Have you paid Dedoimedo a visit?

Besides many interesting articles (and rants! :D) he also offer some nice Linux books.

You're right; it's all opinion pieces. Even articles and books are opinion pieces, where the author tells you what they think is the best way. That doesn't mean they aren't educational and valuable. But that's not my point. I feel like I've outgrown most of it. And there's not a lot of real, good, "what's happening now in Linux" (current events) publications for me to keep up with. So I'm working my way through publications like the Linux Bible, playing with administration and servers, etc. So, I don't know, but maybe that's where I am. Maybe I'm past what Youtube and blogs have to offer.

Back when I wanted to learn how to use Audacity, over a decade ago, I found some excellent tutorials on Youtube, but I think the ratio of useful to useless has skewed drastically since then.

I attribute much of this to the growth of "social" media in the intervening years. It has turned us into a society of attention-seekers and it's convinced everyone to think that he or she is an expert in everything.

Grumble grumble grumble.

I'll give it a look. Thanks!

I second that recommendation of Dedoimedo!

I follow the TUXMACHINES rss feed. Lots of fluff, but some really solid articles as well. Occasionally links to video, but I never follow those links.

Recommending gotbletu once again. He doesn't post frequently. If he ever does a distro review hunt me down and shoot me.

Most YT vids are by people who have only recently started using Linux, that's why there is no real content.

Best to read man pages, etc, as they are written by the people who coded it - else, read up stuff that is aimed squarely at administrators, written by actual admins.

I am getting very tired of newbies who come here having get their systems into a terrible mess by following some video or other that they saw on YouTube. Then they expect us to get them out of it.

Typically they started out with a problem that would have been easy enough to fix if they'd asked about it here, but no, they had to go to YouTube. And now they're up the creek!

That place is a disaster area.

While I certainly agree most of us have gotten a lesson in what "lowest common denominator" looks like (rather sobering isn't it?) I'd also like to note that it's likely wise to be a wee bit careful. After all YouTube and other social media operate on algorithms that serve up according to the pattern in our activity history (Now if I could just stop clicking on dancing girls in swim suits... ) ;)

You too? :D

Seriously, though, I primarily subscribe to Linux, coding, science and tabletop gaming channels. (I'm a real geek) I get recommendations for "shuffle dance" type stuff all the time. I'm not a dancer, and have no idea why Youtube thinks I want that stuff. I'm guessing it's indirectly due to other channel members' subscribes. Or maybe from stuff my kids watch.

It's not. Corporate drones design these videos to gently push their audience towards corporate products.
From independent contractors' point of view, it's best to stay away from drones or else you'd turn into one.
Since I was mainly taught systems by rude overworked people on irc, I can smell drones from a mile away.
It's why I never watch these how-to whats-up videos.. they're all just ads.

I've come to disregard YouTube on everything except NFL highlights. What could be explained a one or two sentences, YouTurd takes 5 minutes! You have to put up with silly looking faces, music. I'm too old to watch a video, when wording excels. Give me a user manual anytime.