kurzgesagt – AI Slop Is Killing Our Channel / Destroying the Internet
Maybe not that interesting for everyone here, but I found no better community for this.
- YouTube
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call_me_xale
in reply to Petersson • • •Jrockwar
in reply to call_me_xale • • •like this
SuiXi3D likes this.
InternetCitizen2
in reply to Jrockwar • • •They have gotten money from Bill Gates foundation. Still its a pop sci YouTube and does a good job at it. Some say its spreading misinformation or that context is missing. I don't really see malicious intentions. Expecting more of a pop sci publication is kind of absurd; take a real class and study if you want more.
An example:
How Kurzgesagt Cooks Propaganda For Billionaires
- YouTube
m.youtube.comdubyakay
in reply to InternetCitizen2 • • •While not wrong, this is now quite a bit dated. Kurzgesagt acknowledged being called out for it and addressed it via various channels. One of them here:
reddit.com/r/kurzgesagt/commen…
FenderStratocaster
in reply to call_me_xale • • •like this
MudMan likes this.
call_me_xale
in reply to FenderStratocaster • • •blakemiller
in reply to call_me_xale • • •TheGrandNagus
in reply to call_me_xale • • •Jesus
in reply to Petersson • • •like this
SuiXi3D e MHLoppy like this.
dubyakay
in reply to Jesus • • •like this
tiredofsametab likes this.
This is fine🔥🐶☕🔥
in reply to dubyakay • • •Jesus
in reply to Petersson • • •Catoblepas
in reply to Jesus • • •Sounds better than the fucking singing purple llama I get all the time ruining a song from Dirty Dancing by changing the ‘I’ to ‘AI’.
‘AI had the time of my life’ doesn’t even make sense!
biofaust
in reply to Catoblepas • • •Snot Flickerman
in reply to Jesus • • •Use Firefox + uBlock Origin on desktop and on mobile. Only watch YouTube via Firefox. Never see these bullshit ads again.
Currently adblocking is winning the war of the technical evolution of control vs. resistance.
Truscape
in reply to Snot Flickerman • • •CrazyLikeGollum
in reply to Truscape • • •And VacuumTube for an app like experience on HTPC's, linux based set top boxes, as well as MacOS and windows or linux based tablets.
Edit: added hyperlink to projects github page.
GitHub - shy1132/VacuumTube: YouTube Leanback on the desktop, with enhancements
GitHubM137
in reply to Petersson • • •I and, from what I've seen discussed here and elsewhere online, many other people have stopped watching the channel because of many valid reasons completely unrelated to AI.
I haven't watched a single one of their videos for years, something changed in their content and I just lost interest. Then there have been several controversial events throughout the years, both objective bad stuff and subjective things that made many loose interest and faith in their integrity.
They definitely became one of the many channels that lost it's way because of how big it got. The animations became too "perfect" in a weird way, they lost their personality and they also got scared of having real opinions so they started doing this "all sides" shit and that's when I tapped out.
I've tried to watch new videos from them about once every 6 months or so, but I can't even make it past a minute without completely loosing interest.
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Lasslinthar e magic_lobster_party like this.
FenderStratocaster
in reply to M137 • • •like this
riot e warm like this.
TheAsianDonKnots
in reply to FenderStratocaster • • •FenderStratocaster
in reply to TheAsianDonKnots • • •like this
riot likes this.
MudMan
in reply to FenderStratocaster • • •In that it's mostly a merch ad hidden behind a clickbait title.
So I guess it's a good test for that sort of "just read the headline" response.
It's been a rough few days and I think I may be coming around. What hope is there to parse AI misinformation if people can't parse a Reddit-like link aggregator?
I may be done with this place at this point. It's just all bad. If not the whole Internet, certainly the whole of social media.
SkaveRat
in reply to MudMan • • •brvslvrnst
in reply to M137 • • •like this
warm likes this.
46_and_2
in reply to M137 • • •Completely agree, their channel has changed a lot and seems to be producing videos on a conveyor belt now, while before they used to do one video or maximum two a month. Now it seems they produce a video a week, and interesting topics are more hard to come by.
When they said that they're "almost 70 full time people and a lot of freelancers on top" I almost did a spit take. I know there are big channels and operations on YT, but this seems such an unreasonable amount of employees for this type of channel and audience. No wonder it feels oversaturated and overdone, they probably feel the need to put more and more videos to keep their huge team and expences afloat.
Just find a sustainable pace and team size, don't go the corporate way of growth over all.
Davy_Jones
in reply to Petersson • • •unexposedhazard
in reply to Davy_Jones • • •like this
magic_lobster_party likes this.
melfie
in reply to Petersson • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to Petersson • • •Their quality going down is probably what’s killing their channel. Every video is a merch ad, and the occasional shilling for the fossil fuel industry probably doesn’t help any.
These things are to be expected when you get bought by private equity, but let’s not be dishonest and say it’s all AI slop that’s killing them.
AceBonobo
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Excuse me, what?
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to AceBonobo • • •They are owned by private equity? It's pretty common these days for the more popular YT channels. Veritasium, Astrum, Fireship, fern., and Hoog are some other examples. Basically, if it's a popular YT channel, it's either owned by PE, in negotiations to be acquired by PE, or pursued by a PE firm in the hopes that they can acquire it. Private equity is accelerating their acquisitions, actually, and they want to control everything that captures the attention of viewers.
Here's a video that talks about it.
- YouTube
www.youtube.comcircuscritic
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Anyone down voting this should be ashamed of themselves.
Like deeply and personally ashamed.
The type of shame that follows them for the rest their lives, because that's how scummy you'd have to be in order downvote someone shining a light on how private equity is buying out major YouTube channels.
Something that I was entirely unaware of, and appreciate your comment regarding.
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to circuscritic • • •I get it. They like the channel, and don't want to think that a channel they love could do something they don't love. Or maybe some of them don't see it as a bad thing in the first place.
Me, I'm the opposite. I want to know who owns the media I consume, because I want to know who might be influencing the things I see. It's always better to have the whole truth, even if that truth hurts. It doesn't mean you can't enjoy the channel still, it just means you're better prepared to understand the context of anything that that channel might say. Even cold hard facts with empirical evidence can be propaganda, depending on how it's presented.
TheGrandNagus
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Except you lied about who they are owned by.
Why make yourself out to be virtuous and caring about the truth when your entire premise is a lie?
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to TheGrandNagus • • •I never made myself out to be virtuous, nor do I care about what you think of me. I'm an asshole, and that's fine because I love me exactly how I am and don't need random strangers on the internet for validation. and I certainly don't care about what you think of them making propaganda videos. I wouldn't even still be in this thread if you guys weren't still throwing a tantrum about somebody calling out your precious favorite YouTube channel for their less-than-stellar quality and tendency to pander to billionaires.
I posted my opinion, you got butthurt over it. that's as far as this conversation is ever going to go, because I don't care about you enough to bother arguing it extensively. now why don't you take your sci-fi antisemitic trope of a username and get out of my mentions.
hikaru755
in reply to circuscritic • • •Damage
in reply to circuscritic • • •circuscritic
in reply to Damage • • •The video which made the accusations, not me, provided sources for all of the claims.
Did you even look?
Sorry, that was rhetorical, obviously you did not look.
Damage
in reply to circuscritic • • •circuscritic
in reply to Damage • • •Damage
in reply to circuscritic • • •Look, I'm sorry you got invested in Youtube channels and now feel betrayed, but that's something everyone else already understood: don't blindly trust anyone or any organisation, they can be bought, and will when it's advantageous to do so.
In the meantime, don't shit on people's work without a good reason, or you're doing the work for those who mean to control you.
circuscritic
in reply to Damage • • •I have no idea what you're going on about.
It's not a matter of betrayal, it was a video revealing another area of influence in society that is now controlled behind the scenes by private equity.
Whose work was I shitting on? I was shaming people who were down voting that very well sourced and informative video, that documented private equity's quiet takeover of major YouTube channels.
Maybe you should review the comment thread and see if you meant to respond to someone else, because that's the most charitable explanation I can come up with for your responses to me.
RisingSwell
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to RisingSwell • • •FabioTheNewOrder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to FabioTheNewOrder • • •FabioTheNewOrder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to FabioTheNewOrder • • •my family and I grow most of our food, and we're part of the local community garden where the small town we live in also grows food that is shared with everyone.
so out of the two of us, I'm pretty sure it'll be you who is starving.
FabioTheNewOrder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •And prayvtell, where do you find your seedlings and your fertilizer? And the tools to be used to work the fields? That's the problem of people like you, you can't see how intertwined it is our life with the rest of the world and you don't know how much it sucks to be living at a subsistence level. But go off with your fantasy, it does cost anything to dream.
Also, I forgot to ask how would you fare in a draught, a hailstorm or a long winter. But these are impossible conditions in your dreamworld I reckon
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to FabioTheNewOrder • • •well we use the stuff we grow for seeds, we don't buy into the capitalist propaganda that you can't replant things because It'S iLlEgAl. and compost is free and easy to make. also, I'm planning on getting chickens for fertilizer as well, once I build the infrastructure for them. they are great for dealing with insect pests too!
my next-door neighbor is a 40-year old dude that took up blacksmithing after he watched one too many YT videos. he made me a knife for last christmas out of a rusty steel cable.
I live in the midwest, we deal with those all the time.
a better world is possible, and it's not a dream. get up off your ass and make it with your friends. don't let legality or naysayers tell you something is impossible, that's capitalist propaganda meant to keep you down.
FabioTheNewOrder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Yes of course, a utopia is waiting for those who are able to grow a crop using a field inside of an apartment.
Dude, you're projecting a reality which could be applied to a very narrow set of people in modern society and in the western world. Imagining a better future is possible and good, but we need to keep it aligned with the actual realities present at this time. Being a bad crop away from death and surviving in a close anarchist encampment can work in a movie like 38 years later, not in real life
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to FabioTheNewOrder • • •FabioTheNewOrder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •You speak of solidarity after having decided that a possible life changing sum of money would be used to benefit you and the people you decide are worthy of your benevolence. Let me tell you brother, you need to have a look into a vocabulary as soon as possible. And to what the tech overlords are doing with their money. You'll find to be more similar than you think to Bezos and Zuckerberg
Also,he conditions described in your posts are those we had to endure during the middle ages, when citie and villages were tiny nation states and in constant war with eachother to scrap the poor resources we had available at that time, when serfdom was a common occurrence and when people were lucky to live beyond 40 years of age. Not my best pick if I have to choose a future for the whole of humanity.
Lastly you still haven't time how should people living in cities and urban areas live in this futur of yours. Does your crop grow on asphalt and concrete or do you see the problem your "vision" would bring to a huge prt
FabioTheNewOrder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •You talk about,s solidarity afeter having decided that a life-changing sum of money would be used to benefit you and those you deem worthy of yourself. Please pick up a vocabulary and look at the definition of the words you use. Also look at what Bezos and Zuckerberg are doing with their money and how they're building their compounds and you'll find to be closer to them than to an anarchist.
Humanity already went through the conditions you described in your post: it was during the middle ages, when cities were tiny nation states at constant war with eachother to scrap the poor and few resources available, serfdom was pretty common and people were lucky to live past 40 years of age. Not exactly my first choice when it comes to decide how I would like to live my future life.
Lastly I despise the system we live in as much, if not more, than you. But, differently from you, I'm not used to throwing away the baby with the bath water and I prefer to safeguard those advancements wich are truly helpful to humanity such as vaccines, democracy and human rights to cite some of them.
I almost forgot, you still haven't explained how should people living in cities and urban areas survive in this future of yours. Does your crop grow on asphalt and concrete or do you see the problem your "vision" would bring to a huge part of any population?
Keep on dreaming of a 38 years later were you're the protagonist, I'm sure it will help you and everyone else ;)
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to FabioTheNewOrder • • •anarchism is all about mutual association. so yes, anarchist communities would be made of people who agreed to be a community together. this is basic.
what a first-world mindset. many places in the world still operate like this, you're just so comfortable in your way of life you don't even think about them. I would encourage you to break out of that mindset, and show a little interest in the wide world around you.
yes, crops do grow in the cities. many cities are turning to urban farming in order to feed people. singapore is a leader in this, because they have a very large population with very little area for anything, let alone farming food. with not only private citizen-grown farms, but also the worlds first commercial rooftop farming company. and it's not just rooftops, farms are appearing indoors, sometimes taking up entire floors in some skyscrapers. in cities in china, such as chongqing and shenzhen, urban farms and gardens are very common, and shoved into whatever small areas they can be put into. i've seen them in alleys, dead space between buildings, on rooftops, hanging from the ceiling, and even on top of concrete walls in the form of potted crops.
but it's not just asia, places like new york city are also mandating green spaces on top of some skyscrapers as well. those can take the form of parks, or farms, depending on the preferences of the building owners, as long as they are natural plants. furthermore, many residential apartment buildings in places like new york, chicago, and other american cities are seeing rooftop farms appear. in reality, almost everyone can grow some food for themselves, even if all you have is a single small window sill.
you seem to be very ignorant of the world. I would also encourage you to seek out information on green initiatives, and how people in cities are dealing with the problems they face in an urban landscape. there is no doubt that you are speaking on a topic you are woefully unprepared for.
if the best you can do to argue against me is bring up a fictional zombie apocalypse in which everyone was infected and died, then perhaps it is time to admit you already lost the argument. we're talking about reality here and what is happening right now all across the world, not your fantasy horror worlds.
FabioTheNewOrder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Being considered worthy of living in a space you so kindly have cut out of the external world is not association if you still haven't realised that.
And still I wouldn't want to live like that. Our goal as a specie should be to elevate those living in hellish scenario like the one I described and that you so eagerly wish for all of us. Maybe this hasn't crossed your mind since you must be very young and fairly able bodied, but not everyone is capable of living in conditions where safe drinking water is unavailable and the best health care is relying on the phase of the moon to ingest the medicine cooked up by a wannabe shaman. It's not about being comfortable, it's about making everything better for everybody, for Christ' sake. You want to see millions of people die while you gloat about your helm and your ditch sorrounding it? Go for it, but at least don't call it "solidarity"; call it for what it is: egoism and main character syndrome.
Good luck feeding a city of millions with the fruits of planted pottery. You're gonna need a lot of pottery. Jesus Christ, a proper lot of pottery.
If the best you can do is responding to a snarky remark I left at the end of my comment thinking that it was the main point I was trying to make while imagining cities where millions of people live able to support themselves with only a couple of trees and tomato plants and completely misunderstanding the meaning of the anarchist mindset I'm afraid we're not having an argument at all, we are displaying the level of delusion you are willing to let yourself live in. Just like those asking for a civil war do not absolutely understand what they're asking for so do you with your call for an uncontrolled fall of the system.
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to FabioTheNewOrder • • •that exactly is what mutual association is. I suggest you read the AFAQ, because you very clearly do not know anything about anarchism. the freedom of association requires the freedom to disassociate.
as for the rest of your comment, it takes a real special sort of person to look at examples I gave you of cities literally feeding thousands of people through urban farms and go "nah, I can't conceive of that being true, so it isn't". that's MAGA levels of denial. it doesn't matter your opinion or feelings on the matter. it's a real thing, it's happening now, and it's slowly being scaled upwards. snarky bullshit remarks aren't going to change that.
I will be blocking you now. you're not interested in accepting reality, and so our mutual association is no longer mutual, and I'm taking advantage my freedom to cut closed-minded useless people out of my life. live the rest of your sad little life as a slave to capitalism in whatever depressing, dystopian way seems best to you.
FabioTheNewOrder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Keep on disassociating from someone who is trying to make you think about the result of your actions, that's exactly how grown up people act and that's gonna make associating so much wider when you'll find yourself alone in your fiery outrage.
A perfect example of a pizza cutter kind of anarchist, all edge, no point.
You talk about agricultural projects which feed thousands in cities where MILLIONS of people live. You talk about cooperation but you don't consider those who are unable to cooperate due to age, health conditions or any ithe reason. You talk about changing the system but you offer nonviable alternative other than "break it all down and hope for the best". I'm sorry, I can't be bothered with auch juvenile ideas of revolution, they would only bring death and suffering for too many people to be considered viable. I hope you'll grow up sooner rather than later and realise that we can only hope to improve the situation when we will learn everything about the positives of the current system and how we can keep them while discarding everything else.
As for myself I'll be living in this hellish capitalist system as you will until it won't collapse on itself or until I'll die, it rest to be seen what happens first. But I'll be living in it with the clear objective of improving it without needing to kill hundreds of thousands of people during that process, thank you very much
Valmond
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Ŝan
in reply to Valmond • • •Voyajer
in reply to Valmond • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to Valmond • • •bitjunkie
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to bitjunkie • • •bitjunkie
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •toynbee
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to toynbee • • •toynbee
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Yes, and also I was able to extrapolate that much, but I was looking for some idea of what kind of content they provided.
That said, I can look them up; apologies for bothering you on the matter.
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to toynbee • • •toynbee
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to toynbee • • •Rose
in reply to toynbee • • •Astrum makes space stuff videos? I dunno, been a while.
Fireship makes videos about programming. Has series about "(Programming language/Framework) explained in 100 seconds", for example. I think people are complaining that the channel is slipping into AI dudebroery.
Hoog is a history/explainer type channel, I think.
toynbee
in reply to Rose • • •hikaru755
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •AceBonobo
in reply to hikaru755 • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to hikaru755 • • •hikaru755
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to hikaru755 • • •bitjunkie
in reply to hikaru755 • • •Interesting way to say "making shit up"
hikaru755
in reply to bitjunkie • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to hikaru755 • • •SkyeStarfall
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •minimum
in reply to SkyeStarfall • • •socsa
in reply to SkyeStarfall • • •Iceman
in reply to socsa • • •Blisterexe
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •like this
tiredofsametab likes this.
Jankatarch
in reply to Blisterexe • • •Idk about fossil fuels specifically but they been directly being sponsored by big companies and in return making propoganda for them for a few years now.
youtu.be/HjHMoNGqQTI
- YouTube
youtu.beGloomy
in reply to Jankatarch • • •As much as i regret linking to reddit here, i feel it is fair to also post the channels answer to the video.
reddit.com/r/kurzgesagt/commen…
Kyden Fumofly
in reply to Gloomy • • •I watch that channel for years and i had no idea. I post his answer over the channels answer. Although that is 3 years old, i wonder what is now happening.
reddit.com/r/thehatedone/comme…
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to Blisterexe • • •They accepted, and continue to accept a great amount of money from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. That foundation owns over $11 billion in investments in the fossil fuel industry, including coal-burning utility companies.
In return, there were quite a few videos that Kurzgesagt admits were funded directly by the Foundation, that exaggerate the positive influence corporations owned by the foundation have had. Videos which the CEO of Kurzgesagt has admitted they probably would not have made if the Foundation had not paid for them.
blakemiller
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Randomgal
in reply to blakemiller • • •Yeah. It seems like a ridiculous accusation to make. Bro couldn't even answer the question about example of shilling so they had to pivot into the crime of taking money from a foundation to produce high quality educational content.
How dare they?
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to Randomgal • • •question answered. if you don't want to accept the CEO of Kurzgesagt word that they would not have made the videos if they hadn't been paid to, then that isn't my problem. I'm not here to convince you, and I don't mind if you don't believe him.
bitjunkie
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to bitjunkie • • •I said what I said to voice my own opinion on their channel, I didn't voice it as an indication that I was interested in debating the matter. I've already come to my own conclusions. read their website and their medium, or search up one of the deep dive videos on it if you're really interested. I'm not going to go too far out of my way to convince anyone, since it doesn't really harm me in any way if you believe me or not.
I also didn't say anywhere that you should stop watching their videos. you should, however, know who owns and funds every bit of media you consume, so that you can use that information to be healthily skeptical of things people are telling you, just as you are with me. I still watch fern., even though they are owned by PE, because their videos are high quality and mostly free of bias. but I keep in the back of my mind that they have corporate overlords that might want me to believe one thing or another.
JoshuaFalken
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •I did a few searches and while I didn't find that quote from Kurzgesagt's CEO, I did find the contribution listed from a decade ago on the Gates foundation website. $570,000 paid out over four years. They also gave NPR $2,000,000 the next year.
Since I didn't find the CEOs quote you've mentioned, I can only question the context around it. Would those videos not have been made because the Gates foundation specifically tied the funding to those videos being created? Or would they not have been made because Kurzgesagt didn't have the money to do so otherwise?
Regardless, Kurzgesagt is a private company and if they wanted to conceal hidden agendas by corporate contributors, they would just keep quiet - not openly acknowledge that they made content with money given to them by some larger organisation.
If we're going to denounce any group of people that are connected via Bacon's Law to a disastrous corporate industry, the moral high ground will be unachievable for the entirety of our species.
parlour game
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to JoshuaFalken • • •JoshuaFalken
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to JoshuaFalken • • •blakemiller
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to blakemiller • • •blakemiller
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to blakemiller • • •xthexder
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •This on its own proves nothing bad. Some videos just require a bigger budget to make and can't be made on their otherwise limited budget. Or the topic is just lower priority due to writer interests. If they were forced into covering specific topics then that's a different story, but I haven't seen any evidence that was the case.
Ganbat
in reply to blakemiller • • •"A small loan of a million dollars."
Does any of that matter in this situation, anyway? Exaggerating their content in exchange for money already places question on their reliability as an educational content creator.
This is fine🔥🐶☕🔥
in reply to Ganbat • • •I don't think you understood what they're saying. Try reading it again.
Hint: the investment of $11 billion refers to investment of Gates Foundation in fossil fuels.
Ganbat
in reply to This is fine🔥🐶☕🔥 • • •Well, considering these exact words were used:
What can I say but duh. If I misunderstood anything, it was the comment I replied to, which was unclear about the "0.05% down from 6%" detail, and seemed to be associating that with the $11 billion figure by context.
But hey, nice deflection, and super cool of you to be that rude about it, too.
_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to This is fine🔥🐶☕🔥 • • •per Kurzgesagt,
the 0.05% figure is wrong, according to the people making the money themselves.
This is fine🔥🐶☕🔥
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to This is fine🔥🐶☕🔥 • • •This is fine🔥🐶☕🔥
in reply to blakemiller • • •I'm trying to think of their 'fossil fuel shilling' video and only videos that come to mind are where they say we're too entrenched in the fossil fuel industry to make a switch to renewable overnight. It's just not realistic.
And other than fuel, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of products made from petroleum. Approximately 85% of petroleum is made into fuel. Rest is used to make things like pharma products, paint, pesticides, polymers etc.
Tollana1234567
in reply to This is fine🔥🐶☕🔥 • • •Uriel238 [all pronouns]
in reply to blakemiller • • •The problem is when the contributors influence what the videos say, in contradiction to data.
Kurzgesagt's video on +2° / +3° / +4° over the global mean isn't going to be so bad video was conspicuous to me, and is in fact, based on fossil-fuel industry rhetoric, rather than climatology estimations (which tell us over +1.5° is going to fuck us, and is).
blakemiller
in reply to Uriel238 [all pronouns] • • •Uriel238 [all pronouns]
in reply to blakemiller • • •CybranM
in reply to Uriel238 [all pronouns] • • •Uriel238 [all pronouns]
in reply to CybranM • • •It's allegedly a documentary, not fiction. It should make sense from beginning to end.
Sounds like you feel the need to defend Kurzgesagt for sentimental reasons, and since they're presenting themselves as a source for accurate information, that just won't do.
CybranM
in reply to Uriel238 [all pronouns] • • •null
in reply to blakemiller • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to null • • •null
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to null • • •null
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Eugene V. Debs' Ghost
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •null
in reply to Eugene V. Debs' Ghost • • •Eugene V. Debs' Ghost
in reply to null • • •null
in reply to Eugene V. Debs' Ghost • • •Eugene V. Debs' Ghost
in reply to null • • •Shill implied some payback. And Tankie is usually followed up by "bot of thing I don't like."
lol
null
in reply to Eugene V. Debs' Ghost • • •blakemiller
in reply to null • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to blakemiller • • •blakemiller
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to blakemiller • • •☂️-
in reply to blakemiller • • •spreading corporate propaganda is not exactly virtuous.
for only a small fraction of their revenue in return?
JoshuaFalken
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •It's interesting how any false narrative starts with a granule of truth.
Kurzgesagt was indeed provided $570,000 in 2015. That money was paid out across the following four years.
They have not continued to accept any amount of money from the Gates foundation.
Committed grants
Gates Foundation☂️-
in reply to JoshuaFalken • • •JoshuaFalken
in reply to ☂️- • • •Sorry, I didn't think the word 'continued' would have needed underlining for anyone that could read what I wrote.
Using a piece of factual information to prop up false information within the same sentence is how false narratives take hold.
☂️-
in reply to JoshuaFalken • • •that's not how i read it at all. no misinformation here.
see, the fact they took money to publish critical misinformation about climate change is not a joke. it should take more than an "i'm sowwy" to fix their reputation.
as it justifiably should.
JoshuaFalken
in reply to ☂️- • • •I'm unsure we are talking about the same comment. The misinformation is the claim the Gates foundation is continuing to fund Kurzgesagt, when that clearly isn't the case. This incorrect information is veiled by beginning the statement with the truth of the 2015 grant.
Insofar as the reputational damage Kurzgesagt has incurred, I'm not sure there's much meat on that bone. Sure, you might believe they have fallen from grace or some such, but as I pointed out in another comment here, we can't just connect everything under the sun and say 'group A is bad because groups B through Y are all next to one another and with group Z doing all those injustices, group A is complicit in those crimes'.
To me, the question of whether Kurzgesagt is a Gates mouthpiece is pretty cut and dry. A few reasons for this, but the most glaring is simply that the money didn't keep coming, and it wasn't much money to begin with. I wouldn't be going out of my way to talk up my employer to clients if my last bonus was a decade ago and didn't even cover my rent for the month I got it.
obazdaa
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •_cryptagion [he/him]
in reply to obazdaa • • •First off, no you didn’t.
Secondly, if you take money from billionaires to make propaganda videos for them, then you’re owned by them. You sell your soul to the devil, you can’t undo it later because you get called out for it.
Echo Dot
in reply to _cryptagion [he/him] • • •Kissaki
in reply to Petersson • • •I feel like the title doesn't match the content.
The video gives an elaborate description on their evaluation of "AI" and it's influence on the Internet at large. And then they conclude with "we'll continue like before" directly contradicting the title.
Feels disingenuous. And ironic after they talked about their extensive investments into fact checking.
Draedron
in reply to Kissaki • • •Kissaki
in reply to Draedron • • •Did you come into a comment section and expected not to see any comments?
Do you take everything as it is, without criticizing anything?
Do that if you want. No need to be so dismissive without actually making your point. Which I assume is that clickbait is "normal".
Fiery
in reply to Kissaki • • •HugeNerd
in reply to Kissaki • • •dustyData
in reply to Kissaki • • •The channel hat always been disingenuous. It's not the first video they have where they develop a well written essay that has conclusions that make no sense with the information presented. It's the theater of research without any of the substance. The editors just do whatever they want, under the expectations that the writing team will support their preconceived notion.
They're an entertainment channel, not a science communication channel. They have said some awful, totally not fact supported stuff in the past.
MrNobody
in reply to dustyData • • •Like?
dustyData
in reply to MrNobody • • •BreadstickNinja
in reply to dustyData • • •bitjunkie
in reply to BreadstickNinja • • •dustyData
in reply to BreadstickNinja • • •Echo Dot
in reply to dustyData • • •Echo Dot
in reply to dustyData • • •Wow look at all of the evidence you've provided. It's going to take me all night to go through it.
If you going to make claims like that you're going to need to provide even a shred of evidence
87Six
in reply to Kissaki • • •_stranger_
in reply to 87Six • • •87Six
in reply to _stranger_ • • •_stranger_
in reply to 87Six • • •You're using a lot of weasel words and zero sources for someone arguing we should all fact check things.
I'm not even saying your wrong, but your going to have to do a lot more than that to convince me that "they're known for" everything you just said, because that sounds like you have a very specific beef with them that overshadows everything else they've ever done (in your estimation) and your projecting that as a universal truth, when really it's not.
I respect your opinion, but there are certainly far more worse channels than there are better ones, and they're known for being one of the better ones.
edit: If this is what you're trying to say, I agree with you: lemy.lol/comment/21580850
melfie
2025-10-08 20:32:09
87Six
in reply to _stranger_ • • •Echo Dot
in reply to 87Six • • •Right so you say everyone should source all their work but then claim very specific things about the channel and then refuse to provide sources.
Interesting.
But I guess as long as you're not here to try and convince anyone that what you're saying is true it's okay for you to just say anything regardless of validity. That's very political of you, well done.
87Six
in reply to Echo Dot • • •Jhex
in reply to Kissaki • • •You missed the entire point of the video.
The claims are simple:
It's the exact same situation about climate change... we need to act now, most of us will suffer otherwise but for now we continue on living while trying to adjust where we can (recycling, reusing, less/no meat, etc) even if we know that will not be enough long term.
Tja
in reply to Jhex • • •Jhex
in reply to Tja • • •well, it may be a matter of context and tolerance here but I find the concept they are presenting is axiomatic and as such would not require any further explanation:
They use the internet to research their videos... the internet is getting more and more polluted with false narratives... ergo, it is becoming harder to research for their videos. Without good source, there are no videos.
If I tell you plants need water to exist but each season brings less and less rain year after year... would you say a title such as "drought is killing the plants" clickbaity?
Tja
in reply to Jhex • • •Jhex
in reply to Tja • • •Yes, that is what they claim. But I am sure you have seen how hard it is now to find something even if you know exactly what you are looking for. It's not like there are 2 libraries online for anything you need, right? You start researching about topic A and read that Dr XYZ did a study on this so you look for that study... just to find out Dr XYZ does not and has never existed.
So you want a specific number as to how many bad sources they are now forcing to discard because they turned out to be AI slop?
Tja
in reply to Jhex • • •Jhex
in reply to Tja • • •it's not that type of channel... they never do more than a percentage or a rate.
their thing is to explain concepts in a way a young audience can digest them
jj4211
in reply to Tja • • •Those metrics aren't any more trustworthy than their own subjective word anyway. If they wanted to say they took more time then they could delay at their whim anyway. If they said their production costs increased, then again, they could spend the money to fit the narrative. On those particular points objective evidence is so susceptible to being gamed that it isn't really more valuable than their subjective reporting.
Numbers of subscribers/views could be a bit more informative, but then people inclined to disbelieve would claim it's because of any number of other reasons not because of AI slop.
Tja
in reply to jj4211 • • •jj4211
in reply to Tja • • •Killing in this case sounds like the content is becoming harder and harder to create, which they lay out the subjective case for, but that wouldn't be exactly something they could use figures to present, since it's so subjective.
The one point they might have been able to show with numbers would be the emergence of AI slop 'infotainment animations' diluting the audience, but that wasn't exactly the biggest point of the video and it might be a bit early to be able to demonstrate statistically credible evidence on that one.
jj4211
in reply to Jhex • • •Jhex
in reply to jj4211 • • •chunes
in reply to Petersson • • •Lemminary
in reply to chunes • • •like this
tiredofsametab likes this.
chunes
in reply to Lemminary • • •Reginald_T_Biter
in reply to chunes • • •like this
tiredofsametab likes this.
Socialism_Everyday
in reply to Reginald_T_Biter • • •Reginald_T_Biter
in reply to Socialism_Everyday • • •TheGrandNagus
in reply to Socialism_Everyday • • •Socialism_Everyday
in reply to TheGrandNagus • • •Lemminary
in reply to chunes • • •kalkulat
in reply to Petersson • • •Lemminary
in reply to kalkulat • • •like this
tiredofsametab likes this.
kalkulat
in reply to Lemminary • • •TheGrandNagus
in reply to kalkulat • • •46_and_2
in reply to TheGrandNagus • • •TheGrandNagus
in reply to 46_and_2 • • •I didn't say they have to like it, that would be silly.
I'm criticising them for making an incorrect statement, being corrected on it, then acting extremely proud of being ignorant of the facts, and committing to not informing themselves.
Honytawk
in reply to kalkulat • • •They have been doing this animation style since 2013.
Why do you think they use AI?
I think your AI senses are broken, you see AI everywhere where there is not. You're like the extreme opposite of AI Tech Bro. Like you have paranoid AI-phobia or something.
like this
tiredofsametab likes this.
YeahIgotskills2
in reply to Petersson • • •nutsack
in reply to YeahIgotskills2 • • •𝙲𝚑𝚊𝚒𝚛𝚖𝚊𝚗 𝙼𝚎𝚘𝚠
in reply to nutsack • • •nutsack
in reply to 𝙲𝚑𝚊𝚒𝚛𝚖𝚊𝚗 𝙼𝚎𝚘𝚠 • • •Echo Dot
in reply to 𝙲𝚑𝚊𝚒𝚛𝚖𝚊𝚗 𝙼𝚎𝚘𝚠 • • •In the video you're literally commenting on they explain how they fact check their videos and how they work with professionals in the field at matter.
You can always complain that something wasn't as good as you personally wanted it to be but that may very well be bias. The people making the accusations may have a bias. All we can do is take the totality of their output and cast judgement on that.
𝙲𝚑𝚊𝚒𝚛𝚖𝚊𝚗 𝙼𝚎𝚘𝚠
in reply to Echo Dot • • •The point was that they haven't always held themselves up to those standards and have sometimes only used professionals espousing a single viewpoint (where multiple exist).
I should mention this isn't bias, iirc the channel did release a video apologizing for some of the issues (though not all), so it wasn't even up to their own standards by their own admission.
There's a wikipedia entry listing some of the controversies: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurzgesa…
Looking things up now, I see that the plagiarism case was slightly different: they had published a video on addiction, which was fairly explosive in its claims. Turns out it was citing basically just one fringe researcher who was also accused of plagiarism. The claims did not seem to hold up to scrutiny.
When another channel doing a series on how pop-sci influencers can sometimes spread misinformed ideas asked some questions to Kurzgesagt, they were immediately a bit apprehensive but agreed to do some interview questions, though with the caveat that they were busy with other things and needed a few weeks before it could take place. Then before the interview took place they suddenly put out their own apology video and took the addiction video down. At no point was it mentioned that another channel prompted this action, it was presented as some kind of inward reflection that they had come to themselves.
German animation and design studio
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)recked_wralph
in reply to YeahIgotskills2 • • •Tollana1234567
in reply to YeahIgotskills2 • • •ZeroOne
in reply to Petersson • • •Kurzgezagt is a slop channel too you know.
- YouTube
www.youtube.comSmoothOperator
in reply to ZeroOne • • •You can't really call it slop just because you disagree with their views and representations of things.
Their stuff is carefully researched and sourced, human crafted and open to critique. Whether they're correct in their assessments or not is of course up for debate, but it's good craftsmanship and they show their work.
like this
tiredofsametab likes this.
1rre
in reply to SmoothOperator • • •Eh, there's a lot of blending of conjecture, opinion and fact all presented as truth, and their handling of mistakes could be better - they've openly said if they consider a mistake to be minor then they don't even issue a correction or update.
I personally think that attitude towards production pushes it towards slop, as for things like entertainment one of the key defining things that separate slop from quality media is passion, but if you don't care about making accurate content then are you any better than just getting AI to write a script?
ZeroOne
in reply to SmoothOperator • • •SmoothOperator
in reply to ZeroOne • • •bitjunkie
in reply to ZeroOne • • •ZeroOne
in reply to bitjunkie • • •mrgoosmoos
in reply to Petersson • • •tobogganablaze
in reply to mrgoosmoos • • •There you go.
github.com/laylavish/uBlockOri…
GitHub - laylavish/uBlockOrigin-HUGE-AI-Blocklist: A huge blocklist of manually curated sites that contain AI generated imagery for uBlock Origin & uBlacklist.
GitHubVerilyFemme
in reply to mrgoosmoos • • •GitHub - laylavish/uBlockOrigin-HUGE-AI-Blocklist: A huge blocklist of manually curated sites that contain AI generated imagery for uBlock Origin & uBlacklist.
GitHubRaiderkev
in reply to mrgoosmoos • • •Echo Dot
in reply to Raiderkev • • •Google still does its psychotic summarys though.
Then other day I was trying to find out how to get just one AD account not to sync through to Azure without disabling it. And the AI came up with this complicated instruction set that didn't work and was totally made up from nowhere. Now what on earth was the point in doing that?
At one point it told me I had to triple click on something. Because that's totally a thing.
jj4211
in reply to Echo Dot • • •It's so fun when it's so specific about some detail with casual confidence that is based on absolutely nothing at all. I know ultimately it's architecture is more akin to a predictive word generator, but it seems so much better.
Saw a clear demonstration and it is wild that the output is consistent, but at least in the model I saw being run, every word is generated without it having considered what the word after would be or what the general concept it is going for. For a human one has to already know the concept before he/she starts putting words to it, but at least the models I've seen explained with detail, it manages to assemble it word by word without knowing where it is trying to go in advance.
Raiderkev
in reply to jj4211 • • •rodneylives
in reply to Echo Dot • • •&udm=14 | the disenshittification Konami code
udm14.comEh-I
in reply to Petersson • • •Kyden Fumofly
in reply to Eh-I • • •SpicyLengthiness
in reply to Kyden Fumofly • • •TheGrandNagus
in reply to SpicyLengthiness • • •I get the frustration, but it does actually cost money to make content, especially high effort content like this.
Add on top of that the fact that the people involved need to be able to eat, have a home, provide for their families, have a life.
People would complain if they were sponsored by some shitty VPN provider or the like, and also complain about them trying to sell merch. I certainly wouldn't work for free, so I don't see why they should have to.
It's not really that hard to do a couple of key presses to skip ahead, either. It's what I do.
SpicyLengthiness
in reply to TheGrandNagus • • •BackgrndNoize
in reply to Eh-I • • •a_postmodern_hat
in reply to BackgrndNoize • • •100%. The recent videos all seem like they’re ragebait (‘alcohol is awesome’ springs to mind).
They could be good, I haven’t watched them. if they’re targeting people who respond to that tone then it’s not for me.
It’s a shame. I liked the earlier videos on ant colonies and strange matter and stars and stuff.
Auth
in reply to Petersson • • •Copycopycopy
in reply to Auth • • •PKscope
in reply to Auth • • •For what it's worth, I kinda agree. Maybe I've changed but I feel like their content over the last year or two is nowhere near as good as it was.
Maybe I've just had a change in taste, though.
Tollana1234567
in reply to Auth • • •TheObviousSolution
in reply to Petersson • • •TeddE
in reply to TheObviousSolution • • •Echo Dot
in reply to TeddE • • •I don't think blockchain has any legitimate uses. All of the proposed uses for blockchain are all tech bro nonsense.
I think they were talking about having a decentralised property permits. As if that's something that would be even remotely useful.
TeddE
in reply to Echo Dot • • •Yeah, and if it weren't for the techbro nonsense, it would be tossed onto the pile of mathematical curios that don't have nontrivial uses.
The thing is - we often do find uses for those curiosities years later.
In the mean time, I wouldn't mind if a decentralized video game came along where game assets were decentralized, distributed by bittorrent, and player assets were decentralized and tracked by blockchain.
mistermodal
in reply to Echo Dot • • •You'd be surprised how valuable these technologies can be when they're not only being developed to create new financialized services to overcharge people for. Manufacturing and shipping has huge capital and logistic buffers created by information gaps, production shortfalls, fraud, etcetera, and cryptographic ledgers are excellent for ensuring accurate production and inventory information is relayed to clients in realtime. What's more, it has the potential to mediate international transactions without relying on Swift or global banking institutions that are an extension of US authority.
Notice how nothing I said was about fucking NFTs. The western financial system completely lost the plot doing super cocaine and became convinced they could just ask the rest of the world to stay slaves forever. They don't even care about its potential! They want TrumpCoin.
tino
in reply to Petersson • • •deaf_fish
in reply to tino • • •I don't think they are techno-solutionists but that sometimes is the vibe they give off.
I just think there's some directions they won't go thanks to the threat of capital.
Echo Dot
in reply to tino • • •If you actually watch the video that's not what they're talking about. They are talking about how it's difficult to fact check information in a world of AI misinformation.
I always find it's easier to know what a video is about if I actually watched the video. It's just this little life hack I've come up with.
tino
in reply to Echo Dot • • •Watch the video? Duh. Thanks I watched it, and I know they don’t talk about how AI steals their art style (even though it’s really happening). I just pointed out the irony. The video also says they are usually enthusiastic about new tech but not this time.
I know this channel well enough to have seen countless videos praising fake tech like carbon capture and that’s why I have a problem with them.
Am I allowed to have an opinion?
Echo Dot
in reply to tino • • •You are allowed to have an opinion but when it's a stupid opinion expect to be ridiculed for it.
Carbon capture is an actual technology it's real and it works. There's not a lot of it about yet but there's also not a lot of fusion reactors yet but they're also real technology.
jsomae
in reply to tino • • •Reginald_T_Biter
in reply to tino • • •AnimalsDream
in reply to Petersson • • •Echo Dot
in reply to AnimalsDream • • •frog_meister
in reply to AnimalsDream • • •EndlessNightmare
in reply to Petersson • • •Alcoholicorn
in reply to EndlessNightmare • • •capitalism will solve climate change
Tangential, but thats what disgusted me about the Osaka world expo. The theme was sustainability so you had fossil fuel companies presenting wildly impractical "solutions" and art projects. The message was "things are under control, continue sleepwalking into oblivion"
Echo Dot
in reply to EndlessNightmare • • •There's nothing helpful about giving up though is there.
And we could stop climate change, it's entirely possible, presumably people don't want to die so they will take action but they probably not going to start to act until climate change becomes more apparent, that's depressing but that's human nature. Humans have a long history of making radical changes at the last minute, e.g the cold war.
We like to go right up to the cliff edge but we tend not to take the final step.
After all even China is cleaning up its act and they're the least likely to be cooperative so if even they're doing something about it there's hope.
Taldan
in reply to EndlessNightmare • • •TheGrandNagus
in reply to EndlessNightmare • • •They don't say that, though?
They say things like "with effort, we can solve climate change, or minimise its effects."
Which is very different. And personally, I hate over the top doomerism where everyone says everything is fucked beyond repair all the time.
https://scribe.disroot.org/u/kadu
in reply to TheGrandNagus • • •The issue is not the claim that with effort we maybe can minimise the effects, it's the techno-utopia angle. We will solve this by changing nothing about the underlying economic system driving climate change, but Bill Gates and other smart billionaires will make some fantastic technology that will save us!
ltxrtquq
in reply to TheGrandNagus • • •I'm pretty sure they do say that, almost exactly.
Bazoogle
in reply to EndlessNightmare • • •Have you heard of the experiment with swimming rats and how much longer they swam when given hope? We need hope to survive.
Though they don't say we will solve it, but that we can solve it if we start now.
Studies show that when we have it, it can carry us. When we don't, we can drown.
Joseph T. Hallinan (Psychology Today)Teppichbrand
in reply to EndlessNightmare • • •book about climate activism and sabotage by Andreas Malm
Contributors to Wikimedia projects (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.)commie
in reply to Teppichbrand • • •frog_meister
in reply to EndlessNightmare • • •It was the "what-ifs" that did it for me.
Very boring stuff.
Empricorn
in reply to Petersson • • •I'm curious why you have a different title than the video?
silly goose meekah
in reply to Empricorn • • •Empricorn
in reply to silly goose meekah • • •Taldan
in reply to Empricorn • • •Petersson
in reply to Empricorn • • •Rose56
in reply to Petersson • • •frog_meister
in reply to Petersson • • •I don't really have an issue with AI slop. It's the same level of quality as most influencer-shit out there.
I just ignore it.