Category: Technology

YOUTUBE NEEDS MORE OUTPUT

YouTube will always need more. More viewers, more time spent on the site, more more more.

Some folks want to “monetize their channels,” meaning, get a cut of the ad revenue from views. Before you had to 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours over the last year.

Well, YouTube says you need 8,000 hours.

From TechCrunch:

YouTube announced on Monday that new creators will have to meet higher thresholds to begin earning money from ads and subscriptions.

Creators who want to start earning on the platform will need at least 8,000 qualified watch hours over the past year or 20 million qualified Shorts views in the last 90 days. Currently, creators need 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours over the past year or 1,000 subscribers and 10 million Shorts views over the past 90 days.

More content, more chances for people to keep watching, and an even bigger investment for people looking to get monetized.

As Seth Godin says, the problem with the race to the bottom is you just might win.

ADS ARE EVERYWHERE

So BMW dropped an ad for Spider Man into the big dumb video dashboard. I mean, did we really think advertisers weren’t going to find a way to weasel their way onto those dashboard displays? It’s prime real estate, esp when you can target BMW drivers who have money, right?

Apparently this is a one time thing, but if there’s money to be made I’m sure you’ll see this in many more cars in the coming years.

And this is exactly why I want a older car with a manual transmission with windows I can roll down myself.

SUBSTACK NOTES SOURCE PROBLEM

I love loathe seeing breaking news and big statements on Substack Notes with massive engagement without a link to a source.

  • “Senator grows horns and spiked tail!” 2.4K likes
  • “AP reports plastic in newborn eyeballs!” 5.3K likes
  • “Studies prove breathing is helpful.” 3,000 comments

Like, we’re just taking the posters word?

Posting without credit or source is 100% totally ok because EnGaGeMeNt??!

There was a time on social media where you’d get 100 replies all saying “SOURCE!?!?” if you left out a link to where you got your news.

STOP BLAMING TECH FOR MISSING OUT

We don’t need a new platform, we need to fucking regain focus on allocate time and attention to the people we say we love and want to follow.

“Oh, I never see my friend’s posts anymore!”

Well fucking bookmark their profile and set a reminder!

Subscribe to their newsletter or RSS or podcast, set a recurring alert to email / call / send a letter.

There’s so much technology available to us to find, re-find, and remind. “Siri, remind me to…” is the probably 85% of the answer to all this.

We don’t need another login, we need to fucking grow up and choose our damn destiny, retake our agency, and dictate our own flow of time and energy.

Another platform run by a bunch of strangers probably ain’t the answer we need.

DISCOVERY WITHOUT SOCIAL MEDIA

From Bear Blog Discover → a blog post titled “More Than Email” → Tuta (Secure Email: Private, Green & Ad-free) → CryptPad (CryptPad is a collaborative office suite that is end-to-end encrypted and open-source.)

“BuT How will i FIND nEw CoOL sTUFF WiThOUt SoCiAL MediA?!?”

By clicking around Bear Blog’s Discover and Bubbles you can find some interesting blog posts, which lead you down rabbit holes to other interesting blogs or products or services.

It’s not served to you on a silver platter like an algorithm, but that’s the point.

DNS SETTINGS ARE NOT A VIBE

Vibe coding is fun and all (here’s my new Hunterthen site), but the behind the scenes work is not.

Updating DNS settings, SSL certificates, troubleshooting your router to not block FTP traffic? SHEESH.

Social media won because it was easy; upload a photo, write a quick bio, and you can upload a video all within 10 minutes.

But if we can’t set up a website in less that 15 minutes then it’s just not worth it.

It’s not that it’s hard, it just takes a bit to figure stuff out. We can do hard things!

I’ve been fiddling around with DNS stuff since the mid 2000s and I’m glad I have Claude to ask about my CNAME settings to properly authenticate my SSL cert.

Then again, this is why everyone doesn’t write a book either. It takes time and patience. Plenty of hurdles.

Either you want to do the thing, and will do whatever it takes, or you won’t.