Roughly eighteen months ago I published my first Usless ReviewTM of How-To Videos. In re-reading I cringe a little, as I nearly always do when I revisit my work, but also there is a tinge of disappointment. Rather than a litany of cheap jokes, which is the UR template, I instead opted for some idyll about a teenage summer spent in Mexico City. What? The whole point of the piece seemed to be that How-To videos are nice in a way, but the game is seldom as fun once you’ve entered the cheat code. In other words, it’s more fulfilling to figure things out on your own.
Gee, thanks Dad.
Luckily for me, I’m still annoyed by How-To video, though I watch them fairly frequently, and I have a fresh batch of sarcastic blather to offer you as regards the topic.
- “You’re doing it wrong.” – I don’t know who pioneered this sub-genre, but videos seem to be proliferating based on the premise that we’re all morons. The truth of that statement notwithstanding, is that really how you propose to teach me something new? By telling me I’m a deluded idiot? I can’t speak for everyone, but on my own behalf, the authors are invited to f#*$ directly off.
- “In just ten minutes…” – If you make a ten-minute video and I watch it, the whole budget is blown. Also, if it takes you ten full minutes to explain, you’re a bad explainer. I happen to be a coaching expert based on the half-day training I did with the local youth soccer club. What I can tell you is, the less you say, the better your advice. Also, maybe factor in the sixteen additional years I’ll need to practice.
- “This one hack…” – Actual hacks bring down governments. You telling me to drop my heel isn’t a hack. Put another way, there’s only one hack in this video, and they’re in front of the camera.
- “The 5 Best…Whatevers” – One final kind of how-to video that I dislike is the one that purports to tell you what the best shoe, bike, saddle, etc. is for you. Believe it or not, I really hate writing reviews (which is why the Useless ReviewsTM exist in the first place), because I know what you know, personal shape, size, style, preference is so hard to legislate for. I try always to couch my comments on products in terms of why they work FOR ME. And of course, reviews are a whole silent, side industry too, which is part of why TCI exists, and though we do take money from companies willing to support our work, we always call that out if we talk about their products. “The 5 Best/10 Best sub-genre is really just the paid-for listicle of the bike game,” he said in the format of his own listicle. See how meta I am?
I continue to believe our ability to succeed in this modern world, dominated as it is by digital media, is based on our ability to separate useful information from what the French call merde. By all means, watch 100 videos on how to ride a wheelie. Riding a wheelie is a dope thing to be able to do, a sweet party trick. But don’t forget to go to the park, find a nice, soft grassy spot, and practice.
A lot of those ten minute “how to” videos are put online by crackpots, too. Usually by people who know more about how to stand in front of a camera than how to explain a technical topic to a noob. But given the dearth of good editing and writing in technical manuals, one sometimes is caught between putting up with Cletus Spruckler explaining it in a Youtube video or trying to figure out what the ESL writer meant when you open the instructions and try to follow them. Usually, while under the bike repair stand crying.