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  • I'll second a couple of other things that people have mentioned, like SmarterEveryDay and CGP Grey.

    Hmm. What would I consistently watch new material on?

    General-audience military history. It's not especially flashy, and you'll see typos and such, but it consistently shows maps, which is somewhere that I think a lot of military history stuff falls over. And the guy has read the material for the stuff he covers, at least the stuff that I'm reasonably familiar with. There are much larger military history channels out there, and much blingier ones, but I'd rate this well for actually helping someone accurately understand the material covered. He does a good job of highlighting what I think decent books on the subject matter consider the important, salient bits. I'd say that he's probably reading -- and understanding -- the major recommended books on a battle prior to doing a video on it. I'd recommend his videos on battles over any commercial documentaries that I've seen.

    There are other military history channels that I do watch, but I think that of them, that's probably the one I'd recommend being worthwhile as a watch the most.

    Drachinifel -- does naval history, especially gun-era stuff and British stuff -- but while Drachinifel is pretty prolific, I wouldn't rank his output as highly; he's basically taking some high-level stuff from a quick read and putting it in video format. He's not doing all that much reading per video. But he's got a lot of stuff.

    The Operations Room also favors maps, but I feel like they tend to pull more of their material from personal accounts from individuals than I'd like.

    Kings And Generals has covered a lot of different conflicts, is flashier, also puts stuff on maps, but I've definitely seen stuff on there that I'd call erroneous. I'd watch something from them due to the scope of their material, but take it with a grain of salt.

    Hmm.

    I don't really follow channels much, repeatedly intentionally come back to anyone. Like, to have a Web analogy, there are websites out there that I like, but very few to which I'd subscribe to an RSS feed, because even for places that have good content, I rarely want to watch a high proportion of anything that they've done.

    I can't think of anyone that does software that I'd recommend watching (or, honestly, in general, video for that). I haven't been all that blown away by video for international affairs stuff, not to the point that I'd explicitly recommend someone.

    • theslowmoguys does a lot of well-filmed very slow motion stuff. I wouldn't go back to see something just because they've put it out, but they've got some of the better slow-motion footage of different things that I've seen. Fun watch.
    • Oh, forgottenweapons. This is pretty well-known in the firearms world, so it's probably not a huge surprise to people who are interested in firearms. It originally focused on unusual firearms mechanisms, but I think that they've done a video on darn near every firearm out there now, so it's kind of a nice place to get a video overview from an informed person of most firearms, short bit history, highlights unusual mechanisms of the thing. I definitely would not go out and try to watch through this whole thing unless you are some kind of absolutely rabid firearms mechanism person, but it consistently has good-quality, informed material. There's a !forgottenweapons@lemmy.world community on the Threadiverse.
    • PerunAU is also probably pretty well-known. Guy in defense economics, good for a level-headed, high-level look at the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Shows a series of Powerpoint slides. If he comes out with a new video, I'd watch it; he generally doesn't waste viewer time, and insofar as my knowledge extends, the information he puts out is pretty solid. I don't have the knowledge to evaluate the validity of his opinions, but he's pretty good at explicitly stating that something is or is not his opinion. There's been a lot of people making a lot of videos on the conflict, and I think that he's one of the more-worthwhile people to pay attention to.

    I feel kinda bad to heavily list military- or weapons- related stuff, as I certainly watch plenty of other stuff on YouTube, but honestly, while I watch other material, most of the cases where I think I'd watch new material from a particular individual falls into those categories. Like, there are channels spanning a wide range of things, that have put out great content, that I think is interesting, but they also put out a whole lot of other stuff that I'm not interested in. I might recommend a particular video, but not the whole channel.

    EDIT:

    • primitivetechnology9550. Guy goes out into the woods with nothing but his shorts and just using what's available, constructs a "technology tree", starting with something like a stone axe and moving up to iron production and increasingly-sophisticated structures. Pretty well-known, but I've enjoyed every video I've ever seen on there.

  • Lemmino

    I'm surprised no one mentioned this channel yet. Previously known for making top 10 facts of everything, but has since transitioned into long form documentary of mysteries. He takes a long time between videos, but its always an instant click whenever he uploads. Does his own research, cites them, makes the background music and all of the animations for it. Honeypot for react channels too.

    Fortnine

    Motorcycle related videos. Does some motorcycle reviews, but the explanation type videos they mostly do are awesome. Even if you're not a motor head, you can always learn/enjoy something from their videos. If not the knowledge and physics, then the excellent videography and story telling Ryan puts in there.

    Technology Connections

    The Youtube Appliance guy. I kid, but he does excellent videos delving into tech in general appliances or retro stuff. One of his best videos is about dishwasher detergents, so good he had to make 2 more follow up videos about it. Seriously, go give it a watch.

  • Bigtime

    is an awesome newer car and motorcycle channel, they split off from donut to go do their own creative stuff after donut go bought by a big soulless media company

    Fortnine

    is an amazing motorcycle youtube channel with absurd production quality and directing often worthy of full length documentaries

    Berm peak

    is a super well produced mountain biking and bikes channel

    Lab Muffin Beauty Science

    If you're into science based skincare I absolutely adore her, she has a chemistry PhD and a specialization in cosmetic chemistry. She spends a lot of time debunking baseless skincare marketing which I don't really need since everything I know about skincare I learned from her and various other science focused youtubers, but I absolutely adore her informative videos that are guides to various aspects of skincare, or an exploration of how to competently interpret research

    Adam savage's Tested

    channel is a lot of fun if you like maker content, he's just as energetic and charismatic of a character as he was back on Mythbusters

    Hybrid calisthenics

    is a wonderful exercise fitness and wellness channel where the guy running it is just an earnest, kind, compassionate human being who offers advice that meets people where they are and helps them progress, regardless of their current ability level. He went viral a while back for a video talking about how you can do exercise at any level, even if you've literally never done a pushup in your life, where he demonstrates modified versions of bodyweight exercises that make them more accessible, or even more difficult so that people can work their way up to their goals from any starting point. People fell in love with his personality and attitude of compassion.

    My absolute favorites for cooking are:

    Adam Ragusea

    does an amazing job of making recipes realistic and approachable for home cooking, and his background as a journalist results in incredibly high quality research videos that are unbelievably informative

    internet shaquille

    unprotentious while focusing on technique, has a fantastic delivery style, it's hard to describe exactly what makes him special, but the videos are phenomenal and he often gives great life advice

    J Kenji Lopez alt

    the goat. Super knowledgable, especially regarding the science of cooking, and is a well respected name in recipe development. His videos are him with a gopro camera strapped to his head while he prepares the food and talks about it's origin, how he likes to make it, etc. Its like having an expert demonstrate for you in their home kitchen while casually chatting about all the knowledge they have to share about a given recipe

    Chinese cooking demystified

    the absolute best source for traditional chineese cooking, and food history lessons to boot. I love their delivery style, and their videos always give a ton of historical and cultural context and are a joy to watch)

    Lemme know if you'd like more food youtubers, these are my absolute faves though, and all offer very different perspectives on food (sometimes disagreeing with eachother) while usually teaching at least as much about technique, how to approach cooking, and their own personal philosophy when developing recipes as they do the specific recipe itself.

    Brian David Gilbert

    makes a wide range of bizarre nonsense and I adore him. Comedy sketches, horror short film kinda stuff, incomprehensible fever-dreams, a guide to the united states health insurance mess that somehow manages to be as funny as it is depressing, goofy music, unironically wonderfull music, recipies. He used to make polygon's unhinged video series called unraveled, his personal channel is even better and even more unhinged

  • The ones that I get excited to see new videos from are, in no particular order:

    Lindsay Nikole

    She's a biologist and does videos on prehistoric animals and time periods, that we know of. Entertaining videos and it turns out we studied under some of the same people.

    acollierastro

    Dr. Collier is a theoretical physicist who covers a wide arc a physics topics, and who did a pretty impressive review of Picard.

    BobbyBroccoli

    Very indepth and well researched videos about science and tech scandals and controversies

    Dr Becky

    Is an Oxford Astrophysicist who covers a lot of findings about JWT and will point out upcoming things in the night sky

  • Brew

    *Delves into all kids of weird circumstances and medical mysteries. Morbid and informative.

    Zoe

    *Up-to-date exercise and nutrition science. I've seriously learned a lot.

    Imperfect Paintings

    Shows you how to try different types of abstract art. Has been a huge inspiration in getting me to paint and experiment with art.

  • North of the Border

    His name is Adam and he likes to make tiny nerdy things. He makes dioramas of nerdy stuff, sometimes normal, some times with too many teeth, fingers, and/or toes.

  • GEOLOGY can be intriguing when much of it is set outdoors (in videos, no bug bites, no poison ivy) and being explained by a professor at a small college with a great love of the topic and a talent and desire to share it with a large audience. Yes, I'm talking Nick on the Rocks himself. Danger:He's often accompanied by other interesting geologists. It might be catching.

    https://www.youtube.com/@GeologyNick/videos

    If you're new to the topic or have children, then Nick also does short (under 10-minute) shows that are shown on PBS, which you'll find here:

    https://www.pbs.org/show/nick-rocks/

  • DougDoug

    He is bald at 2D Platformers and does funny coding stuff with his Chat and/or AI

    Papa Meat

    Hunter Hanckock (Meatcanyon). He can control fire and does lots of IRL Videos about strange/funny/gross Topics.

    Ididathing

    YouTube's worst Blacksmith makes dangerous Inventions, and videos about Australian Animals now and then.

  • Several:

    BobbyBroccoli - Good videos about science scandals.

    Brick Experiment Channel - Guy in Finland making awesome Lego builds

    Calum - Fantastic videos about really cool stuff like, shipping cintainers, land trains, WWII rescue buoys, flying homes and more.

    Clabretro - Interesting videos about setting up a retro lab with cool enterprise computer gear.

    Code Bullet - Chaotic programming with a focus on making AI playing games.

    James Channel - A channel by a video games collector, the first video he uploaded a year ago about making a portable Super Nintendo, he uses a lot of duct tape and hot glue. He has also built a working NES game that can play other NES games.

    Jet Lag: The Game - The team behind Wendover Productions plays games where the world is the game board, they have played tag across Europe, the have played Hide and Seek throughout Switzerland, they have played connect four with US states and more.

    Our Own Devices - A lovely man talks about things, highly recommended.

    Paper Will - Have you ever wondered about how North Korea entertains their citizens? This channel has a five and half hour long video about it. What about cults? What kind of entertainment do they produce? There is an hour long video about that.

    Peter Dibble - A channel focusing on the Pacific North West of the US, but has awesome videos about barcodes, the 90s US high speed train campaign, a buss riding the sky, America's christmas monorails, Lego's cousin Modulex, and more.

    RetroBytes - Highly nerdy content, excellent videos about topics like: CPU architectures, Unix workstations, Networks, the History of Computer Graphics.

54 comments