Usually when we hear of people hiking with cats we think of them walking with the cat, or cats, on a leash. In a Pass Moi Les Jumelles (PAJU for short), we follow two guys who go for a walk with four cats. The report is funny because the cats, or some might even say kittens, are allowed to roam and explore with the human companions. They can leap across streams over and over. Occasionally they, the cats, fall into the water.
I love the medium of video and I have love having a choice of thousands, or even millions of videos to choose from. In effect my love of the medium of video should mean that I love YouTube. I don’t, because of sensationalism and clickbait.
I have paid for YouTube prime twice now, to cut out all the adverts, and I love that. In theory plugins do the same thing, for free, and I did use plugins for years before finally deciding to spend money on YouTube Prime.
I used to really like YouTube. It was a place where normal people could share videos of their normal lives, for normal people to enjoy, and to discover organically. Today YouTube is a way of forcing people to watch adverts before watching content that has been seen half a million to a million times by people with a million subscribers who keep saying “i have a million subscribers” and showing off. This makes most YouTube content unpleasant.
Last night I watched a video about a visit to Perm36 but it covered just the trip. The video below is far more complete and informative. I am currently reading Gulag by Anne Applebaum, rather than The Gulag Archipelago, like she mentions. I started reading it decades ago but never finished it. I read A day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch in a single day.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgtjgPtGmx0
Reading Gulag, The Gulag Archipelago and other books helps give some context to what Soviet Russia was like. As I read Gulag by Applebaum I get the feeling that Soviet Russia was about enslaving people to make profit for some whilst everyone else suffers. From this perspective what the Soviet Union would morph into, at the end of the Soviet age would make more sense.
I have not studied electronics but I have studied the Google IT support course among others so I have some basics of how computers and tech work. This type of documentary series is interesting because it brings history to life, and explains how things work. It is not sensationalist, does not use too much music and more. It just guides you through how technology works.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v49ucdZcx9s
I was surprised to hear that transmission was as low as 2 watts and as high as just 11 watts. I also learned that for some communications they used just two watts of power for Apollo 13, 57 hours into the mission, to reduce power consumption. Of course on Earth they had a 270ft antenna to receive the signal. Compare this to a radio station that may use 50,000 watts. I don’t remember how many watts were used in satellite broadcasting but from a quick skim it’s about 20 watts but this goes to smaller and smaller dishes on earth. Starlink uses about 2 watts of power.
Between adverts that play too often, videos that encourage people tho shift to the Right side of the political spectrum and sensationalism I decided to stop using YouTube. I have spent two months without YouTube. I use alternative video platforms. I use Udemy, Prime Video, Linkedin Learning, Vimeo and other platforms.
I stopped using YouTube because it went from being a video sharing platform for individuals to being a broadcast platform where algorithms force some types of content rather than others. I saw an increasing amount of sensationalist headlines and video titles and grew tired of them. I was tired of having to filter out the emotional politically slanted content from worthwhile content. I had to spend more time reporting and ignoring content designed to make me angry or emotional. Clickbait was another challenge to overcome.
In the past if you wanted to be a video editor you also needed to be a camera operator, and to be a camera operator you needed to be a video editor. By knowing both skills you shot good material because you knew how hard bad material was to use. As a result of this videos were worth watching with all of our attention.
In recent years, there has been a move towards multimedia editing, where you don’t expect people to watch the video while sitting in front of a TV. You expect them to be looking at a mobile phone while commuting, or scrolling through a social media feed. Job offers reflect this. You often see jobs that required perfect spelling and grammar, Adobe Premiere and Adobe After Effects. The need for an editor to be a camera operator is gone. We have gone from videos being made by camera operators and video editors who love their medium, to graphists, who overlay graphics over video. They’re making slideshows, rather than video content.
You remember the old saying. The best camera is the one that you have with you. Today the same can be said about “edit suites” that you carry in your trousers or jacket pocket. I’m speaking of edit suites that work with your iphone or ipad. Lumafusion is one such example.
It differs from other mobile editing solutions in a number of key ways. The first is that it allows you to edit on a timeline with three video sources at once This means that you have more control. It allows you to split audio which allows you to overlap sound from one clip to another and provide a better finish.
Joseph Nye was at the Graduate institute to address the question Are we Seeing the End of the American Liberal Order? He did not want to give a yes or no answer but rather to introduce ideas with which to frame and understand the context of the question looking back in history but also looking at contemporary issues. In so doing he spoke about why the aftermaths of the First World War led to war and why the Aftermath and attitudes after the Second World War led to 75 years of peace. He spoke about Hard Power and Soft Power. He spoke about how with Soft power we find attitudes that everyone wants to adopt and participate in. What I like about lectures by such individuals is that they really know their topic in depth and they understand it. They are well read and they have taken an active role in the topics they discuss. As a result when they come up to the podium their hands are empty. He did eventually pull out a single sheet of paper and occasionally looked at it. He talked with authority, and occasionally humour. Here are a number of videos Verhofstadt, Merkel, Macron and others believe in Soft Power, they believe that through mutually advantageous projects we can all benefit. Just yesterday roaming fees were terminated for European countries. This means that we can now travel and communicate in any other European country. Soft power is the opening of borders for trade, education and more. It is about trust and similar goals. It is about collaboration. As a result of yesterday’s talk I want to read his books. I want to learn more about the topics he discusses and delve deeper into the context. We must neutralise the populist discourse by understanding what led to so many years of peace. It is important not to regress.
This yodelling video is currently the number one trending video on youtube. I am unclear on whether it is for Switzerland or a bigger region. A small tractor is driving up a Swiss Alpine road with a group of yodelers sitting in a trailer. A car with Ma Cherie playing on the radio overtakes and the yodelers start to yodel the song. This video is on the Canton de Valais Youtube account.