[HN Gopher] Top 70000 educational YouTube channels in 20 languag...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Top 70000 educational YouTube channels in 20 languages by category
        
       Author : askytb
       Score  : 183 points
       Date   : 2022-11-04 17:02 UTC (6 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (limnology.co)
 (TXT) w3m dump (limnology.co)
        
       | phyrex wrote:
       | The Chinese version distinguishes simplified from traditional
       | characters. It shouldn't do that.
       | 
       | The German version is a little meh. Top categories are something
       | like "howto". It seems like you used a very simple word-based
       | algorithm to create the categories?
        
       | photochemsyn wrote:
       | Great resource, found a lot of interesting videos already.
       | 
       | One suggestion is to include video length in the individual video
       | display, as most of the very short videos aren't that useful.
        
       | truly wrote:
       | This is great and very useful to me!
       | 
       | What source are you getting the channels from?
       | 
       | And how do you choose which channel goes in?
        
       | blinding-streak wrote:
       | Great idea. Bookmarked. Thanks for building and sharing it.
        
       | proee wrote:
       | This is _exactly_ how I wish YouTube allowed me to browse for
       | videos! Great resource. Does anyone on HN have additional
       | resources that allow for content discovery?
        
         | conzept wrote:
         | I'm creating an encyclopedia based on Wikipedia, Wikidata,
         | YouTube and many other sources of information. For each of the
         | millions of topics in a language-wiki, the software renders a
         | "topic card" with thematic sections, each containing links to
         | other content. Link: https://conze.pt
        
         | nileshtrivedi wrote:
         | My own attempt https://learnawesome.org/ (repo:
         | https://github.com/learn-awesome/learndb )
        
       | ElijahLynn wrote:
       | TKT Talk under English > Music here,
       | https://limnology.co/en/languages/en/keywords/music, is not in
       | English.
       | 
       | Not sure how to report an incorrect listing on your site, would
       | be good to better surface how to do that.
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | I'll add a report button, it definitely needs it. All of that
         | data is from the the youtube channels themselves and _a lot_ of
         | them mislabel things, even such basic ones as their channel's
         | language.
        
           | ElijahLynn wrote:
           | Thanks!
        
       | rajeshp1986 wrote:
       | This is pretty awesome. One small feedback, I noticed how there
       | are multiple tags indicating same kind of content. for ex -
       | "Mathematics" and "math". Combining these would be useful.
        
       | gingerlime wrote:
       | Looks cool! curious how you sourced and tagged the channels?
       | 
       | We have a few popular anatomy channels in different languages[0],
       | but I couldn't find any of our videos when searching for
       | "anatomy" and also results were quite mixed. Some videos were
       | quite unrelated or very loosely related at best.
       | 
       | [0] main one in English
       | https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHn_K1zOBYZqtmIYkXLEIQw
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | It's in the database:
         | https://limnology.co/en/creators/UCHn_K1zOBYZqtmIYkXLEIQw
         | 
         | And on the second page for the anatomy keyword
         | https://limnology.co/en/languages/en/keywords/anatomy?page=2
         | 
         | I think it got somewhat downranked because of the recent
         | views/subscribers mismatch
        
       | spaniard89277 wrote:
       | This is good:
       | https://limnology.co/es/creators/UCjtUS7-SZTi6pXjUbzGHQCg
       | 
       | It would be cool to be able to find similar channels in other
       | languages, but I can see how that would be challenging.
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | Yeah, that is something I'd love to implement but so far could
         | not figure it out, even simply interlinking the keywords across
         | 20 different languages is very non-trivial
        
       | shirononon_ wrote:
       | AI has already digitized these videos a countless number of times
       | why are we slow to implement this as an algorithm into the
       | genetic code of a fish which we may then stick into our ear to
       | perform any spoken translation to us.
       | 
       | We will probably have similar for eyeballs one day but they may
       | be more invasive.
        
       | repple wrote:
       | Thanks so much! Appreciate you doing this.
        
       | kosmet wrote:
       | I think this list shows that how overwhelming the amount of
       | resources to learn but we have so limited time. I think Duolingo
       | style learning paths are way to go because we need to minimize
       | the time to learn something. These kind of dumps are of no use
       | except for bookmarking and feeling good.
        
         | vitorsr wrote:
         | I had the opposite reaction. I think this list shows what is
         | passable as educational nowadays. I would personally be very
         | cautious to consider anything included as edutainment, never
         | mind educational.
         | 
         | I took some time to peruse the list after topics for which I
         | took formal education and could not find a single useful
         | channel.
         | 
         | The only very few exceptions to the rule are MIT OCW kind of
         | channels where universities include playlists with footage of
         | undergraduate courses.
        
         | frozencell wrote:
         | Can you get a job watching 1000 hours of YouTube?
        
           | kosmet wrote:
           | Good point. Learning mostly occurs during the active parts
           | where no YouTube video can provide. I think that's why
           | universities will live a lot longer than people think.
        
       | okdood64 wrote:
       | As a YouTube addict, this is one of the greatest things I've ever
       | seen. Thank you!
        
       | beefman wrote:
       | Under English, you have both "diy" and "do it yourself", as well
       | as "english" and "learn english".
        
       | trts wrote:
       | Amazing headline. It reminds me about a joke from a Futurama
       | episode, from the late 90s, while Fry is channel surfing
       | intergalactic cable, "Sheesh... 40,000 channels and only 150 of
       | them have anything good on."
        
         | mym1990 wrote:
         | If 10,000 people say this but there is little overlap in the
         | channel preferences, suddenly 40,000 channels seems a
         | reasonable number. Point being that there are a wide ranging
         | number of interests, just because it isn't in your niche,
         | doesn't mean it shouldn't be there at all.
        
       | sangupta wrote:
       | Site seems down for me, and isup.me.
        
       | robot wrote:
       | this is very useful, the first video I hit was a very educational
       | one with no fluff.
        
       | fudged71 wrote:
       | Ok now create a vector space of similarity between videos in each
       | category and extract the key points from each video into a
       | summary of each category.
        
       | adhoc_slime wrote:
       | This is alright, I like the category breakdown, it makes browsing
       | great, but its still subject to what _youtube_ considers good
       | content. Which just results in the top content being short-form
       | videos which provide quick-facts, not something I can actually
       | learn with. Not necessarily a bad thing for different categories
       | or if that is what you're seeking in the category but a
       | consequential factor for someone seeking something outside the
       | advertiser-friendly, profit maximizing algorithms.
       | 
       | I just love things the variety of things that fall outside the
       | google-ads algos its so easy to silo our "content" from platforms
       | like this. I browse marginalia [0] just to spice it up and see
       | what else there is out there.
       | 
       | [0] https://search.marginalia.nu/
        
         | jasode wrote:
         | _> Which just results in the top content being short-form
         | videos which provide quick-facts, not something I can actually
         | learn with._
         | 
         | Youtube also has tons of long-form 1+ hours content. There's a
         | recent machine learning video that's _25+ hours_ long and it 's
         | not hidden away in obscurity. It's prominently listed on the
         | 1st page of search results for _" deep learning tutorial"_ :
         | https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=deep+learning+t...
         | 
         | As another example, I got a friend exposed to sewing channels
         | on Youtube. Some content creators create hour-long "sew alongs"
         | which she watches every week now to learn new techniques. It
         | fills in a gap left behind by Public Television since they
         | don't air sewing shows anymore.
         | 
         | Lots of long-form videos in car repairs, woodworking, etc.
         | 
         | EDIT ADD: the 25-hour deep learning video example is this one:
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_ikDlimN6A
         | 
         | ... which was also copied to freeCodeCamp.org channel (the 12th
         | recently uploaded video) :
         | 
         | https://www.youtube.com/c/Freecodecamp/videos
        
           | kencausey wrote:
           | >Youtube also has tons of long-form 1+ hours content. There's
           | a recent machine learning video that's 25+ hours long and
           | it's not hidden away in obscurity. It's prominently listed on
           | the 1st page of search results for "deep learning tutorial" :
           | https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=deep+learning+t.
           | ..
           | 
           | I would be careful with statements like this. I believe that
           | the Youtube search results are tuned by your personal viewing
           | history, and of course just on a general basis the results
           | are subject to change. I don't see the video you are talking
           | about when I do that search, but then I don't know what you
           | mean by 'on the 1st page' since it is an infinite scroll.
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | Try digging deeper into the "Related Keywords" cloud at the
         | top, the narrower is the keyword you pick, the more long-form &
         | technical and the less pop-channell-y stuff you'll see.
        
       | ppjim wrote:
       | Thanks
        
       | worik wrote:
       | I am outraged that the "English" option has the USA flag!
       | 
       | It should be the St. George's cross, or at the very least (and
       | most practically) the Union Jack.
        
         | penguin_booze wrote:
         | Look at me. I'm the captain now.
        
         | bigyikes wrote:
         | It makes sense if you go by size of English-speaking
         | population.
         | 
         | ...but then it might be replaced by an Indian or Nigerian flag
         | in a few decades :)
        
       | nanook wrote:
       | I find it hilarious that "Indian English" is a separate category
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | I had to split it because the sheer size of Indian audiences
         | breaks all the metrics, and yet those videos would not be super
         | relevant in the west as a very large percentage of the Indian
         | educational youtube consists of various kinds of local
         | exam/test preparation channels
        
         | rpastuszak wrote:
         | Why?
         | 
         | IIRC Indian English has almost 250m speakers, which is in the
         | same ballpark as what we'd call American English and has its
         | own, distinct features as much as AmE vs. BrE.
         | 
         | Edit: added context
        
           | hansel_der wrote:
           | seems like you are both right
        
       | visarga wrote:
       | Many of the channels are stale, latest video from one or more
       | years ago.
        
         | allarm wrote:
         | I don't think it's a problem unless it's about some cutting
         | edge technology.
        
       | punnerud wrote:
       | Where are all the Rust videos? Python on top:
       | https://limnology.co/en/languages/en/keywords/programming
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | elil17 wrote:
       | Idea is great but there is a lot of overlap between the tags,
       | e.g. there are six pages of tags for Chinese but half of them are
       | all variants on the same tech topics (e.g. there is a separate
       | tag for Ping Guo , Shou Ji , Dian Nao , and "apple watch").
        
       | samstave wrote:
       | YT is absolute garbage... we should call out the ACTUAL people
       | responsible for just how terrible their UX is.
       | 
       | If anyone is hiring and someone says they did UX at YT - do not
       | hire them.
        
         | johndfsgdgdfg wrote:
         | Thank you for posting this. Moreover Google is a spyware
         | company that holds users hostages for money. I wish Twitch can
         | replace Youtube someday.
        
           | samstave wrote:
           | Yeah, I wasnt calling out YT content - specifically calling
           | out the platform team internally...
        
         | agilob wrote:
         | >anyone is hiring and someone says they did UX at YT - do not
         | hire them.
         | 
         | Unless you and your business care more about monies than what
         | people say on social media, and your company is suddenly making
         | more money then... I guess hire them?
        
       | fazfq wrote:
       | Very cool. Would it be possible to separate South American
       | Spanish from Spanish... Spanish?
        
       | yuy910616 wrote:
       | This is actually pretty awesome! I think the ranking algo is
       | doing a pretty good job. I checked a few categories I follow
       | closely, and the top results match pretty well with how I would
       | personally rank them. And now I'm off to explore other topics.
       | Thanks!
        
       | enumjorge wrote:
       | This is a great resource. One thing to watch out for if you're
       | using this to practice listening skills in a foreign language, is
       | that not all regions seem to be tagged correctly. I clicked on
       | Spanish, then the Mexico tag, and the top video was of someone
       | with a Spanish accent rather than a Mexican or Latin American
       | one.
        
       | tkk23 wrote:
       | How difficult is it to collect user feedback to improve the
       | categorization?
        
       | grammers wrote:
       | Now I'm busy. Thanks for sharing!
        
       | patrickdavey wrote:
       | Awesome - wish it had Dutch!
        
       | dang wrote:
       | This isn't eligible for Show HN - please see
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html - so I've taken that out
       | of the title now.
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | Because it's a "list"? I don't think that's correct, there's
         | ballpark 200k different pages with unique content in that app,
         | that's a lot more than just a list.
        
       | throw_m239339 wrote:
       | Looks cool, how is it curated? Manually or with an algorithm?
        
       | elcapitan wrote:
       | This is great, two suggestions:
       | 
       | - search box on every sub page
       | 
       | - allow for reverse search of channels I know (so I can check out
       | similar channels)
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | Thanks! Search box has been requested multiple times, so will
         | implement, and reverse search is already possible here:
         | https://limnology.co/en/channels
        
           | elcapitan wrote:
           | Ah, no idea how I missed that, thanks!
        
       | derekja wrote:
       | This is great! Thanks!
        
       | zelphirkalt wrote:
       | This is missing something critical: It shows tags, but does not
       | allow to use them like tags. Instead it only allows to use them
       | as categories. One should be able to narrow down results by
       | clicking multiple tags.
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | I did think about it, but my concern was that because I only
         | take a small subset of top keywords for each channel, it's very
         | easy to create a combination of tags that'll show no results.
         | I'll play around with it and see if it makes sense to
         | implement.
        
       | orsenthil wrote:
       | What is the point of 70000 educational channels for an
       | individual?
        
         | znpy wrote:
         | You can pick the one you like in your languay
        
       | spapas82 wrote:
       | Can you also add greek? I'm always on the look for good content
       | for my children but can't find much in my language :(
        
         | askytb wrote:
         | Unfortunately all the other languages have too few results, I
         | just checked and Greek only has 0.7% as many channels as
         | English in the db, so it'd only be a few pages of content
        
         | elkos wrote:
         | I second that "astronio" is pretty good.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2022-11-04 23:03 UTC)