one-upmanship

Sal Mercogliano of What's Going on With Shipping? discusses a debate between the Center for Maritime Strategy and the Heritage Foundation over whether the Jones Act helps or harms American shipping and national security.

A Jimquisition episode examining the human cost of predatory videogame monetization, focusing on loot boxes and microtransactions. It features testimonials from people harmed by gambling-style game mechanics.

MegaLag investigates PayPal's Honey browser extension, showing how it swaps affiliate attribution and was promoted by large YouTube influencers. It includes technical demonstrations of the affiliate tag replacement in browser dev tools.

Dan Olson of Folding Ideas critiques Fortnite's monetization, arguing it uses manufactured discontent, such as shop design and skins, to push spending. The video dissects the psychological techniques behind the game's business model.

CGP Grey argues that a classroom works well only for the one student pitched at the average level, and sketches a future of personalized instruction. It introduces the idea of a Digital Aristotle, a tutor for every learner.

Linus Tech Tips gives its 2020 breakdown of how the company earns money, including ads, sponsors, merch and affiliate links. It includes a pie chart of revenue sources.

Not Just Bikes looks at the cancelled plan to spend over $200 million widening Wonderland Road, a stroad in his hometown of London, Ontario. He asks whether the cancellation marks a turning point away from car-dependent development.

Linus Tech Tips addresses criticism of its clickbait-style thumbnails in an Honest Answers episode, explaining that the YouTube algorithm pushes creators toward them.

Linus Tech Tips documents a major RAID failure on its Whonnock server and the attempt to recover the lost data with a data recovery firm.

Josh Strife Hayes critiques Diablo Immortal's monetization, arguing it is a gacha game in a Diablo skin with predatory spending mechanics.

Jay Smooth's short video on how to tell someone their words sound racist. He argues for focusing on what the person said or did rather than labeling who they are.

Razbuten has his wife, who has never played games, try a sampling of titles and shows where she struggles. It highlights unspoken game conventions that experienced players take for granted.

Filmmaker Max Joseph's 35-minute video essay asks whether you have to be a jerk to be a successful leader. It draws on Adam Grant's givers and takers, Robert Greene and famous demanding directors.

A 70-minute video essay by Jimmy McGee on gambling, addiction and game design, tracing horse racing, slot machines and collectible card markets. It is the first in a series on making money from games.

Armor expert The Chieftain explains why tanks still have a place on the modern battlefield despite drones and guided weapons. He responds to the 'tank is dead' debate, noting that tanks have been declared dead repeatedly since 1919.

Patrick Boyle analyzes SpaceX's IPO prospectus, covering its financials, speculative products, AI business, related-party dealings, compensation, and a governance structure with minimal shareholder rights.

An hour-plus Some More News episode that critiques Ben Shapiro's arguments and record of errors. It is a long, comedic and opinionated breakdown.

A Jimquisition episode by Jim Sterling demonstrating the Copyright Deadlock, where a video includes footage owned by several companies so that competing YouTube Content ID claims cancel each other out. It highlights how absurd the system is.

Louis Rossmann visits Apple Authorized Service Providers to see what repairs they can actually do. He finds, for example, that an iPhone 6 headphone jack is not repairable and requires an expensive board replacement.

Music YouTuber Rick Beato describes confronting the people behind copyright blocks on one of his videos. The video is a rant about how takedowns and demonetization hit music education channels.

Tom Scott's correction video on his earlier claim that 18th-century insurance firefighters let uninsured buildings burn. After a historian looked into it, he concludes the story was wrong and explains how the error happened.

The Hated One argues that Kurzgesagt acts as a propaganda vehicle for its billionaire-linked sponsors, citing funding it received. The video prompted a response from Kurzgesagt.

A commentary video by YouTuber PaymoneyWubby reacting to children's content on the Musical.ly app, which became TikTok. It highlights the child-safety concerns of young kids dancing on a public social platform.

A one-minute clip of William Shatner trying to describe the awe of space after a Blue Origin flight while Jeff Bezos sprays champagne.

The Hated One argues that Apple tracks users and shares their data despite its privacy marketing, pointing to Apple's own privacy policy. It is a critical take on Apple as a corporation rather than a friend of privacy.

Jonathan Blow's hour-long livestreamed response to a RustConf 2018 closing keynote about entity systems in Rust. He argues that index-based entity systems amount to manual memory management that sidesteps the borrow checker, and he talks about friction for game developers.

A one-minute clip of Slavoj Zizek showing what he calls the official geographical limit between the Balkans and Central Europe, standing at a river in Ljubljana. It is a short, absurd and funny piece of cultural geography.

Joseph Anderson's long critique of Jonathan Blow's puzzle game The Witness, covering its gameplay, its hundreds of puzzles and its philosophical pretensions. He argues it is a great game that he nonetheless advises against playing.

Part one of a two-part skeptical series examining Elon Musk's past business dealings to test whether he is a self-made genius billionaire.

Adam Neely examines Phil Ewell's paper arguing Western music theory is framed by a white racial perspective. He covers North Indian theory, alternative frameworks, Schenker and responses to the paper.

Tom Scott writes a more honest VPN ad, with the sponsor's name redacted, and explains why the typical claims in VPN advertising are misleading. He notes the sponsor was not happy about it.

Folding Ideas uses the rise and fall of the YouTube competitor VidMe to examine why platforms are not friends to creators. It argues that alternatives to big platforms tend to attract the users banned from the original and lack a core vision.

ContraPoints' 35-minute video essay on incels, examining the community, its worldview and how people get radicalized. It is delivered with theatrical style and an empathetic tone.

John Oliver's Last Week Tonight segment on state lotteries. It argues that the claim that lotteries fund education is misleading, because the money is fungible and often diverted to general funds.

FortNine argues that e-bikes have injury rates and speeds closer to motorcycles than to pedal bikes. It argues riders should treat them with similar safety gear and caution.

Miniminuteman begins a long, humorous point-by-point debunking of Graham Hancock's Netflix series Ancient Apocalypse and its claims of a lost ice-age civilization. It is part one of a multi-part critique.

John Oliver's Last Week Tonight segment on televangelists and the 'seed faith' prosperity gospel. It looks at how US tax law lets preachers extract money from poor viewers, and how easy it is to start a church.

hbomberguy investigates the modern flat earth movement and why people come to believe it. The video treats the community with a measured, humorous tone and looks at the social causes behind the belief.

Oh The Urbanity! questions the framing that urban planning reforms like bike lanes and traffic calming wage war on suburbanites. It argues that suburban and urban residents alike want less traffic on their own streets.

A short anarchist-leaning video by Larken Rose arguing that the Constitution and similar documents cannot legitimately grant anyone the right to take other people's property. It uses a rhetorical 'paper that lets me rob you' setup to challenge belief in political authority.