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Friday Fun Thread for May 31, 2024

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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What's your preferred video watching speed?

I watch most Russian-speaking youtubers at 2x, with just a few fast talkers getting a 1.75x setting. Most English-speaking youtubers are watchable at 1.5x, the most articulate (or non-native Euro speakers) at 1.75x. This guy, however, takes the cake (pun intended). Somehow I can understand him at 1x, struggle to understand him at 1.25x and at 1.5x I might as well be listening to Prisencolinensinainciusol.

2x speed when possible (and I'd probably experiment with a little, but not too much, higher if offered). If they speak too quickly for me to keep up, I'll drop a little to 1.75 or 1.5, or more if needed. I'll drop temporarily and rewatch a portion if something was hard to catch.

But video content feels inefficient, so I try to prefer text, or watching quickly.

People watching videos (at least, ones primarily meant to inform) at 1x speed is kind of crazy to me. How do you sit through that? Why not watch twice as much in that time? At least, for me, 1x speed is, unless there's a very quick speaker, quite a bit slower than what's needed for me to understand—it's at the pace of them speaking, and usually it's faster to understand a sentence than to come up with one. Perhaps that would change if I watched videos on harder to understand topics, like advanced math or something.

I should probably make more use of youtubetranscript.com.

In my case because I'm almost always watch videos in the background and more often than not I already don't have enough to last through the day without repetition.