Youtube coffee content.

The thing with YouTube is that there’s a huge audience who just like to watch nice things, and the truth/transparency is secondary. Same with motorbikes, guitars, cameras, I’m sure any other hobby. The majority will watch the videos shot cinematically with the 4k 60fps camera, studio lights, short focal lengths, great colour correction etc, over the guy stating the facts clearly but shooting in his living room with an old smartphone. Of course it’s great when both happen, but entertainment value usually comes first.

Slightly off-topic but in my industry we sometimes reference a principle called ‘The Aesthetic Usability Effect’ which basically says people perceive an experience (in this case design) as better if it looks nicer, even if it’s not technically better.

It’s why James Hoffman has done so well, especially recently. His videos might not be the most useful for those of us wanting an in-depth, honest review of new gear, but they’re usually well shot, informative and quite enjoyable to watch.

I guess similar to the Netflix effect on things. Most of us have watched documentaries on subjects we didn’t think we were interested in because it was been beautifully shot, even if the content is questionable.

Dusk

Yeah 100%.

Creating good niche content for a limited audience (in the grand scheme of the general public) ends up being time consuming for zero to very little financial reward. At that point you’re doing it purely as a hobby or for the benefit of your community and shouldn’t worry about engagement.

If the goal is monetisation, viewership and engagement then why wouldn’t you make content more people will watch.

mathof2 Hoffmann is also different from the other influencers being discussed on this thread in that he hasn’t put all his eggs in the YouTube basket.

He is also not heavily shilling products for financial gain. The amount of shilling going on in the coffee world has increased substantially, so much so, I have been reluctant to make YouTube videos for a long time now. Home Barista is an ideal place for things to be shilled hard because of the North American Market, it’s happened before, is happening now (big time and don’t try and guess the machine) and it will happen in the future.

This shilling and influencers is hugely bad for the world of coffee, especially here in the UK:

• The Chinesium shill (wonder what happened to all the UK coffee resellers, what a shame we have no bricks and mortar companies, if a company set up selling machines and grinders it would do really well etc..). These Chinese companies that sell direct genuinely don’t care…often if you get a bad product you’re stuck with it
• The Chinese burr shill….they are generally not great in big grinders, there, I’ve said it. Lots of fancy words like DLC thrown around etc..perhaps they will become better…perhaps some are good. However don’t trust the likes of Hedrick to know and the Chinese only tell you what they want to generally. Only time will tell
• Useful product development grinds to a halt, sure the easy stuff gets done, but not the difficult stuff, and certainly not the stuff you actually need, but don’t realise you need. It’s all sh*t and shinola as my dad used to say
• so much more but CBA to type it

Grinders - Imagine, we now have a world where it’s OK for grinders to stall on really lightly roasted hard beans, even ones costing £4,000. or grinders you have to run then add beans gradually…this is unbelievable, how on earth did we ever get here and where is the pushback??

Machines that work by magic, with the manufacturers spouting obvious contradictions which are totally unchallenged

Roasters (people) that spring up from nowhere and are brilliant, but have zero experience

Closed forums and groups for products, rather than openness and people don’t seem to worry about that, believing whatever reasons the manufacturer gives. e.g. Ah well “non owners will simply dilute the discussions with irrelevancies”. This is easily solved by making the forums read only but visible to non owners and having a specific area where non owners can ask questions.. Of course the closed forum is about “control”, if you are excommunicated from it, you cannot read anything and in some cases have no support/warranty. I have spoken to many people this has happened to!!

And “we” (royal we) are letting it happen….It’s partly why I set up this place.

I mean this with the greatest respect, as this is by far my favourite coffee forum as the chat seems truthful and friendly;

There are some relationships on here that may not be clear to all members. We know there’s friendships and close involvement with ACS and Niche products. Some people were involved extensively with the testing of the Duo for example.

Obviously regulars notice the people openly talking about their involvement in such products and probably assume those people would be honest if they thought a product they were involved with wasn’t good.

I know none of this is commercially motivated and unpaid, but being completely diplomatic you can see why the suggestion of slight bias has been made on other forums.

Hopefully not the only one who’s thought this on occasion.

DavecUK Funnily enough, I have also had enough of HB. The place is a sham where if it makes money for its owners, then they will allow anything to happen. A new product launched very recently, the main protagonist now has ‘supporter’ status meaning he has made a contribution large enough to their coffers to be protected. God forbid anyone who now criticises them and their shilled product.

It is such a refreshing change to log on to here where there are no commercial pressures. I do not think any other forums are run this way meaning it’s members who are on forums elsewhere are used to being bombarded with money making schemes.