Add Robot Mechanic to my Resume

About a week ago our upstairs Eufy robot vacuum stopped working. It would start every morning at 8am as scheduled but then beep loudly for about 15 seconds and then just sit there until someone picked it up and put it back on the charger. Upon further inspection, the unit couldn't move forward. It could spin and go backwards but not forward. Having had this experience before, I knew what to do but turned the unit off and let it sit for a week.

This evening I have a number of meetings with Japan that will run quite late and so I thought I would take some time this morning and fix the busted robot vacuum. The first thing I did was clean the brush and wheels. My wife's sewing room is on that floor and the vacuum picks up a lot of string. Surprisingly the brush didn't have too much wrapped around it. The wheels had some. Once I removed all the string, I tested the vacuum. Nope, it still couldn't move forward.

I turned off the Eufy, flipped it over, and set it on my worktable. For the record, my worktable today doubles as my dinning room table at meal times. Next I removed the 8 screws that attach the front bumper to the vacuum. The bumper covers the front 3rd of the device and has about an 8th of an inch of play. I could still move the bumper in and out. When I pulled off the bumper I could see a lot of dust balls and fluff. I pulled out my hand-held vacuum and can of compressed air. Then I cleaned out the front third of the Eufy vacuum. Once everything looked clean, I put my bad pet back together and gave it a test. It worked fine and so I let it loose to clean the floor.

Today's electronics are meant to be disposable. That means when they stop working, you throw them away and buy new ones. Call me a bit old fashioned but I think you should be able to get more than 3 years out of a robot vacuum. Having had them for about a decade now, there really are only a few things that can go wrong. The first is the battery going bad and those are fairly painless to replace. The second is the front bumper getting jammed. To fix that you generally just need to clean it out. If you clean it out and it still won't move forward, you have my permission to throw it away. If you clean it out and you can't figure out how to put the vacuum back together, visit the University of YouTube and you should be able to figure it out. 

A Hacked Instagram Account

I woke up this morning and started the day with my usual routine. Shortly after I got out of bed, my wife received a phone call. I initially thought it to be a work associate but then I discovered her sister called. My wife's Instagram account got hacked and her sister wanted to warn her to update her password. My wife immediately went into her office and changed her Instagram password. My son also sent my wife a text message letting her know her account had been hacked.

Now I will confess that I don't even own an Instagram account so I am not sure how my son and wife's sister knew the account had been hacked. When I talked to my wife she said they both received "Follow" requests and incoherent messages. I assume that meant the hacker tried to contact all of my wife's Instagram connections. If I hacked my wife's account I assure you I would have been much more intelligent in my actions. I probably would have promoted my YouTube channel or something equally beneficial to me.

After changing Instagram credentials my wife logged into her Facebook account and changed her password there. Facebook owns Instagram and the two services are tightly linked and a breach in one account could lead to a breach in the other. Unfortunately my wife's Facebook account initially wouldn't let her change the password. She had to force a security code to be sent her and then she could change it. My guess is that the IP address associated with our Google Fiber account recently updated and it looks to Facebook like my wife is using an unknown computer to access the service. Ultimately my wife updated both Facebook and Instagram login credentials.

Now the question I have is how someone hacked my wife's account in the first place. Unfortunately all I can do is guess. Perhaps they discovered her password that is common with another account. That would be my first guess and underscores the importance of using separate passwords for all of your different logins. Other additional security measures include 2-factor or multi-factor authentication and passphrases that rely on face recognition or fingerprints. Unfortunately we live in a time when passwords may not be enough.

More Comments Equals More Views

Monday I posted another skiing YouTube video listing my top 5 favorite sidecountry ski areas. One thing about throwing out a term like "sidecountry" is that if you ask 10 different people, you may get 11 different responses on what it means. I provided a definition in the video and it is getting several comments. Some people don't agree with my definition and are asking questions.

At first glance, it seems like all of these comments are causing YouTube's algorithm that shares videos to push this new one to the front. I published another video on Saturday about preparing for the upcoming ski season and it doesn't have nearly the traffic even though it came out 2 days before this latest one. My hypothesis is that comments indicate engagement and so they think others will also like the video so YouTube is sharing it more.

All of this traffic for my video suggests I can get more traffic by creating controversial content. That does have a downside though. If people don't like your content, they might disengage from the channel. I also don't like controversy. While it is fine to disagree with an undefined word, there is also the chance people could be offended and I make an extra effort not to offend people.

I plan to watch video views over the next few weeks and see if the trend hold true. I may need to solicit a few of my friends to submit comments and see how that effects outside views. Currently I have a number of new viewers but not any new subscribers. If the number of subscribers increases, that will strengthen my hypothesis. I'll be sure to keep you posted.  

My Latest YouTube Releases

One advantage of working for Sony is that we get 4-day weekends for both Memorial and Labor Day. I like it because we get the Friday off before the Monday holidays and that gives me a bit of extra time to get stuff done. One year I used the that time to go visit Alaska and do some ocean kayaking. This year I did something different: I released 2 YouTube videos.

I woke up on Friday and decided I would try and put out a video in a single day. There is a lot of work that goes into each video and I wasn't sure I could do it but wanted to give it a try. I sat down at my computer and put together a compelling script. Then I recorded the narration. The subject of the video is preparing for the 2025/26 ski season. I came close but didn't quite finish the video in a single day. I had to roll over onto Saturday but got it released that evening.

In order to put out the video quickly, I had to interrupt another video I started creating over a year ago. I liked the topic but just didn't feel the need to get the video out and so it languished on my computer in a half-done state for months. Getting a video put out early in the weekend ignited a desire to finish an update on my second most popular video on the Top 5 Sidecountry Ski Areas of North America. My wife had to do some sewing and so she gave me permission yesterday to sit in front of my computer and finish the video. I completed everything last night and immediately released it.

Of the 2 videos, the Sidecountry one is my favorite. I can't really pinpoint why I didn't finish it earlier. I know one thing that slowed me down was not having enough photo and video content for one of the ski areas. I had to go back through an old photo album and scan pictures from back in the 1980's. I have a really good scanner and once I digitized the images, the video sat uncompleted for months. Perhaps laziness kept me from working on it or I valued spending my time on other pursuits. Ultimately I got it done and in less than 24 hours it has been viewed close to 100 times.

In the past, the closest I have ever released 2 videos is 5 days. This marks the first time I have done it in 2 days. I will be interested to see how that effects the number of views. My channel has about 650 subscribers and I hope to get more. Unfortunately I have not received any new ones since the first video on Friday. Perhaps there is something else I need to do to increase my popularity. Until then, I hope everyone enjoys the videos.

Enjoying the Tour de France for 2025

I have not bothered watching the Tour de France for the past 15 years. I really felt let down when Lance Armstrong admitted to taking performance enhancing drugs. While everyone suspected it, I had hoped he was beyond such tactics. This year I got back into it because of my youngest son. While not a cyclist, he is a runner and appreciates the athletic effort required for such an event.

A lot has changed in the last 15 years. Back then I had a cable television subscription and could watch the Tour on one of the many stations that came into my home. Since then I have ditched cable and rely on Internet streaming for most of my video entertainment. Fortunately NBC Sports is providing 2 levels of coverage on YouTube: Short 10-minute segments with the highlights and stage finish or 40-minute segments with more in-depth action. That is a far cry from waking up early and watching 4 hours of coverage every day for 3 weeks. I have to say that I prefer the shorter highlights.

I originally started following the Tour de France a year before Lance Armstrong started winning the race. I wanted to see how any of the Americans did. I feel myself doing the same thing this year but also enjoying the success of riders from other countries.

One thing I have enjoyed this year is watching the climbs through some of the most difficult terrain suitable for a bike. Here in Utah there are plenty of mountain climbs that rival those in Europe and so I know how difficult it is to get a bike up those hills. Watching the climbs is always part of the highlights. I just wish they would show equal coverage of the descents as that is where the speed is. Back 15 years ago there were some spectacular downhill specialists that really poured on the speed and it made for quite a show. Perhaps I just need to watch the longer segments and will see more descending.

Yes, the tour has been enjoyable this year so far and I am happy I am making the time to watch it. It is probably something I will continue in future years. Being able to have it on in the background while I take care of routine tasks makes it so much easier to watch. 

Top 10 Lists on the Internet

Last year my wife and I planned to climb Mt. Rainier and we had a wonderful time doing so over the 4th of July weekend. This year my wife wanted to do the Rim-2-Rim hike in the Grand Canyon. Unfortunately wildfires in the area have burned the North Rim lodge and so the area will be closed at least until the spring of next year. That makes it tough to do a Rim-2-Rim with one of the rims closed. Now we are looking at alternative trips as it is really depressing not being able to carry out our plans.

Today my wife sent me 15 bucket-list hikes in the USA. While not all of the hikes are in National Parks, some of them are and it is a pretty good list.  I like how it is divided into hard-moderate-and-easy hikes so you can choose them depending upon your ability. While I like the list, my bucket-list of hikes is much different. Yours probably is too. If you do an Internet search for bucket-list hikes, none of the lists will be the same unless one plagiarizes another. That's okay. All Internet lists should only be treated as a starting point, allowing you to cherry pick your favorites and leave off those you have done or know are not your cup of tea.

In my YouTube channel, I list a number of ski areas that make various top 5 lists. While one may think that I view myself as the absolute expert on each of the resorts, the real power of the channel is when others comment about how their list is different than mine. When it comes to the steepest areas in North America I talked about why I removed Squaw Valley, which is now Palisades Tahoe, from the list. I enjoy the friendly comments with others asking me to add it back. I also enjoy all of the other recommendations, which is why I skied Kicking Horse a year ago. The ski area did not disappoint and made it onto an updated list.

When you come across lists of any kind on the Internet, remember that they are not sacred nor infallible. Instead treat them as mere suggestions. They are starting points for you to create your own lists. My wife and I have a list of vacations we would like to take. As we come across lists of interesting places, we see if there are any additions or changes we need to make. Ultimately our list will become better because of the suggestions of others.

Back to the University of YouTube

Once again my youngest daughter came to me with a car problem she needed help with: replacing a headlight bulb. One nice thing about modern cars is how well they do keeping dirt and debris out of the engine compartment. The downside is that it is not very intuitive on how to do simple things like replacing a headlight. Before committing to the work, I looked on YouTube at the process of replacing a headlight on her Jeep Cherokee.

The first video I found had a very encouraging sign: the video came in at 3 minutes. That indicated it would be a fairly simple job. I watched all 3 minutes of the video and learned the very important trick to get to bulb. While I would have tried to go in through the hood, it is actually easier to unscrew 3 bolts and go in through the wheel well. The guy did it in 3 minutes on the video but did some editing to remove some of the boring parts. I estimated it would take me 10 minutes. I found time in my schedule and texted my daughter when she should come over so we could work on her car.

My daughter arrived with the new bulb and we did the work in my driveway. Fortunately we had a bit of a warm spell this week and I didn't need to bundle up. We worked together and quickly had the old bulb removed. As you should never let oil from your fingers get on a new headlight bulb, I ran inside quickly to get a single disposable glove so I could handle the new bulb safely. Then we reversed the process and had the new bulb in quickly. It would have gone 30 seconds faster if I had remembered that you turn to the right to tighten. Once I figured that out, the car went back together easily.

When I added up the time it took me to research the most efficient way to change the headlight bulb and the time to actually do the work, I figured I saved myself about an hour. Yes I could have gone in through the hood and figured out how to change the bulb thanks to my skinny hands. I probably would have lost a lot of skin and learned a dozen new expletives so I'm glad I took the time to do a bit of research.

Daytime Television Blows

Last night I got a nasty case of the stomach flu. I woke up every 90 minutes to empty my stomach contents. Fortunately towards the end of the night, my stomach would cramp up, waking me, but I didn't need to go pray to the porcelain god. I think my body recognized I didn't have anything else to expel. I ended up staying in bed until 8am, which is late considering I usually get up at 6am. When I finally did wake up, I didn't feel like doing anything and so I turned on the television to see what I could find on broadcast TV. From the title of this post you can tell I came away disappointed.

When all of the streaming services became ubiquitous, I cancelled my cable subscription and increased my Internet speed. Now I really only use broadcast television to watch the nightly news every evening. Being too lazy to look for something to watch online, I cycled through the normal TV channels. Some of them had local news shows and others had national morning news shows. None of them interested me. I looked at a few of the public broadcasting networks and again came away disappointed. Ultimately after 30 minutes I turned off the TV and headed to my office to read e-mail.

I did the bare minimum e-mail for work and attended an hour-long meeting that got shortened to 15 minutes when I explained I spent the night with the stomach flu. Then I headed to my TV room to watch what I wanted in the comfort of my soft-padded-leather couches. While I could watch shows coming over the airwaves, I also had all of my streaming services including Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, and even YouTube. I entertained myself while eating a very soft and bland breakfast without the hassle of channel surfing. After about an hour and seeing that all the food I ate stayed down, I ate some grapes and yogurt as my energy is low and my stomach empty.

I have not really watched daytime-broadcast TV in about a decade and I have to say I haven't missed much. It is filled with the same programming I used to hate when I stayed home from school because of illness. Fortunately we have many more entertainment options and are not stuck watching VHS video tapes with their lousy 320x240-pixel resolution. Technology really does make being sick easier to deal with.

Coming Together After Such A Publicized Election

My wife spent Tuesday in bed with a nasty case of the stomach flu. Rather than keep her awake in our bedroom by watching the election results, I migrated to the guest bedroom with another TV and viewed the news. While the country focused on the presidential race, I hoped to find out how some of our local elections fared. Unfortunately the majority of the news focused on who would become the nation's next president.

My wife is surprised at how much time I spent focused on this year's election. She is the Political Science major and so I usually just ask her who to vote for. This year I felt the need to do my own research and decide for myself the best candidates. In the past two presidential elections I felt I couldn't vote for any of the candidates and wrote in "Tom Hanks." He's a likeable guy and would probably win if he ever decided to run. I know that I threw my vote away and so this year I wanted to vote for someone that represented what I want to see in the government.

One thing I noticed while doing research is that you cannot trust the mainstream media for fair and unbiased reporting. We all have our favorite candidates and adjust the narrative to reinforce our position. It is a natural human trait and I can't fault the journalists for doing so. Unfortunately the CBS news show "60 Minutes" crossed the line with their interview of a presidential candidate. A question was asked and the candidate responded. 60 Minutes then went back and edited the answer. The answer they put in came from a completely different question. It is only because of the Internet that we have both answers and know the gravity of what took place. It is important to note that I do not fault the candidate for the actions of 60 Minutes. Decades of journalistic integrity disappeared after this stunt and I have stopped watching any news show from CBS.

After doing my own research, I discovered it takes a lot of work to find out what the truth really is. Truths have been reported as lies and in other situations, lies have been spread unchecked. The unfortunate result of all these lies is that the public has become polarized to the point of hating the other side. Once the emotion of hate enters our minds, it is difficult for logic to temper our actions. 

Now that the election is over, I have seen both sides trying to do the right thing. The winner seems gracious and the name calling has stopped. The loser seems gracious and is encouraging her supporters to continue to push for the changes she hoped to enact if she had won. Unfortunately there are a number of people on the Internet sharing videos of themselves reacting emotionally to the outcome. I started watching a YouTube video created by someone whose candidate won and it showed all of the emotional breakdowns of those who supported the other candidate. I didn't watch long as I found it to be in poor taste. Instead of gloating over a win and delighting in the suffering of the other side, we should all be reaching out and trying to understand the issues others felt so strongly about and why.

I did not watch the second presidential debate in this election cycle but I did watch the only VP debate. I came away having more respect for both candidates. While I had vilified one candidate thanks to the news, I realized both candidates agreed significantly and that put us all on more common ground than I originally thought.

My hope is that we can all come together and accomplish great things. Feelings may be hurt because a friend or family member voted for the other side. Now that the election is over, I hope we can forgive and rekindle those important relationships.

Different Vacations

For the past year I have been training to climb Mt. Rainier. Now that the trip is over I find myself with a lot of extra time in the evenings and on weekends. This is both a blessing and a curse. While the training for climbing a mountain overwhelmed my schedule, it provided a needed focus in my life. While I have another vacation approaching, it is much less physically demanding.

In September I will be headed to Disney World with two of my grandchildren and wife. I am making sure to keep up on my evening walks so we won't get tired by all the walking we plan to do. I am also leveraging online resources to help plan the event. With Mt. Rainier, I utilized a lot of material from the Uphill Athlete. With Disney World, there are a lot of YouTube videos to help with the preparation. Fortunately most of the work can be done on the computer while relaxing on the couch.

Tomorrow starts a week of getting on the Internet early and making dining reservations to maximize my grand-kids' time with princesses and themed meals. It won't be nearly as physically draining as waking up early and hiking a thousand vertical feet. To be honest, I miss the physical preparation.

I had a friend ask if I am going to let my physical fitness decline now that my Mt. Rainier trip is over. I don't think I can as I have come to enjoy being able to walk up hills faster than I ever have before. As soon as we get some early season snow, I plan to hike up Alta with my skis and do my best to avoid rocks on the way down. There are also a lot of mountain peaks in the area that we couldn't climb earlier in the summer because of dangerous snow. The snow is all but gone and so my wife and I plan summit some of them in the coming days.

Ultimately I need another physical vacation in the next year to train for. Do I pull out my bike and plan for a century ride (that would be 100-miles in a single day) or try for another mountain? My wife has asked about doing Mt. Whitney in California or perhaps Mt. Adams in Washington. Ultimately I have worked hard to achieve this fitness level and while I have joked about sitting on the couch for the next 3 months, I'd prefer to continue improving my fitness.

My Latest YouTube Video

It has been a little over 2 years since I have started publishing YouTube videos in earnest. During that time I have learned a lot. Sometimes you post a video that you think will be popular only to get a handful of views. Then you publish something and it surprises you with the number of people watching it. I suppose after a bit of experience you can guess at what people want to view and may even be right.

I just published my latest YouTube video and I knew it would be popular, which is why I made it. My most popular video is of the Top 5 Steepest Ski Areas in North America. I actually threw in a ski area that deserved to be on the list but one that I expected to remove when I skied someplace with steeper terrain. Unfortunately I didn't find such a place until this year. I quickly put together a new video and published it on Tuesday. Since then I have watched the video's popularity grow and am pleased with the response. I hope that the new content receives as many views as the original which has been played over 100,000 times.

Now the real question is how to drive more traffic to my channel without constantly putting out new versions of the same video? I can go back through and look at my short films in order of popularity and work on a revision of the second most popular one, which is something I am doing. Ideally I need to come up with new content that is equally as compelling to watch as my most popular video. That is tough to do. If it was easy, we would have a lot more original content out of Hollywood and not nearly as many sequels. Fortunately I have found that controversial topics generate a lot more views than safe ones. Let's see if I can come up with such a topic.

Christmas Eve Toy Assembly

My kids are all grown and some even have kids of their own. That doesn't mean I won't be assembling toys this evening. I think it is a time-honored tradition to wait until the last minute before wrapping and assembling toys for Christmas morning.

Fortunately parents of today have a number of options to help them for those hard-to-build toys. A simple Internet search will yield Reddit threads and YouTube videos to help you create a magical morning for your children. The trick is to make sure you have all the necessary parts and tools. Nothing is more difficult for a child than waking up Christmas morning and not being able to play with your new toy because of missing batteries.

Last night I did a walk around my neighborhood and saw a fellow grandparent putting together a playhouse. I heard the the sound of a drill tightening wood screws and saw the nearly completed structure, sans roof in the open garage. Today I saw him again and asked about the spectacular gift. Things are going well and he is glad he began the project a bit early. He should be finished up by about the same time Santa gifts are expected under the tree.

University of YouTube

The check-engine light on my daughter's Jeep Cherokee came on and so I had her use my OBD2 reader to pull the code from the computer. Sometimes the code is a $2000 problem and other times it is a $20 one. She checked the code and found it to be closer to $20 than $2000. The code she pulled is P0128 which indicates that the engine never gets up to the proper operating temperature. Generally this means the thermostat needs to be replaced.

There are a number of tests to verify the problem. If the car is overheating or running cold, that is a good indicator the thermostat is bad. In my daughter's case it is running cold, which means that the thermostat has failed in the open position, which is what it is engineered to do. The final test is to feel the hoses going to and from the engine. If they are both cold, then it is not a temperature sensor problem. My daughter ran through the diagnostic and we are sure the thermostat needs to be replaced.

Now we have two options. We can take the car to a trusted mechanic and pay $300 to have them replace the part or we can buy the part from the auto store and do the work ourselves. Like most of us, my daughter is not made of money and would prefer to save $250 and do the work ourselves. Thermostats generally run about $10 but the Jeep Cherokee requires one to replace the entire thermostat housing at a cost of around $50. It is $42 if you buy an aftermarket part or $63 if you buy the original part from the dealership. At such a low cost differential, I suggested my daughter use an original part.

This evening I spent some time going through YouTube videos on how to pull off the old part and replace the new one. Unfortunately Jeep did a very poor job of making the repair easy. You have to remove a number of different pieces and have useful socket-set attachments, all of which I have. After reviewing the videos, I know it will take a couple of hours but is not an overwhelmingly difficult job. The trick will be to remove as many parts as possible and being able to work hands into cramped spaces.

One nice thing about YouTube is there are a number of do-it-yourself auto mechanics willing to show you the steps for engine repair. They will also show you various tips and tricks to help make the job easier. If you review the videos and feel the job is beyond your skill set, then feel free to back away and leave it to qualified professionals.

Trending Content: Good or Bad

Yesterday I had a meeting right in the middle of my morning and so I couldn't go out on my usual morning bike ride. At this time of the year, it gets too hot to ride much past 11am and the roads are too crowded before 9am. Instead of riding outside I rode in my nice-cool basement.

To help keep boredom away and excitement levels up during my exercise routine, I listened to music. Sometimes I listen to Pandora and other times Spotify. I don't pay for either service and so I get the pleasure of listening to ads and I do my best to ignore them. Yesterday I had one ad catch my attention. It talked about trending content and if you listened to this particular podcast you would know about all the latest Internet content that everyone is following. That got me wondering if trending is a good thing or not.

I have a friend that I used to work with that despised trending content. He likened it to everyone being sheep and following each other around. He's not wrong as there is a lot to be said for individuality. Given the relative ease of selecting your own music content, shouldn't we all have highly specialized music playlists with only our favorite songs. There are a lot of popular songs that I just can't stand and none of them are on my playlists.

The flip side of individual content is that of discovery. How do you know if you should listen to a new song? A coworker of mine that does a lot of work in the music industry listens to a lot of different music just to make sure she doesn't miss something new that she might like. If you always listen to the same songs, they become routine and eventually like all the other pop music played on the radio that everyone has come to hate.

There are a few songs that come to mind when I think about trending music. The first time I heard "Shut Up and Dance" from Walk the Moon, I instantly liked it. I didn't need to hear it a million times. However without it trending, I wouldn't have ever heard it in the first place.

We live in a wonderful time where we can choose what music we listen to. We can do the same with movies, television shows, and YouTube videos. We are not constrained by being forced to watch or listen to that content on someone else's schedule because we can stream it at will. We also don't have to be influenced by what is popular. However we can let trending content help us decide if it is worthy of our time. Like I wrote, it is a wonderful time right now.

Carnage and Destruction

Last week I tried to ski every morning before work only to have my plans thwarted by avalanche danger. The huge snowfall coupled with rapidly warming temperatures created an unsafe environment for driving the canyon between the Salt Lake valley and the ski areas up Little Cottonwood Canyon, Snowbird and Alta. For the first 3 days, I could go to a safe area closer to home and tour to Alien Tower at the top of Suncrest in Draper. Then the warming temperatures melted a lot of snow and I decided it was no longer worth it. I waited patiently and was rewarded on Saturday morning with a safe window where the canyon opened enough to drive to Alta. Then I had to wait until the sun went down for them to open it again. It meant hanging out at Alta until after 7pm even though the lifts stopped running at 4:30.

As the canyon is closed again this morning and probably won't open until Saturday, I used my early morning time to create a video of Saturday's drive up to Alta where I filmed about 80% of the trip. In the video you can see most of the avalanches that crossed the road during the previous week. I missed the first one which is when I decided that I should probably pull out my phone and capture video as others might be interested in the carnage and destruction.

What is it about carnage and destruction that attracts viewers to video sites like YouTube? I get a lot of views of my skiing videos but this one will probably turn out to be one of my most popular. Should someone ask how to get a bazillion views of their video, I would recommend including natural disasters or other train-wreck ideas. People just can't help but watch.

A Case for YouTube Videos

Several days ago my truck informed me I needed to change the oil. I managed to get into the specialty service station on Christmas Eve as the establishment had no customers at the time. The last time I had the service performed, they had me stay in my car but this time they invited me into their 4-person waiting room. They had a television going with various YouTube videos playing.

My oil change only took a few minutes and I have to say that I enjoyed watching some of the YouTube videos while I waited. I didn't have the option of selecting which videos I wanted to see. Instead the television just showed some of the popular videos that only lasted a few minutes each. The first video showed some guys in Australia that have a large tower where they drop various objects. The series I watched extolled the virtues of some really strong tape. They made a landing platform out of the tape on a steel frame. The objects started out small like a ball made out of rubber bands. The tape held and so they moved up to larger objects. Next came a small anvil and once again the tape held. They progressed through a number of objects with the final item dropped being a giant 500 pound fist made of metal. The tape didn't break but it did lose its grip on the metal frame.

The interesting thing about the videos is that anyone could walk in for a service appointment and not require any background as to what is going on. When it is time to leave, you don't feel like you are going to miss something important. If you really want to see what happens as the objects get larger, you can just go home and pull it up on YouTube.

I came out of the oil change feeling entertained and like the service happened quickly. As someone that creates YouTube content I now have something to aspire to. Perhaps someday I will create a video interesting enough that strangers getting an oil change will enjoy watching it.

My Personal Dashboard

I do a bit of volunteer work using my amateur radio skills. Sometimes this allows me entrance into community emergency operations centers or EOCs. They tend to look like NASA's mission control or at least what we see of it in movies. There are generally large screens showing all sorts of information that is helpful for dealing with an emergency that might be taking place.

Lately I have been thinking about information I find useful as I go about my daily routine. After all, I generally spend most of my day at my computer for work and have my personal computer next to my work one. I thought I would give a rundown of what my personal dashboard looks like in the hopes of giving others ideas of what might help them.

I would say that the most often visited application on my personal computer is my e-mail. About 90% of the e-mail I get is immediately deleted and so while I spend a lot of time looking at it, the information isn't that useful. 

Next I have my web browser open and have 4 tabs that I constantly view. It doesn't matter if it is summer or winter, I am always looking at 4 websites. One of those is weather.gov. This is where most news organizations get their information and so instead of picking my favorite local site, I just go to the source. In the winter, I focus on the forecast for Alta ski resort. In the summer, I shift down to my own neighborhood.

The second website I check is for my stock portfolio. Right now the market is pretty depressed and so I only check it daily. When the market is up, I probably check it 3 or 4 times a day. Naturally when I am looking to invest, I spend a lot of time here.

My third website is that of my YouTube channel. I like to see if I have any comments to respond to as well as see how many people are viewing any of my videos. I don't have a lot of daily views but it is interesting to see trends and how the weather effects the number of views. Let's just say that in May of this year I was seeing 8,000 views in a single day.

Finally I have this blog in the 4th tab of my browser. I don't check to see how many views a post is getting. Instead I keep the window open to remind me to post something every few days. I only get about 10 reads of each post and I never get any comments. This is in sharp contrast to my YouTube channel where I average around 150 views every day.

Inventorying what I have in my personal dashboard has me thinking. Are there any other tidbits of information I should be reviewing on a daily basis? Perhaps traffic? As I work out of my home, I don't see the need to keep a traffic map open. It is nice to know it is there if I need it though.

YouTube Season

I seem to have found a bit of a following with my YouTube videos that focus on the Top 5 Ski Areas of North America. That means that ski season is also YouTube season for me. I tried putting together some videos over the summer but discovered I couldn't easily run up to the ski resort and get more content when needed. I have also found that ski videos don't really get watched during the summer.

My most popular video has just passed 70,000 views, which I think is a lot. I know I would get a lot more if I was a 20-year-old girl trying on swimsuits but that isn't what I am interested in sharing. When I look at other ski videos, I am doing fairly well. There are only a few that get more views and most are less than that.

I am also discovering the content the people want to see. The videos I have the most fun making are about backcountry ski trips but they only get a few hundred views. Show something controversial like which resorts have the steepest slopes or the best powder and you rack up the views. Controversy also means you get people disliking your content and leaving mean comments. I try to respond kindly and let them express their opinion. Hopefully it is paying off.

Lately I have been getting some very nice complements from people that seem to like my videos. That is gratifying but I can't let it go to my head. Fortunately there is someone that will come along and tell me I am an idiot for suggesting a particular ski area and so I think I am staying fairly grounded. If I get back up to 8000 views per day like I did at the end of last season, then I can't make any promises.

Thousands of Views on YouTube

Something special happened over the past week with my YouTube channel: I started getting over a thousand views a day on my skiing videos. I was happy to get tens of views and the rise from that number to the thousands only took about five days. I wish I could tell you what happened but I can only guess.

My first guess is based on what happens with sports video games. When the regular season comes to an end, people still want to get their sports fix. In video games they will go back to playing a football game like Madden once the Super Bowl is over. As most of the ski areas in North America have closed down for the season, skiers and snowboarders are left wanting more. They resort to watching ski videos on YouTube. Again, it is just a guess.

Another guess is that I met a popular YouTube personality with around two thousand subscribers. He subscribed to my channel and a lot of his followers might also like my content and so they are viewing my videos based on him subscribing. Again, it is just a guess.

Finally I have spent a lot of time responding to every comment to each of my videos. I am guessing that lots of comments translates into YouTube recommending my content more. As each comment results in my response, the algorithm may see two comments for every user leaving a message. This would indicate that creators responding to viewers helps drive more traffic and it makes sense. All I know is that I am spending about an hour or so each day responding. It can be flattering but I have to find time to get back to everyone. I also discovered that not everyone likes my videos. While I expected people to disagree with ski areas that I list as favorites, I didn't anticipate avalanche nazis telling me I am promoting unsafe backcountry skiing. Don't worry, I'm not. They just want disclaimers all over the place.

Ultimately I am happy with the overwhelmingly positive response and requests of locals to show me around the next time I am at their ski area. Unfortunately I am still a long ways away from being able to quit my job and become a full-time YouTuber. I still need about 650 more subscribers before I can even monetize the channel. Once I hit that mark I expect my monthly income to be somewhere between being able to afford a gumball or a can of soda. In other words, I am not quitting my day job.

Getting More YouTube Views

For the past 5 weeks I have been trying to put out one new video on my YouTube channel every week. The reason is that I wanted to see if frequent posting of content changes the number of views my videos receive. It does and the numbers are interesting.

YouTube provides analytics that I can check whenever I want. Looking at those statistics I see that I used to get roughly tens of recommendations by YouTube for my videos on a daily basis. That means that of all the viewers on YouTube looking for skiing or adventure videos, only ten or so will have the chance to see one of mine. That's not a lot.

When I started posting more videos, that number shot up significantly. As long as I posted weekly, YouTube recommended my content around three to four hundred times per day. Yes some of that can be attributed to the fact that I have more videos to choose from and so I looked at another statistic. I waited 8 days before I posted my video last night. Before posting that video, the number of times YouTube recommended my content had dropped down below a hundred. After posting it, the number of recommendations increased significantly again.

So what does all of this mean? Simply posting content more frequently gets you more views. I am now trying to figure out a way to post more frequently. Evidence suggests that posting daily would dramatically increase my audience. Unfortunately I put a lot of work into each of my videos and a side-effect of posting more frequently would mean a reduction in quality. I hope that isn't the case as that would mean a bunch of short junk videos would gain a larger audience than longer well-crafted ones. I hope that viewers would be somewhat discriminatory with what they watch.

I will see what I can do to post more frequently without a reduction in quality and see if the data agrees with my hypothesis or not. In any event, I am learning a lot and that is the whole reason I am creating videos.