[DISCUSS] Pros/cons of videos for technical documentation?
[DISCUSS] Pros/cons of videos for technical documentation?
You probably have already noticed that nowadays it's becoming fashionable online to share technical material via videos (eg YouTube.)
I somehow can understand the appeal of creating videos for sharing thoughts/news, esp b/c it takes way less time and focus compared to writing things (just hit the record button and go.)
But videos are
👎 not index-able (at least locally)
👎 not searchable
👎 not copy-paste friendly if at all
👎 impossible to skim through
👎 a major distraction from the train of thoughts
IMO, in most cases, the more effective and impactful medium of technical comms is the written form: a Mastodon toot, a blog post, a gist, a Pastebin entry or even a Facebook post!
What are your thoughts?
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For me personally it's easier to watch a video than to read a blog post or whatever these days. That's mostly because I can listen/watch while doing chores. However, if I need to use it later there's just no way I can find it or find what was in it. I like the format of Theprimeagen in particular when he goes over blog posts, I can always refer to that when I want to. So I'd say:
- videos as a replacement for written media: no
- videos as an addition to written media: yes
I think Supabase does this well. The documentation is there, videos are more specific and lengthy
So as entertainment it's great, as technical reference it's terrible?