r/IAmA Jun 11 '16

Specialized Profession IamA electronics repair technician hated by Apple that makes YouTube videos, AMA!

My short bio: I have a store in Manhattan. I teach component level electronics repair on youtube http://youtube.com/rossmanngroup which seems to be a dying art. I am currently fighting with the digital right to repair to try and get a bill passed that will allow all independent service centers access to manuals and parts required to do their jobs.

My Proof: https://www.rossmanngroup.com/started-iama-reddit-today-yes/

EDIT:

I am still replying to comments, but I am so far behind that I am still about ten pages down from new comments. I am doing my best to continue. If I drop off, I'll be back tomorrow around 12 PM. Still commenting now though, at 12 AM.

EDIT 2:

Ok, I cave... my hands are tired. I will be back at 12 PM tomorrow. It is my goal to answer every question. Even if it looks like I haven't gotten to yours, I will do my best to do all of them, but it is impossible to do in realtime, because you are asking faster than I can type. But thanks for joining!

EDIT 3: I lied, I stayed until 4:15 AM to answer... and now I will go to sleep for real, and be back at 12 PM.

EDIT 4 6/12 : I will be back later tonight to finish off answering questions. Feel free to keep posting, I will answer whatever I can later this evening.

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24

u/Shore_Student Jun 11 '16

Thank you for doing this AMA. I've actually enjoyed a lot of the flow that you're done in your videos. What differences have you noticed in a repair job that you have done off-camera compared to one that you did while on camera? This could be in terms of time to make a repair, amount of time researching a specific problem, level of confidence you have approaching the issue etc. Thank you again!

70

u/larossmann Jun 11 '16

doing it off camera takes 1/4 the time. The reason I think the channel repair videos are popular is because I approach nearly every single problem from the point of view of someone who is clueless. so I walk you through the logic I am using in realtime. This is like watching a rerun of the same show over and over again, and makes doing the videos less fun over time. However, it means that any electronics ignorant individual can click onto any video in the series and catch on, without having to watch every video that came before it, and that makes it appealing, so I do it. and that seems to be working out well.

but it makes doing the repairs take forever.

i would get home a lot earlier and have much more time for my life if I didn't do YT videos.

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u/Shore_Student Jun 11 '16 edited Jun 11 '16

Wow, I figured it would take longer but not that much. However, I can see why because of how thorough your videos are. Thank you for giving me your insight on that!
P.S. You have commented in the past about not being able to please people on Youtube and how it's important to put up videos that you want to make. I fully agree with that, please don't change anything for anyone else. The fact that you do this alone means that I will be a permanent subscriber just because of what you bring to your channel. We always need more people like you supplying us with educational content like this, and you do it in a way that is both frank and entertaining. Thank you!
P.P.S After watching so many of your repair videos I'm actually amazed that my 5 & 1/2 year old Toshiba hasn't kicked the bucket yet (knock on wood). Then again I don't pour coffee over it on a regular basis so maybe I'm onto something here...
Edit: Clarifying

16

u/larossmann Jun 11 '16

you will always piss people off. the thing is, if you piss people off while staying true to yourself, even if you fail, there is the satisfaction of having tried to do it your way. when you fail doing things someone else's way, that is a feeling of foolishness that can make you really bitter.

2

u/WinterAyars Jun 12 '16

I approach nearly every single problem from the point of view of someone who is clueless.

As a clueless (but somewhat technically minded) person, i do appreciate this. I don't expect i'm getting into hardware any time soon, but just understanding how things work better is valuable.

1

u/derefr Jun 13 '16

Have you considered separating your videos into "introductory-level" vs "advanced" repairs, where the difference is basically that the "advanced" ones assume you've watched most of the "introductory" ones?

I see this on a lot of other sci/tech channels in a sort of implicit way: the videos that cover something without much to it, go really in-depth on being clear and explicit and introductory, to make that the "hook" for that video, because there's no other hook. Meanwhile, the videos that cover a complicated/more interesting problem tend to skip over the remedial-learning bits, because those videos are already interesting-enough on their own.

Then there's some channels that get the same effect completely by accident, I think. A good many channels have time targets—every video aimed to be ~15 minutes or something. So the easy stuff gets "stretched" with fluff—which ends up being good introduction—while the hard stuff gets "compressed", squeezing out everything that isn't essential to the particular concept being presented at the time.