Greetings fellow nerds
As you might have noticed I've recently found the free time and most importantly,
a previously undiscovered cache of neurotransmitters, to make videos again.
I don't know how long the cache will last so let's hope it keeps going for a while.
This video will be channel updates and news.
So pretty boring stuff if you're just here for the science but keep watching if you like updates on where we're going.
First I want to thank all of my subscribers, viewers, youtube members, and patrons.
I know my posting rate is super erratic, with an almost three year hiatus since the last block of videos.
So thanks for still being there.
I'd like to specially thank all my patrons both current and in the past, for all your contributions.
This list of names is all of you, including the former ones.
Patreon has wonderfully included the ability to remember all contributors for all time.
Thanks for your support, even if temporary.
And if you'd like to start then I've included links in the video description.
It has also come to my attention that a fair number of you are reluctant to use patreon for various reasons.
Patreon has indeed made some controversial decisions
and additionally some of you would prefer to make single donations rather than per video contributions.
Fortunately, youtube itself has now offered up a way of doing that with super thanks.
Basically it's a way of giving a one time donation.
Just click on the super thanks icon below this video and set how much you would like to donate.
But I'm not going to ask you for donations on videos yet to come.
Instead, let's review all the videos I've made this year.
We started with a piece of lab equipment, the rotary evaporator, designed to quickly dry or reduce the solvent of large volumes of liquids.
It's one of those unique things that really makes a lab look like a lab.
Then we got a taste of analytical chemistry by performing a titration on hydrogen peroxide to get an exact concentration
and even went through basic error analysis to understand the accuracy and precision of our results.
I redid my potassium chlorate from bleach video.
While nothing new, at least it's in high definition this time.
But using that potassium chlorate we did some synthesis and went through a mini project to figure out how to make potassium permanganate.
There were some failures and false starts, but eventually we figured out how and got these awesome black crystals.
I had to fight my arch enemy, the hotplate stirrer, and fix it yet again but this time the fault was just a broken encoder wheel that just needed a good gluing.
I then went over how to make sulfur dioxide.
It was a good review because later we would use sulfur dioxide to make nitrosylsulfuric acid and in turn make isopropyl nitrite without using sodium nitrite.
I tried to make sodium nitrite from it but failed.
I'll eventually get back to that though, maybe that's something for 2024.
For fun we repeated the test tube thunderstorm reaction in a beaker.
Yes, despite having a Ph.D. in chemistry I am still easily amused.
We also explored the chemistry of flameless ration heaters.
They're basically chemical heaters for food.
We couldn't reproduce the exact chemistry of the real ones but we could make similarly hot ones with household chemistry.
There are even more chemistries available so maybe i'll revisit this topic in the future.
Then we got to my first 100k video for many years, the oxygen candle.
This was a simple pyrotechnic mixture that actually makes more oxygen than it consumes.
It's used to provide emergency or backup air in submarines and space stations.
It's so ubiquitous that it's even had its own set of accidents over the years.
Finally, last video of the year was the promethean match, the ancestor to modern matches.
A lot of labor to make and not very reliable, or even safe.
But they do sometimes work and are an interesting historical stepping stone to modern matches.
So those were all my videos for this year.
If you're making a donation through super thanks, then do it based on what you think those videos were worth.
I don't know what's going to happen in the coming year.
I hope to try and match or exceed 2023 but there is a chance I get nothing done in 2024.
Donate for what has already been delivered.
I'm thinking of doing this donation drive every year as long as I have at least ten videos or so to show for it.
Let me know if that's a good idea or not.
But let me know in the comments what was your favorite video or what video you found most interesting.
Is there anything you want me to follow up on?
Of all the videos I made this year,
I think the video where I found the concentration of hydrogen peroxide by titration was the one i'm most proud of.
I was able to get reasonably good analytical results from just amateur grade chemicals and even quantify the error limits.
I liked that I could bring an analytical tool to the amateur chemist and also introduce gravimetric titration,
which is actually a rather obscure type of titration but is perfect for the limited toolset of the amateur chemist.
The video I had the most fun making was the oxygen candle.
And I'm sure it's obvious why, it's fire, and I like fire.
The video I had the most trouble with was one you didn't get to see because of it.
It was a video on copper refining.
I accidentally destroyed the melting furnace I was using to melt the copper.
I'm sure you metal refiners are probably laughing at my stupidity.
And I also had trouble during the electrorefining step because I couldn't get the right additives to make it form solid copper.
I'm still working on that one and I'll get back to that project in the coming year.
Another terrible compilation of failures was a video on trying to start fire without matches using chemsitry.
I was aiming for ten, but i could only get four to work, so i just discarded that video.
So what are my plans for the coming year?
In addition to the copper refining work, I want to revisit alkali metal synthesis chemistry.
I seem to be the unofficial youtube expert on the alcohol catalyzed magnesium reduction process.
I might try and do potassium next after I finish up the sodium work.
It's been years since my last update.
And i know a lot of you want this project to continue.
I'll try and do some precious metal chemistry with platinum and palladium.
I'm very sorry to the viewer that donated a palladium bar and I never got around to it.
I hope to get back to it soon.
Beyond that I do have a few organic chemistry and catalysis projects, as well as electrochemistry.
But those are still on the development stage with no solid outline.
I still have the long term goal of getting to one million subs.
I know my channel has been stagnant for the past several years, I think if i'm more consistent in my video output I could get there.
But who knows, I might run out of time or neurotransmitters before then.
We'll see.
For some light hearted funny news now.
South Korea banned my "how chemists light a barbecue" video.
A whole country thought my video should not be shown.
I'm not even mad, I'm actually kind of honored to have stepped up a level in infamy.
Just for that, I think I might start diving into cannabis chemistry just to see what else I'll get banned for.
It's perfectly legal in Canada, but not so legal in many parts of the world.
On a different note, some people have asked just how much revenue this channel makes.
How much does a chemistry channel with eight hundred thousand subscribers make in a year.
Let's check out the breakdown.
For all of 2023 I made about $8,623.56 US dollars.
We can also check patreon and add that up to get $10,869.31.
If we total that up we get about $19,492.87 american dollars.
A lot of that money is spent on expenses leaving little profit.
I didn't take any sponsors in 2023, so that's all of it.
I know other channels have lots of sponsors, but I think your attention is too valuable to sell for the mere pittance sponsors keep offering.
So I haven't.
But as you can see from these numbers, i need to work way harder to bring those numbers up.
I'm not sure if those numbers are good or bad for a youtube channel with eight hundred thousand subscribers.
But chemistry youtube channels are still fairly niche to really judge.
So who knows.
But i still need to work way harder, $20k is not even a full time job here in canada.
And that brings me to my final topic for this video, which is actually not about me but about youtube in general.
Just an idle observation that i think is pretty cool.
I might be wrong, but I think we're in a wonderful renaissance for youtube chemistry and maybe even youtube science in general.
I remember the early days when youtube had very few experimental science channels and I was fighting tooth and nail for recognition.
Now we have so many chemistry youtube channels now, doing awesome science and syntheses i could only dream of.
This is the youtube I wanted to watch when I started.
I was once a voice shouting into a void.
Now i'm an insignificant whisper in a chorus of thousands.
And I couldn't be happier.
Anyway, that's my thoughts, numbers, and observations for 2023.
I hope to get more done in 2024.