Now I want you to consider, just for a moment, what you have in common with a Marmoset.
Of course there are the normal “we’re all mammal” things – we all communicate
and get goosebumps and eat and groom – but you, specifically, share another interest.
You both like watching YouTube videos.
A few years back, a group of researchers gave a group of Marmosets an experimental fruit
contraption.
You could open it by either pulling or pushing on different parts of it, but it was tricky
to figure out without instructions.
So, the monkeys were shown how-to videos, of other monkeys they didn’t know who’d
been trained to open the contraption.
And this worked – 11 of the 12 monkeys relied on the video to open the fruit contraption.
Only one figured it out themself.
While the how-to clips were not streamed on YouTube, one could argue that they were created
in the aesthetic of YouTube, that they sparked curiosity, facilitated social learning and
had an audience.
When I started this YouTube channel – 5 and a bit years ago in the corner of my bedroom
in Sydney – I had no idea who would watch it, or why, but I’d worked in the classroom
for a long time and I was keen to try a type of experimental learning, to see what was
possible on the internet.
Since then I’ve made 186 videos, people have watched them tens of millions of times
and left 75,000 comments.
And I realised this week that I’ve read all of those 75,000 comments because I care
about what you have to say, the wisdom of the crowd, and I always want to improve what
I’m creating.
I’m slightly terrified of the emotional impact of reading so many comments but in
the past year the comments on my channel have been super thoughtful and hey, I’m still
making videos!
Which brings me to my next point – the Marmoset Youtubers had the luxury of creating their
fruit contraption tutorials in the Brazilian rainforest as part of a fully funded experiment.
And, over the past five years, I’ve managed to make BrainCraft work as a fully funded
experiment – I’m thankful to have had the continued support of PBS Digital Studios
and help from Screen Australia, Google, all the sponsors you’ve seen here – buuut
things will be a little different moving forward.
And now I need your help.
Right now, I don’t have any funding for my YouTube channel for 2019, and I’ve put
this off for as long as possible, but I’ve started a Patreon!
If you’ve enjoyed content here in the past and want to see more in the future, I would
super appreciate your help.
I’m going to keep making videos that help you understand more about your brain, body
and behaviour and how we can all navigate this weird world a little bit better.
Because out of those 75,000 comments, you told me that because of videos on this channel
you’ve gone back to school, improved your marks, changed your bad habits, better understood
your emotions and you just think more.
Which is useful.
So this year, I’m going to be making a couple of videos a month, based in science, that
will be super useful for your everyday life – so we can all communicate better, be more
thoughtful, understand emotions and personality and ourselves.
Please let me know down in the dooblydoo if you have any requests, or questions, or if
you just want to write anything at all so we can hit 76,000 comments.
Or if you want me to make more videos about experimental fruit contraptions.
If Marmosets can learn useful life skills from videos, there’s hope for us all.