Good morning Hank; it's Sunday, it's news day, and today I'm going to discuss the rumored demise of the 'you' in 'Youtube'.

But first, important messages for nerdfighters in Philadelphia or Australia! I'm going to be talking and signing copies of my books this Saturday at the Philadelphia Book Festival at 3:30pm, more info in the sidebar – and there's going to be an awesome nerdfightastic nerdfighter gathering on Sunday, May 31st in Melbourne, Australia, featuring me! Yay!

Australia! So Hank, you might be wondering why I dressed up for my video today – it's because I'm trying to make us more attractive to advertisers. But I'm not wearing any pants; you can't make me wear pants, advertisers!

Hank, it's been widely reported that this Thursday, Youtube is going to launch a major redesign of this site that will emphasize professional content over user-generated content. The reports say that there will now be four tabs: there will be TV, movies, music, and then videos, and then all of the user-generated content will be in that 'videos' tab. And so the site will begin emphasizing more television shows, and feature-length movies, and music videos, not so much because that's what people want to watch, but because that's what advertisers want to advertise next to.

And of course the entire Youtube community is going to be furious about this – because, well, first, because that's what the Youtube Community does – it gets furious. And secondly they'll be furious because this new redesign hurts the little guy – but it's strange to me that we think that Youtube has a responsibility to the little guy. Corporations are not in the business of being awesome – they exist to make money, and according to almost every analyst on Wall Street, Youtube looses money hand over fist!

Because it turns out that tens of millions of people want to watch squirrels water-skiing for free, but it's difficult to monetize those views because Lucky Charms doesn't want to associate their brand with water-skiing squirrels. Advertisers want to be associated with, like, American Dad, and Bones. So for the number of views that it takes Youtube to make a dollar, a site like Hulu, that features television shows, can make ten dollars.

So Hank, I find it hard to get mad at Youtube for wanting to stop loosing money. But I am a little bit mad at advertisers for thinking that user-generated content can't sell Lucky Charms. I can sell Lucky Charms as well as anybody!

Lucky Charms are like the vampires of breakfast cereal – they're magical, they're delicious, they're a little bit dangerous and bad for you, they initially make you feel great but then over time you realize that maybe your relationship with Lucky Charms is just a little bit unhealthy, and you start to think maybe I don't want to be in a long-term relationship with a breakfast cereal that tastes delicious but damages my health. But then the Lucky Charms gets all stalker on you, and then for some reason you kinda like that, it makes you feel special, so, yeah, you spend your life with Lucky Charms – that's awesome, that's a great way to get diabetes. Aaaah, Hank, I can't sell Lucky Charms, it's just not in me!

So Youtubers, if you're gonna get mad, that's okay, but don't get mad at Youtube for wanting to make money – get mad at me for being so bad at selling Lucky Charms! That said, Hank, there is one reported change coming to Youtube that makes me furious. Reports are that Youtube will soon have a feature where you can dim all the space like out there, outside of the video screen; and I hate that idea.

What I hate about television is that television is something you watch; what I love about Youtube is that it's not television, it's something that you're called to participate in. My favorite thing about Youtube isn't even what happens inside of here, my favorite thing is what happens down there! (Uh, it looked like I was pointing at my pants, but I wasn't pointing at my pants, because I don't have pants on.) I was pointing at the comments, and admittedly the quality of discourse in many Youtube video comments leaves a little bit to be desired. But for our community, at least, the comments and video responses are a huge portion of what goes on in these videos.

And I hate the idea of making it possible to dim the screen around you so you can pretend you're watching television. Hank, nerdfighters, you're not watching anything. Now let's continue this conversation down below.