Sorry I didn't reply sooner, I got sidetracked.

Mainly, I just don't get the whole hate for Youtube in general. Like I said, I'm torn on the president interview thing but I find some stuff on youtube amazing. It's not only cat videos and self obsessed teenagers.

The youtube channels I listen most are educational and I find that Hank Green produces really good content. Of course it's not perfect and simplified to be more accessible. Of course CrashCourse World History is not the best place to learn world history, but it's an amazing starting point, especially to get young people interested. I know I listened to more than 7h podcast on the Mongols after the 10 mins episode on the Mongols.

I just don't see the fact that accomplishing something on youtube is not worth much. The project for awesome is a Youtube event he created that raised 1.2 million $ this year. Even if that's all a circlejerk, it's a circlejerk that actually does some good.

In the end, maybe the guy that created crash course is not the guy to interview the president, but the fact that his accomplishments are all within youtube doesn't make it any less interesting to me.

After all, I totally see the logic of the White House when they do that. Of course it would be great if they could reach the younger electorate through the new yorker, but that's simply not the reality today and something like that is actually a pretty good way to get that audience to listen. Pretty much the same reason Obama did an AMA on reddit. But on the other hand I'm sure nobody would appreciate the president getting interviewed by Justin Bieber...

I guess that the debates lies in the fact of where the line lies between "the present is in touch with the youngins" and "that's unacceptable". I'm sure some people found the interviews on the Daily Show as stupid too.

PS: The brain scoop is a channel he helped Emily start and it's pretty awesome too.