Your take on paid tutorials these days

[Phunkle]

Hello there,

so I was in my book store of choice the other day, and while looking for something new, I stumbled over something I have completely overlooked for years - tutorial books. How to paint, how to cook, how to craft, how to build, how to do pretty much any kind of hobby.

This made me think about the necessity of these kind of books, or paid courses and tutorials in general. In modern days, where you have so much more information at your fingertips thanks to the internet, do people still pay for these kind of things?

For some reason, this really intrigued me. At first I was just in this sort of "I'll just google it" mentality. But after giving it a couple of thought, I was actually considering buying one of those books. Buying into the commitment, one might say. When I pay for it, I'll value it differently.

Now the question I want to ask is: Is it a silly thing to do to buy information you could easily scramble together from the internet?

[NED funded]

Hello there,

so I was in my book store of choice the other day, and while looking for something new, I stumbled over something I have completely overlooked for years - tutorial books. How to paint, how to cook, how to craft, how to build, how to do pretty much any kind of hobby.

This made me think about the necessity of these kind of books, or paid courses and tutorials in general. In modern days, where you have so much more information at your fingertips thanks to the internet, do people still pay for these kind of things?

For some reason, this really intrigued me. At first I was just in this sort of "I'll just google it" mentality. But after giving it a couple of thought, I was actually considering buying one of those books. Buying into the commitment, one might say. When I pay for it, I'll value it differently.

Now the question I want to ask is: Is it a silly thing to do to buy information you could easily scramble together from the internet?

In some cases I do, specially when whats online is kinda shoddy.

When its paid it tends to be easier to read and easier to follow through (in both cases, video and written).

[AeneasBK]

For a while I've been under the impression that if you would ever need to know how to do something, there will be several youtube videos explaining how, posted by professionals. My partner found some for an ancient sewing machine she was handed down, they were in French; but that wasn't an issue for her as she can speak it; but nevertheless I was pretty impressed.

Recently we replaced a broken gearbox on some uPVC doors from youtube guides, saved us over a hundred quid paying someone to do it for us.

[I Push Buttons]

Is it a silly thing to do to buy information you could easily scramble together from the internet?

Yes.

The library of free alternatives is exhaustive at this point for virtually any topic. You would be hard pressed to find anything that makes a paid options better than the expansive free options; short of like getting degrees and certifications where even if you can freely learn the material, you can't freely obtain those credentials.

[calikid]

I don't buy books if the knowledge is available for free.
Also paying an equivalent of a pizza for a book does not "compel me" to learn harder than free internet stuff.

[Independent voter]

There are a few paid tutorial websites, I can't remember their names at the moment.

They're supposed to have better quality videos.

Another popular paid topic is cutting edge programming stuff that hasn't made it to YouTube yet.

[PACOX]

Half of college is paid tutorials. Resources might be freely available but a good teacher can be the difference between you actually learning something or just understanding an article.

Sometime it's just about just teaching the stuff you actually need to know and not just a manual on X. You have something that didn't click until someone explained it to you?

[Klaiden Potugye]

Hello there,

so I was in my book store of choice the other day, and while looking for something new, I stumbled over something I have completely overlooked for years - tutorial books. How to paint, how to cook, how to craft, how to build, how to do pretty much any kind of hobby.

This made me think about the necessity of these kind of books, or paid courses and tutorials in general. In modern days, where you have so much more information at your fingertips thanks to the internet, do people still pay for these kind of things?

For some reason, this really intrigued me. At first I was just in this sort of "I'll just google it" mentality. But after giving it a couple of thought, I was actually considering buying one of those books. Buying into the commitment, one might say. When I pay for it, I'll value it differently.

Now the question I want to ask is: Is it a silly thing to do to buy information you could easily scramble together from the internet?

Not that easily, as you might believe.

But it is all about opportunity cost. Like the time you spend scouring internet for $20 information for 7 nights.

[Boricha]

Definitely for learning a language, and I'm sure other stuff I'm not thinking of.

[Celista]

It depends on the tutorial, but I definitely believe some exist that are well worth it. If you don't have a certain amount of knowledge on a subject, you might not even know how to search for information on it effectively, and won't be able to gauge if that YT video/whatever free resource is trustworthy or not.

[Witchblade77]

Half of college is paid tutorials. Resources might be freely available but a good teacher can be the difference between you actually learning something or just understanding an article.

Sometime it's just about just teaching the stuff you actually need to know and not just a manual on X. You have something that didn't click until someone explained it to you?

this. for example, I have been watching and reading watercolor tutorials for a while now with very little improvement on my part. and getting very discouraged. so i took a paid class, after researching instructor of course. worth. every. penny. just being shown, demonstrated, corrected in real time as I was painting - made a huge difference. and... amusingly enough, helped make those free tutorials much more useful as well, as i now understand them far better.

[Sunseeker]

First, not everything on the internet is trustworthy, that should be obvious.
Second, not everyone who wants to instruct you for free is actually any good at it.
Thirdly, most of these sorts of books are put together by people who both:
A: know what they're doing and
B: know how to convey that to others
(if you're going "WHY?!" to this, it's because some company wants to make money off of them, so said company makes an effort to ensure they publish people who know their shit)
Fourthly, different people learn differently.
And FINALLY: some people just aren't really great at googling.