Pretty good video. It's not like he explains how to do anything or even picks very good software to begin with, but his genuine excitement is really all that's required. Getting people interested is the important part, and they'll learn much better by using their own motivation. This video also gives off a strong "I'm an idiot, and if I can do it you can do it" vibe which can be really reassuring to those who are just too intimidated to even dip their toe in.
this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2025
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My problem is that I feel like the idiot among idiots so I'm still intimidated by it. I want to eventually take the plunge, but I am genuinely so fucking stupid when it comes to tech that I'm afraid I will break something if I try, lol.
If you're competent enough to use Lemmy, you're absolutely competent enough to run Linux for most purposes.
Honestly, it's a bit more of a stretch, but if you're competent enough to plug in a USB drive you're probably competent enough to install Linux. And most of Lemmy would be here to help you!
My sweet, darling, luddite of a partner struggles with changing the ringtone on his phone, but didn't run into problems using linux.
You're fine.
This video has a lot of self-hosting and somewhat advanced stuff being mentioned, but if all you want to do is start dipping your toe into Linux then it's not nearly as hard as you'd think. I would try running Linux in a VM (i.e. VirtualBox) to get a feel for how it operates and build up confidence that way, as well as maybe watching some videos on how people set up and use their Linux etc. It will be a learning curve, but as long as you pick a beginner-friendly distro (e.g. Linux Mint) it's really no more difficult than if you started using Windows for the first time. Keep backups of your data and/or put Linux on a secondary computer and you should weather the initial few weeks just fine.
On the upside, when you have problems in Linux there will be logical solutions with answers that can be searched for, whereas in an OS like Windows or Mac the solution is probably "I dunno! Reinstall?" or "You just can't do that, sorry". It's also understandable if you don't want to touch anything complicated, but I do think one of the best parts of Linux is really just getting messy, making mistakes, and learning. Because things in Linux make sense, over time you'll learn how to use a computer again. I feel strongly that Windows/Mac/Android/iPhones have (intentionally) dulled the average person's computing skills and put them into a state of learned helplessness. Everyone thinks computers are complicated wizardry because nothing on those proprietary operating systems makes logical sense, and trying to troubleshoot anything results in wasted time and frustration.
A good thing about tech is that if you have a spare device (even a cheap single-board computer like a Raspberry Pi or similar cheaper one, or a partly-broken laptop) or a working virtual machine, you can break things. That's a core characteristic of the old-school hacker mindset, to try stuff and break stuff until you understand stuff. Usually, the worst case, you just reinstall the operating system and have a fresh clean environment (or, better yet, you restore a backup you made! Learning how to fail gracefully is a great skill)
I bricked a certain wacky laptop setup twice and had to start over (luckily with backups) just trying to get a custom startup loading screen. But once I realized why it was breaking and how to avoid it, I had a cooler looking computer!
Tech is made to make us feel stupid, so you are not alone in feeling that.
Crazy to see people stating that they never saw a video of him, but I guess the intersection of his audience and the fediverse is predictably low, especially in a degoogle community.
His recent arc with Linux and now this are pretty nice though.
I think it’s a generational thing. Millennials especially slightly older ones have not really been exposed to this guy at all.
In fact, many of us have actively avoided him. 😂
I just remember he made the baby talk videos back in the day. I was like wtf is this shit? Then avoided him forever after that.
I think he is goofy and unremarkable. Honeslty, more like boring.
Is it that crazy? He's just a game streamer, right? Plenty of people have probably never watched any streaming, let alone from one particular guy.
He has been the most subscribed youtuber for a while in the past. But yeah, mostly gaming and he already "quit" YouTube several times.
Taylor Swift has been the biggest selling artist but plenty of people will never have listened to her music, football is the most popular sport in the world but many will never have watched a match, etc. To sum up with a statement of the obvious: the world's a big place so even very popular things can still be relatively niche!
I never watched his stuff in his "glory" days of yore, but he popped up in videos from Magnus the bouldering/rock climbing guy, and that showed him under a new light. Then I saw his Linux arc and started gaining more respect for him. It seems he's kind of retired from the brain dead content and now has that new dad energy which I vibe with a lot more. Still not watching him regularly though, I don't know what the rest of his content is like.
I watched a Primeagen reaction video to a recent video of Pewds, and that was the first I've seen a PewDiePie video. I've probably caught a couple of shorts over the years, but this was the first video, and it might have been last week.
Well, that was the first PewDiePie video I've ever watched...
Strange that he didn't mention leaving YouTube behind though!
It was like the first thing, he said he can't escape that. But pretty much everything else.
I imagine he's one who could ditch YouTube.
He could spin up his own PeerTube instance just for him to post to. Then tell everyone to follow him there and Mastodon. If only 20% of his audience does it, he'd still make out like a bandit.
He gets a good chunk of money off YouTube.
Like, where exactly is the revenue stream there? I'm on peertube and that isn't paying off for me yet lol
Sponsorships, Ad reads, Product placement.
He doesn't need Google inserting ads, they pay pennies compared to other direct deals.
All of those venues wont be reaching out to you if you are not on YouTube or have enough reach on a different platform. I do hope content creators post on multiple platform but it is not reasonable to think that they can just flip a switch and start posting outside of YouTube.
Of course! Which is why I said 20% of his audience would need to switch with him. And obviously there would be a transition. Nobody said anything to suggest otherwise.
My point was more on the sponsorship rather than the transition. Even if you manage to move 20% of the audience, the sponsorship amount would be less than 20%. Most companies play it safe and allocate budget for proven marketing platforms and wouldn't be willing to put much on a new platform. So while it takes someone to switch platform and convince their audience, there wouldn't be adsense money or sponsorships with no guarantee they would even make 10% of what they used to make on YouTube. Most youtubers are after the money and if anyone is doing it as full time job, that would be an unreasonable request.
I wonder if Floatplane would take him lmao.
he would be stupid, even the passive ad revenue is crazy compared to my salary.
he might get into a weird place, cause youtube doesnt like to promote degoogling and asblocking and the channel might get tagged.
Something tells me PewDiePie is not getting an invite to Nebula any time soon!
He’s collected fuck you money ten times over from YouTube already. He can be done with everything and never work again.
Google asks me to sign in every time I try to google something and switches to the google app. Google can go fuck itself.
Had never watched anything from him. Still haven't - I got annoyed in the first minute.
I think he's some sort of gamer person. At least that's what I've heard of him.
rare youtube/google w
hey me too. also, I still don't know who PewDiePie is.
what I would give to be you
bruh de-googling is way harder than not knowing what a PewDiePie is. I'm trying but not even close.
Never even seen PDP before - only heard of him. But this was a good video - he's on the same path as I am...
Never watched and ain't gonna now...
But when GOOG has positioned its business practices in a way that manages to piss off even this long-time GOOG supporter/evangelist... 🤡 🖕 💩
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