Every businessy guy I have ever met who finds out about Crash Course tells me that we're not just decreasing our revenue by not building a paywalled business, we're also decreasing our impact. This is wrong...and this video shows why. complexly.info/CCcoin25-6
When the goal of a business is to educate instead of making money, this confuses the business person who thinks the only goal is to make money
I use your videos regularly in my gen bio class that I teach. The humor and enthusiasm make a difficult subject more tolerable and easier to understand. Can't thank people like you enough!
I’m relatively businessy and I love Crash Course’s model! It’s true that for certain social enterprises, boosting revenue to grow impact makes sense. But you don’t staple one strategy to every endeavor. Crash Course has a model that works well and generates enormous impact.
Perhaps they confuse reach with impact?
Yeah, take the formally educated business types with a grain of salt. My college business classes lumped "earning profit" into the ethics chapter giving it equal moral weight as "protecting the vulnerable". Its hard to keep grounded when you're getting that kind of indoctrination.
I've seen enough "businessy guys" crash a successful company with exactly that kind of mentality to know that often things work successfully despite them, not because of them.
Thank you to crash course! Anatomy and physiology helped me get to Nursing school!
Those are the kind of business guys you fire in the interview.
MBA's poison everything they touch.
My only thoughts to why Crash Course ISN'T a bigger deal than it deserves to be is some combination of paid education institutions wanting you to have to pay for their own or sponsored study materials and other educators just plainly not believing that anything that is free can be worthwhile. 😕
Business people are in the business of making money. They don't always grasp that someone might want a business for other purposes altogether.
It's as if the culture of monetising everything as much as possible is actually harmful and shouldn't be done
They are telling you that to help themselves, not Crash Course. You know what to say to that.
I agree. You could tell that to $am Harri$.
They are just jealous that you created something that gets massive engagement and They can't make money off it 😂
Paper Video (papervideo.co.za) in 🇿🇦 does something similar, but unfortunately it’s paid at ~$5/month for the full package. Different curricula require different content approaches. One unique approach is their SD card distribution for folks without internet.
I blame the Mongols.
Our class uses Crash Course either as an introduction to a topic or as a review. We love it!
The “businessy bros” need to learn that “increasing revenue” is not the only measure of success.
In a society based on end-stage capitalism, it becomes a default assumption that everything must be commodified, monetized, treated as a profit source, etc. The "impact" rhetoric is a means of rationalizing the greed and drive for unending "growth" and scale.
My first exposure to the Green brothers was when we watched a Crash Course video about the French Revolution in AP world history. I turned to my TFIOS-obsessed friend and was like “look, it’s your favorite author!” as a joke. Then we googled John and were like, “wait, he actually IS the author.”
If they cared about their impact they wouldn't be business guys
Access to good education, should never be a question of of income. One of the promises of the early internet was accessible information, “information wants to be free”. With Crash Course that educational information has not only become accessible but also reliable. Thx a million for Crash Course.
We used the hell out of Crash Course Anatomy & Physiology running tutorials for nursing students in our program. Thanks for doing what you do!
We used CC in homeschooling. Whenever a course didn't explain a topic well enough, we checked CC to explain it better. Learning made fun.
I love Crash Course and know many other teachers who do too! Thank you for keeping it accessible for all
Sooo, they don't get it. Y'all keep being awesome
I will fucking fight *anyone* who says that crash course should be paywalled.
Crash Course Biology was my lifeline!
Do they brain good? Maybe crash course would help them, too. >.> It should be painfully, horrifically obvious that, for the most part, and under most conditions, barriers mean less access being achieved. That's what barriers /are/. Paywalling content means that at least some won't get said content.
Bummed I didn't order the coin collector thing before they sold out 😭
The Crash Course for High Mass Stars live rent free inside my brain.
Hank wearing a suit is crazy
What is the rationale for how this would lessen impact?
even without the obvious evidence to the contrary, its genuinely unhinged that they think making something less accessible makes it more impactful. i've seen so many things become popular despite being cheap and having low barriers of entry enough that any popular product that relies on FOMO feels
more like they're the outlier here tbh. if the goal is to enter the public consciousness, then yeah, i'm not shocked that people sitting on a dragon's hoard of wealth can afford to keep bashing your products over our heads for decades so that they becoming natural.
but then its way better for helpful things to enter the public conscious by just... existing, and being reliable. this isn't just some apply product or an expensive shoe, this is education. whoever those business guys were that you spoke to, they sound hella ignorant
It’s almost like there may be another dimension to business beyond just “profit at any cost”
Thank you for ignoring them sincerely, a student
Crash course helped almost every last minute cram session while driving to big anxiety inducing tests and now I have a successful career. I hope you never lose this spirit and never forget how much you help those with limited resources bridge the gap to success a little easier.
On the other hand, creating a paywall could help yall pay for harvesting all of earth's remaining knowledge resources before they're fully depleted
I taught history, gov't, & econ, for 25 yrs. In a 90 min class, I needed to run my kids thru abt 6 different activities to keep them engaged & expanding their knowledge. CC was self pacing, fun, &memorable for many lessons. It gave context to primary sources & motivated kids to complete all modules
Their cognitive dissonance does not allow for something like CC to exist. Their whole worldview isn't wrong; the facts are.
Of course a business person tried to tell you that. They’re all about profit.
I teach Entrepreneurship to high school and use your videos all the time. Thank you!!
If you think increasing your own profits is helpful to anyone else but yourself, YOU'RE WRONG!* *-it can also help pay your workers if you choose to share the wealth, but let's be honest- what American boss does that?
Except for when I am a forgetful dweeb and misplace it, I carry around my Crash Course coin all the time. It brings me an unreasonable amount of joy.
I want this one. This year's coin is fine and I got it but that one is amazing
TODAY IS THE LAST DAY YOU CAN GET THE 2025 CRASH COURSE COIN!!! STOP PROCRASTINATING!!! complexly.info/CCcoin25-6
My homeschooled teens thank you. Crash Course is the ONLY resource they both enjoyed.
Stop looking at my screen. So what if the tab had been open for ~5 days. For some of us, deadlines are starting guns. First time contributor. Happy to be here
Just under 42 hours left! (That’s a long day)
I believe you mean "proCRASHtinating."
Terrible pun... And you, a groan man
yeah anyone saying you are decreasing reach is just chatting shit - if my tiny village school in England was suggesting it like a ton of years ago (they fucked up on a LOT of bases, but good resource suggestion) you've got A* reach
These business-bro clowns need to watch Crash Course Economics. I assume those videos cover supply and demand, right? Well, putting videos behind a paywall limits the supply. LIMITS. THE. SUPPLY. THAT IS, IT DECREASES THE SUPPLY. How could DECREASING the supply increase the reach?
I'll say it in a slightly different way, just in case anyone is left feeling ANY confusion: If you INCREASE the price of something, you DECREASE demand. In this case, demand can be assumed to be synonymous with reach. Therefore, PAYWALLING THE FUCKING VIDEOS WILL ONLY DECREASE THEIR REACH!
honestly, considering the level of general education and interest in education there, I suspect the content might literally be why half my IT class passed lol
(as in, zero would pass without content, with content there was at least some hope)
missed opportunity to say stop procrashtinating 🥀
Thanks for this reminder and also cool sweatshirt too... Yoink!
My understanding is that they aren't available in Canada, but I'll carry on kicking in $10 a month on Patreon instead.
In my biology degree, were required to take an ethics course. Sometimes I wonder if business degrees require an anti-ethics course
As a parent in a third world country, crash course is an invaluable resource for me. You cannot imagine the impact it has had on my daughter's education. We would not have been able to afford this level of education even if my income was tripled. Thank you so much to you and the Crash Course staff ♥
I remember my middle school science teacher, my high school AP teachers using it and putting it in front of the whole class. It was such a fun way to learn
Businessmen are shortsighted and tied to short-term gains.
You’re a good man, Hank Green. I wish more men were like you.
Thats the most capitalist brainrot statement I've ever heard.
Thanks for reminding me, Hank. My social feed tonight is... not great, and this reinforced all the little things I can still do.
This is such a powerful point. Measuring impact solely through revenue misses the bigger picture Crash Course has made high-quality education accessible to millions, regardless of income. That is impact. Sometimes, the most transformative work can’t be measured in dollars.
tinyurl.com/2r8dnfkb Hopefully this is useful for all of you☝️
Crash Course was one of our favorite learning tools for our kids.
My take is if you need a paywall your product or service really isn't that great. I like when I use something enough that I feel guilted into giving money.
those businessy guys must be the same ones talking to scientific journals 😭 make information free and accessible!!! 💕
Just curious what’s the reason they give for the reduced impact?
“There’s a call on line two. She says she’s the Director of National Intelligence and she’d like to know more about Crash Course…”
Thank you for understanding that education is not a business to be managed, but a precious commodity to be shared. Each time it is shared, it exponentially grows in value to the recipients and the people who share it. Knowledge doesn’t need to be managed and monetized. Bless your wisdom. ❤️
Crash Course is the very best. How many CC coin years have there been so far?
I don't have the $100 this year to spare but will continue considering until I can purchase a future one (I got the fig one since at the time I could)!
I forget to check in on Skylight but I'm glad you're here 🥰 please keep it up
Business bros are never to be listened to.
If you go see a young Gen X/Millennial/Gen Z healthcare professional, the odds are incredibly high that Crash Course was instrumental in their foundational understanding of Biology, Microbiology, and Anatomy and Physiology
Something, something, "But my MBA says", something, something.
Wait, I'm so confused. How would having a paywall increase your impact? Like what is even the logic of that claim
'If you made your content harder to access, it can help more people'
Business guys make the world a worse place and y'all make it better.
Go crash course!!!!
We don't get to argue about pizza over here???
My gut tells me that "effective altruism" is so completely misunderstood by businessy schmucks despite them using it as a constant pitch to investors/entrepreneurs.
I'm in full agreement.
Business guys cannot fathom doing something because it's a good thing to do. Either you're sucking every last dollar from your consumers or you're a blithering, soft, moron
The idea that pay walled content increases your impact is crazy
I could see a world where that could increase the total number of eyeballs on the content. But those would only be eyeballs whose owners could afford the paywall, not any of the ones who couldn’t. I’d argue that doesn’t count as “bigger impact”. Like opening a millionaire-only soup kitchen.
They're like "You will have so much more money to grow what you do!!!"
think of all the people with money you could reach by not reaching far more without
Hank, if you don't charge, how will you be fabulously wealthy in time for unlimited growth to inevitably prove impossible and everything to come crumbling to the ground as the quality of the service declines/price increases in a desperate attempt to keep the cash flowing.
as someone who works in finance, most businessy guys are idiots
I'd like to say to these business people, "I just don't think a few more classes are going to be worth cutting off access to that many people." Accessibility is VALUABLE
all businessy guys are stupid
Revenue isn't the point of crash course and everyone who makes the mistake of thinking that should not be involved with managing crash course.
I also always look for one on whatever topic I'm doing for class. Thank you for these videos!!
Those business folks don't see what you do, but that's also because they tend to not interact with their userbase in the same way you do. And of course they also value money above accessible education but I digress. What you and your team do matters. Thank you.
Hank, I know you’re a moderate progressive but you’re on the path to discovering what it takes to be a true leftist and I can appreciate that.
I hate that way of thinking; it feels almost parasitic. You can be a successful business-type-person without bleeding people at every opportunity. ie: Hank Green
Crash Course is legitimate education and more should follow this model! Thank you @hankgreen.bsky.social
Lmao capitalist propaganda fr, keep doing what ur doing, knowledge is power ‼️
Crash course is amazing!
Lmao, all newspapers died when they paywalled themselves. Now we have a global fascism 👌
Dyou get many takes from sleepy guys? Coz intro/outro stingless playlists would be fantastic for sleeping. Probably no good for business though
Happy to support this team. You helped me through nursing school 🎉
Education is liberation, and who can justly put a price tag on liberty?
Awful people...greedy people...hurt people who project their pain onto others instead of working through their own -ish
I can testify sharing your videos with my nephews and nieces 12 years ago and earning the "Best Auntie Evwr" moniker for like 5 years in a row.🤩💖🎯
Crash course was involved in like at least every history class I ever took around middle school to the end of high school
Doing the opposite of what businessy guys say is a great mantra for how to live an effective and ethical life.
"Let them call me a rebel and welcome, I feel no concern from it; but I should suffer the misery of devils, were I to make a whore of my soul.…" -Thomas Paine
As a first-year high school science teacher, your CC Bio videos saved me. My students loved them! I loved them! Thank you for NOT putting them behind a paywall.
It blows my mind how these guys convince themselves that this is true because it makes it easier for them to make money. If your primary motivation is more money, then anything that serves that end must be correct, right?
if you run into my friends Matt & Scott, say hi.
the best i could do is buy a shirt if i have the money
Watching crash course in history class made me fall in love with learning history!
Look. Im not the smartest guy to ever type on they keyboard. But it seems counter intuitive that an open resource would garner LESS impact. The more eyes that can see your project, the more your project gets passed around (as long as it's a good project). People forget that second bit a lot.
I mean it falls apart instantly on basic logic: increase the impact by paywalling and stopping people from seeing them? psht