What do you think is the best way to improve, books or YouTube videos?
What do you think is the best way to improve, books or YouTube videos?
A good book contains the equivalent of 210 hours of video..
A good book contains the equivalent of 210 hours of video..
The chess books look very boring :(
The chess books look very boring :(
Like, both work.
A reader can easily proceed at a speed that is comfortable for the reader. Later, a specific passage can often be easily found.
A reader can easily proceed at a speed that is comfortable for the reader. Later, a specific passage can often be easily found.
Books require more processing power from the brain than videos. In fact there have been studies that watching video media on the TV or the computer even suppresses critical thinking and encourages reception of information, which is why so much effort has been put in to use video media for propaganda. It's also why people increasingly find books (and not just chess books) to be boring in comparison.
You would think streamlining reception of information like this would be helpful for a game that has so much information like chess, but to be genuinely proficient at the game you need to be able to think critically and make sound decisions in novel and complex situations. Thus you get more mileage from a chess book because the method of information transfer itself fights mental atrophy and cultivates the sort of critical thinking you need to apply the information in real positions at the board. However, most people in the present generation will either find them to not be stimulating enough to keep them engaged or mentally too exhausting because of how much more energy the brain has to invest to use them.
tl;dr books are better but require more mental investment to use.
Books require more processing power from the brain than videos. In fact there have been studies that watching video media on the TV or the computer even suppresses critical thinking and encourages reception of information, which is why so much effort has been put in to use video media for propaganda. It's also why people increasingly find books (and not just chess books) to be boring in comparison.
You would think streamlining reception of information like this would be helpful for a game that has so much information like chess, but to be genuinely proficient at the game you need to be able to think critically and make sound decisions in novel and complex situations. Thus you get more mileage from a chess book because the method of information transfer itself fights mental atrophy and cultivates the sort of critical thinking you need to apply the information in real positions at the board. However, most people in the present generation will either find them to not be stimulating enough to keep them engaged or mentally too exhausting because of how much more energy the brain has to invest to use them.
tl;dr books are better but require more mental investment to use.
What @forsooth plays said. The only thing I want to add is that I am personally leery of YouTube videos. Most streamers who present on YouTube have a lot of clickbait that's difficult to filter out, and if you're like me and can only pay attention to a professionally presented lesson for more than five minutes it's even harder to find something.
Translation: I consider YouTube nothing better than a popularity contest. If books don't do it for you, you may need to consider hiring a coach if you have the budget for it and the learning material here can't quite get you over the hump. The opinions of others may differ as I have gone on record saying the coach option is off the table for me personally (which is to my detriment, but in fairness I'm probably a casual player at most).
What @forsooth plays said. The only thing I want to add is that I am personally leery of YouTube videos. Most streamers who present on YouTube have a lot of clickbait that's difficult to filter out, and if you're like me and can only pay attention to a professionally presented lesson for more than five minutes it's even harder to find something.
Translation: I consider YouTube nothing better than a popularity contest. If books don't do it for you, you may need to consider hiring a coach if you have the budget for it and the learning material here can't quite get you over the hump. The opinions of others may differ as I have gone on record saying the coach option is off the table for me personally (which is to my detriment, but in fairness I'm probably a casual player at most).
I think that there is room for learning by video, but I would hope that one would eventually graduate to some sort of reading.
I think that there is room for learning by video, but I would hope that one would eventually graduate to some sort of reading.
I would put it this way, but that is not 100% absolute in all cases ofc: if you learn from a book, you study the game. If you watch a video, you are consuming content. In theory you could stop the video at important points, but most people don't.
I would put it this way, but that is not 100% absolute in all cases ofc: if you learn from a book, you study the game. If you watch a video, you are consuming content. In theory you could stop the video at important points, but most people don't.
A coach
