Saturday, April 4, 2020

A time for Neverthink

4/04/2020

Life in a state of social distance has included a lot of television watching. Like many others, we're following the Tiger King and that woman stranded in 19th Century Scotland. But I've also developed an appreciation for Neverthink.

It's a video channel that's populated by streams of perpetual video clips, most of them from YouTube. According to Neverthink, the clips are selected and curated by humans who look for the interesting or unusual. The videos are sorted into some 20 different topic channels.

In my first encounter with Neverthink, I was first entranced by the Drones channel. It was showing a guy doing a daredevil run across a series of rooftops followed by a drone chasing a roller coaster. I was hooked. Then there was the Dashcam channel where I killed an hour (maybe more) watching bad drivers do stupid things.

Sounds like mindless entertainment? It is, and that's by design. It's for people who don't want to spend time searching for something to watch. Tech Crunch said the channel "might just be the most ‘lean back’ online video experience yet."

Here's how Neverthink co-founder Aviv Junno described his creation: “We believe that the main reason people watch videos online is just because they want some distraction. To clear their mind after a day of work, have something in the background to keep them company, to watch while commuting to work, on the toilet etc. People don’t necessarily want to watch something specific, or want the perfect video. We created Neverthink for those times”.

Neverthink reminded me of Night Flight, a visual arts program that ran on the USA Network in the 1980s. It's where I saw the animated series Aeon Flux and J-Men Forever.

Not every channel on Neverthink is something to play in the background. It's Late Night News channel streams monologues and segments from Colbert, Kimmel, Fallon, Seth Myers, Samantha Bee and Trevor Noah at Comedy Central, which isn't on YouTubeTV, my selected cable alternative. I also like Making Stuff and the photography tips on the Learn Something channel.

You can see the full channel line-up on the Neverthink website. A Neverthink app is available for Android and iOS devices and for Apple TV and Amazon Fire streaming boxes. 


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Follow me on Twitter @ricmanning and read my technology columns at My Well Being.

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