Science channels explode onto YouTube

Back in May I wrote a blog post about YouTube and the rise of the amateur in science communication. It's exciting to now see a kind of punk mentality in science communication, a sense that anyone can do it. This is something I do myself on YouTube and in that article I encouraged you to join me.

Now, in a move away from its traditional user-generated content, YouTube has recently announced its first venture into original content. So let's take a look at what YouTube will be offering in the way of science communication.

Certainly, this is a major move on behalf of YouTube and its owners at Google. It's part of a rumoured $100m investment, beginning with the announcement of 100 new channels. These include some big names in entertainment such as Madonna, Ashton Kutcher and Jay-Z. There are also news channels from Reuters and the Wall Street Journal, among others such as channels for WWE and Red Bull. And, further down this list, me.

Well, when I say me, I mean a channel called Numberphile, which will feature me and other mathematicians, with each video being about a different number. Numberphile is actually the brainchild of video journalist Brady Haran, who is already popular on YouTube – and with readers of the Guardian blogger GrrlScientist – for his Periodic Table of Videos, as well as Sixty Symbols (physics) and his Favourite Scientist channel.

Numberphile launches on 11 November 2011, that's 11.11.11 – well it seemed appropriate – making it one of the first of the new YouTube 100.

The fact that 10 of the channels in this announcement are educational channels is encouraging. While the serious money may be in channels such as Red Bull and WWE, Google is investing in education, too. In fact, half of those educational channels on offer are science-related.

Brady's other new channel is on astronomy, Deep Sky Videos. The channel will start by looking at the Messier Objects, a list of approximately 100 astronomical objects. Here's a preview.

So, with my journalist hat on (it has a piece of card sticking out of the hat band with "Press" written on it), I asked Brady for the inside scoop. Although Brady says he's "mildly daunted" by the number of videos he will have to produce, he also told me how exciting it was. And I can see why: this is a huge endorsement from YouTube.

Also on offer will be two new channels from the vlogbrothers. The vlogbrothers consist of Hank and John Green, popular YouTube bloggers with a large nerd following. Hank is the one with the science background, so will be launching a science channel. John has a background in English, but is promising a channel on science and the humanities. There is no preview as yet, but maybe this will give us an idea of what to expect.

The channels mentioned so far are from some of the most successful YouTube users, but still come from the YouTube community. The remaining science-related channel will be run by Steve Spangler, best known to American audiences for his numerous television appearances and for further popularising the coke and mentos experiment.

Steve is also the director of the National Hands-on Science Institute in Denver, Colorado and judging by his show reel of television appearances I expect something no less spectacular!

It looks like each of these science channels will be very different in style and content, and I am thoroughly looking forward to seeing what they have to offer. Out of the remaining educational channels, one will be from TED, which I imagine will be on various subjects, but I'm sure many will have a science bent. The other channels have fairly vague descriptions at this point but seem to be in the TED vein.

With luck this initiative will increase the quality of content on YouTube. This is good business for Google, hopefully bringing with it more traffic and advertising revenue. But will it be good business for the users? If YouTube is now effectively acting as a commissioning editor, will that change the sort of content featured on the site?

Is YouTube setting itself up as a broadcaster? Well, not yet. It certainly isn't a broadcaster in the conventional sense. YouTube doesn't shut down at midnight with the national anthem followed by pages from Ceefax. Although that would be awesome. No, this is still the merest drop in the ocean. The overwhelming majority of content is still user-generated and will be for the foreseeable future.

Not only that, but YouTube would be mad to move away from the formula that has made it what it is – the homemade filmmakers, the people, their blogs, their videos of kittens.

James Grime is a mathematician and public speaker, and can mostly be found touring the country on behalf of the University of Cambridge Millennium Mathematics Project