I want to make it clear that I think what Peter is doing is fantastic. Just because we here on HBA are discussing the relative merits and issues with what he is doing... does NOT mean we are being purists, or knocking what he is doing. The clear fact is that he is making semi-disposable airplanes. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, just like there is nothing wrong with reminding ourselves that his airplanes are semi-disposable and can't be used the same way Rockiedog uses his Legal Eagle.
Peter is in the youtube business. Call that clickbait, or call it the new town hall, or the new Popular Mechanics, or call it internet porn for nerds... it doesn't matter. It is the medium in which he is succeeding greatly.
Years ago I knew several people who were in the television business here in Los Angeles. What made great TV shows succeed was that every week, you would tune in to see characters or actors that you had already accepted and liked, but they did a new complete story. The expression that the old-school screenwriters used was "every week the audience meets your lead character, then you put the lead character up a tree, then you kick the s**t out of him for a little more than half of the show, then you get him down from the tree, then the audience sees some small thing that makes them smile... then play him off with the theme music and roll the credits". Next week, lather, rinse, repeat. Any of you folks here that remember The Rockford Files, The Jeffersons, the A-Team, Magnum PI, and dozens of other classic sitcoms and private eye shows can go back and see this formula played out over and over.
Although the medium and the format have changed since Jim Rockford, what an audience reacts to is still very similar today. So although it is not the only successful "formula" there is on youtube, the formula Peter and others are using should be reasonably familiar. Check in with someone you have accepted and who's likeable (Peter), have a project that contains some challenges (put him up a tree), then have difficulties and mishaps or epic equipment fails along the way (kick the crap out of him), then finally have him figure out the solution with a different battery, or motor, or wing structure (get him down from the tree). Then make sure that the airplane flies, with some beautiful video of him flying over farm fields and trees (make the audience smile).
Whether he studied 50 year old sitcoms and private eye shows, or stumbled upon this formula by accident, or whether they teach this formula in schools... I don't know. But Peter is doing it well, whether purposely or otherwise, and we all benefit from his presence on youtube.
