I dont see why people are so enamoured by him. He is nothing. Just repeats information on the internet. There are millions of Cambridge Medics, whats so special about him? Because he makes YT videos!?!
Give a sob story and you win people over, snd thats what hes done. Sad story growing up in a single parent household, went to a good school, then cambridge to be a medic. Great story. But the guy is a dickhead and lives for peoples validation hiding behind titles. Who are you really behind all that? Just a confused boy who wants to please others and make others think he is amazing. With a side of narcissism thrown in. He is nothing special just like Zoella and Co.
He took someones place in med school just so he could have one up on others. The only thing he has passion for is money.
Who writes a book and asks his followers what to call it. Or who asks his followers to email in a CV type thing if they want a chance with him.
What a dick.
Exactly my thought. This dude sums it up perfectly.
The comment section is being a bit critical of this video. At least that's good.
Good point. The last time I checked, he doesn't even update his GR. Compared to him, I'd rather Jack or even Ruby is more followed. At least they update.
people claim ali abdaal is not a decent person bc he is privileged and seemingly does nothing with his privilege for the benefit of others
but if you aren't spending your disposable income or free time helping the poor/refugees, aren't you just as bad as him?
It actually boggles my mind that you think this comparison makes one iota of sense lmao, unless anyone else on this thread is a millionaire who doesn't work then you're not comparing like for like so what even is your point here? Personally I do pro bono work and have DDs set up to two charitable causes so ? Maybe people on this board are on lower incomes and don't have disposable income to donate or maybe they have families and don't have time to volunteer. Give your head a wobble.
Overall just an incredibly weird podcast. Ali is such a creep.
The whole ideology of "dating strategy" is so weird and blind to reality. You see stunning girls with average or less guys all the time and vice versa. You see people who's interests don't align getting married all of the time because in the end people are attracted to people based on their individuality not because they've played the correct game or attained the correct "badges" or "sexual market value". All of this stuff overall is seriously seriously damaging to peoples self esteem and mental health and the fact Ali is engaging with it is very worrying.
They reference Jordan Peterson at one point so...yeah that's where we are at with Ali
Yay, another unempathetic doctor. From his latest video. I've had a few of those emotionless, "I don't care" doctors. The nurses I've had at least attempt to build rapport lol (shouldn't doctors do this too?? because the ones I have had don't).
This is gonna go a bit OT, sorry. It's about a trend I feel applies to a lot of productivity vloggers and studytubers (e.g. those who have been sponsored by that surface laptop - like Holly and Elena), but Ali just sort of emobides it in my view. Their audiece is young and they are pushing super pricey gadgets as though they are essentials. And I hate it so much, haha.
So Ali edits stuff (videos, podcasts, things with high resolution whatever) on his computers and, I guess, will need a decent one for that. But most of his viewers probably don't. They might play games on their devices, at least some of them. Most of them probably won't do anything fancier than use Netflix, which e.g. my laptop I bought used 5 years ago does without problem.
But Ali, like many productivity Youtubers, seems to try to cater to a broader group that includes entrepreneurs and irrelevant startup ideas, but in the end of the day will probably most consist of students at different stages in their academic careers. Maybe people who Rmare doing freelance work and already know what they need to run their software, maybe do writing work, maybe partly rely on tech he doesn't review at all (like printers).
A lot of these vloggers are advertising really fancy and expensive gear to this group and sure, the tech-needs will vary based on your subject. But generally you really do not need fancy equipment to run basically MS Word, something like R, a PDF Reader, Zotero, and maybe LaTeX if you're feeling fancy. I have *opinions* on studytubers listing expensive stuff like mildliners as a study essential. But much like you don't need pastel highlighters that cost a fortune and come in a ridiculous number of colors, you REALLY REALLY DO NOT NEED an iPad or a laptop that's also a tablet, or a keyboard that's also secretly a spaceship.
Sit down on your regular chair, maybe from IKEA, maybe free from Facebook marketplace. Turn on your old laptop with an average built-in webcam, whatever crappy heads at came with your mediocre phone, take out a notepad that lets ink bleed through, use that pen you accidentally kept that one time you signed something, and that nein highlighter you keep losing but it periodically shows up in your stuff again.
He needs to be making far, far more content if he wants to justify having a "team" around him.
Look at LinusTechTips. Obviously was a personal channel at first but its branched out into being one of the biggest tech channels on Youtube, bringing out multiple videos per week on many channels. There is tangible and visible growth there and I don't doubt every team member pulls their weight - it's not just a channel about Linus any more and lots of the other people on the channel are personalities and stars in their own right.
Ali's personal brand is very attached to him though. Angus and his other hanger ons will most likely make their own channels and try to copy Ali's formula when really he should try to be keeping them in his network.
Linus knows his channel is about the tech and he's clearly into what he's doing. Ali, on the other hand, makes his channel about himself because he knows in the back of his mind that the only reason he has clout is because he's an idol for the Pakistani/Indians. His lack of passion is visible because why would you be passionate about something when you'll get likes and views no matter what you put out. There's nothing particularly interesting about him or his content but at least in the old days it was presented in a more digestible way. Nowadays it's just run of the mill garbage entrepreneur mindset nonsense.
By the way, in the recent podcast with his brother he stated that he wants to sign up to Harvard because he thinks it's gonna make him interesting again. Imagine having the resources he has and the first thing on your mind is "I should go back to school so I can make content". He's getting jittery about his declining view count and thinks he can repeat the success he had back when he was in medical school. I've never seen a less inspiring (and inspired) youtuber. Team of 20 people and this is the idea you come up with? He literally can't think of anything because there's nothing interesting about him other than the fact that he went to some "prestigious" school. That was the initial draw and that's what he's going back to. You can't not laugh at it.
KEEP IN MIND this guy makes a literal truckload of cash per cohort teaching people how to YouTube and his idea for revamping his content/life and gaining relevancy is going to school again at almost 30 years old. He's gonna be that geek that the Harvard rowing team makes fun of. He's going about this thing like a fish stranded on shore flapping around for dear life.
Maybe before signing up to Harvard you should learn to film a video that's not overexposed and with crap audio. YouTube expert making millions from teaching gullible fans the path to YouTube success and you can't even film yourself properly. Absolute clown.
The value of volunteering is not that you give an hour of your time to pay someone to do some volunteering, it is the fact you are there in person giving your labour for free to do a good deed.
Not that donating to charities is a bad thing because they do have material costs to do stuff but it misses the point that volunteering is not about what an hour of your time is worth. If myself and Ali both volunteered at a soup kitchen or food bank that hour is still worth 1 hour to the charity despite his hour apparently being worth much more than my 1 hour. The 1 hour of work is valued the same to them and whether it's myself, Ali or Jeff Bezos volunteering, they need volunteers helping out not just infinite money.
I'm a junior doctor and no one cares what med school you went to, no one ever asks. You don't even put it on job applications! As long as you went to a UK medical school, you're viewed equally because all British med schools are regulated and up to a certain standard. Going for a med school based on prestige is so dumb to me, I chose mine based on the place I thought I'd be happy staying for 5+ years of my life!
I send students to Med School every year, and you're absolutely right.
I think his issue is he needs to be seen as super special, hence he was perfectly happy when he was making content that was 'How I came top of my class at Cambridge'. However, upon becoming an actual doctor - as you say - none of this mattered, and he was judged on his day to day work.
What he misses is the fact that in public service jobs, if you work hard and are good at what you do you become hugely well respected within your professional community. Presumably as he can't measure that, or make a YouTube video about it, he doesn't value it.
This proved to be an interesting watch. Few pointers:
1. The level of denial and defensiveness is off the scale here!
2. I couldn't quite believe the cynicism, conceitedness and the total lack of consistency:
- When talking to his more balanced, emotionally intelligent, YT-as-way-of-life-doubter colleagues (and Sheen can be a fabulous proxy for that: a normal, self-aware individual who's ambivalent about online content creation) , he very quickly dismisses his work in the productivity genre as "satire" and irony. This allows him space at their table and their time.
- He is then unable to square this off as his book (due in 2023!) centres around productivity and the only spiel he has managed to come up is "if you are enjoying it, it's not work". "If you are not enjoying what you are doing, you need to change your perspective". Thank you Ali! We wouldn't have figured that out!
Does he not see that when people are in dead-end, soul-crushing work or working in uncaring/ toxic environments for long times, changing perspective to themselves actually has the ability to further ruin mental health (it's so close to victim blaming, it's unreal!). He quotes his junior doctor experience of 2 years (I have gone through this myself) but the reference he makes is to a low-intensity 15 minute task of inserting a cannula for which changing perspective might do the trick. But working for hours and bearing the heat of hour upon hour, day upon day of insidiously toxic or unsupportive work environments can make mincemeat of your passion project and your productivity. Real action happens when you query not yourself but the workplace, the structure around you that needs changing and this takes balls, preparation, confidence to assert etc etc. and does not always yield the results you envisage and it comes with real-life stakes of unemployment, wages lost, whistleblowing, court cases: you name it!
But the context above is us working in teams in the REAL world where we don't get to choose everyone we work with or under. Not as a solitary online content creator who's hit bigtime and is assimilating a bunch of yes-men, yes-women, bookwriting and life coaches to big-up more clones of him online and dream up with another niche buzzword-riddled self-help book for privileged university students and early 20 year olds to commit to their assignments- I have a sneaky suspicion Jade's beaten him to it and he's now forced to move into the adult realm scrambling for ideas (and monetising on the way) with his pseudo-deep dives so he can filch, rebrand and sell.
As Sheen rightly said, he needs a break (like the rest of us) for perspective and life experience. A full calendar at his age with his emotional intelligence and self awareness (spot the sarcasm) is a recipe for a mid-life crisis or a mental illness. It will also take way his compulsion to pitch his privilege, his eccentricities and his niche position as something for other people to emulate: because it is so misguided, one-note and immature, it is tiresome.
As a suggestion, how about a day shadowing professionals from five different fields who have no relation to content creation online and seeing how real life plays out for them- the juggling of life spheres, the everyday regrets: why don't these coaches of his tell him to do such exercises, reflect more, develop empathy for people's struggles, recognise that pat-solutions seldom work and then go back to his little cubby flat to make his next video given he is so successful with more humility and doubt. Apparently he wants to help people!
Also, Ali mentioned that Daily Mail post, where they criticised some [female] physicians wearing bikinis and posting on Instagram. He compared it to somebody's comment here, mentioning him walking around in a towel and talking about his bowel movements.
To that, I'd say, Ali, dear, we have no qualms over you vacationing somewhere in a trunk or bikini. Doctors are people too and so if they post some pic in a swimsuit, let them do it. But the context you are referring to doesn't resonate with yours.
Not on Ali's channel but it is an interesting watch but Ali is basically unaware of his employees doing 50-60 hour weeks. His business is clearly a cult of personality in which he has a bunch of people who look up to him as inspirational basically running his life for him whilst he just acts as a figure head. 24 minutes onwards is incredible, he looks so out of touch and just like he has no idea how to manage people.
What strikes me is that his audience didn't mind when he mentioned he has outsourced some tasks to Filipinos because they are cheap.
I mean, if you are from India which is Worldwide capital of outsourcing location for transactional and repetitive tasks, why would you praise the guy of similar ethnic background who looks on you part of the World as a location of cheap labour force and the way to have more cash in the pocket rather than paying fair amount of money.
I don't get it. I'm from Poland, remember the time when we were extremely poor, and when I see guy like him I am just disgusted.
Yeah it's a mystery to me as well, I think the sheer fact of seeing one of their own have this success blinds them to the fact that he's indirectly shitting on his roots. They're still hoping he's a muslim and has kept a remnant of his culture but it's pretty clear he wants to be white and acts like it. He throws the occasional crumbs with some quote from the Quran that gets everyone all giddy before returning to his wannabe high-class white posh British nonsense. I'm an immigrant as well and know what it's like to be poor, which is why his complete lack of self awareness in regards to outsourcing irks me like crazy. I guess higher education has brainwashed him into the old British classism way of thinking which sorta coincides with India's old caste system.
Oh god, he's hit peak productivity guru bellend with his thumbnail / video:
Has anyone watched it?
Then there's this one which I just???? Can someone please tell influencers that "productive" and "productively" don't need to be applied to every fucking thing under the sun? Like, if you're doing an activity (singing, playing piano, writing), isn't that inherently 'productive' because you're doing the thing?
With his recent, uninspired offerings it's a marvel how he's almost at 1.5m subscribers. I was tempted by his '21 tips for my 18 year old self' video, but nah, it'll be regurgitated cringe from elsewhere.
I wish he'd just stuck to the study / medicine content. He's like a caricature of himself now.
for example, on the part time YouTube academy course he created is used some strategies that go against the consumers act in the UK. In another words, he’s breaking the law.
Firstly, the cost of his course went up by over 300%. Legal but very greedy.
then a month before the second cohort went on sale, he increased the promotion of the course at the same time he removed the pricing information from the website.
His promos always mentioned that there’s a cap on participants so “be aware of that when we go live with sales and joining the mailing list”.
This means that a lot of people went to the website to get more information knowing that most likely he was going to be oversubscribed but no price information.
Then, at 4pm tickets went on sale for people to realise that the ticket cost a small fortune. Knowing that most likely is going to be oversubscribed people didn’t want to risk not getting a place and bought a ticket. This is an illegal practice and considered sales under pressure.
This are techniques that most likely he learnt in the book “oversubscribed”. What he forgets is that in Europe, consumer law is always on the side of the consumer.
On the example I referred he made many hundred of thousands of pounds of sales under pressure. I might need some of that money to pay for legal fees and compensation.
Wow. If he's like that outside of his medical life then what is he like as a doctor. Not all doctors are saints, but this is super sneaky. As annoying as Dr Alex is and ignoring the fact that he was on love island, at least he uses his social media presence for good. He's constantly talking about healthcare as well as things in his personal life, but at least he's doing things that show he's interested in people's wellbeing. It's not constant ads without declaring it's an ad, or trying to sell these expensive courses to people, or all about money/trying to get rich quick bullshit. I mean let's not lie, Dr Alex obviously enjoys the pay and attention YT gives people, but you can see his content actually shows his passion for medicine.
I'd respect Ali more if he was like... medicine isn't for me. THEN, he can continue as he is and it wouldn't look so bad, because the two careers won't be constantly compared to each other. Medicine takes up a lot of your life, so it's not exactly possible to keep the two seperate.
Not to defend Ali Abdaal, but at least he is self-made and admits that he does YouTube for the money
And tbh his money tips have actually helped people
(Unlike the rich tory ed-baiting Roobeee Granger)
Out of all the Studytubers he is probs the most helpful/least problematic
He's done a fucking jazz piano course. Bet he does not have any music grades at all and you'd be betteer spending your Skillshare membership on a few weeks actual piano lessons with a proper teacher.
Probably is so deluded that he thinks he is actually providing value wiith all his little tidbits of "genius" that he's sharing on Twitter and putting out on his course selling platforms.
I do not know why he expects us to take job advice from a man who basically has never had to apply for a job. He's been a doctor for the NHS but as a Cambridge grad that was most likely the easiest process ever. Then he started his own business and his essentially self employed. He might choose who to hire for his business but Ali's amateur businesses hiring practises are not a good model for applying to like every other job ever.
He said in some video a while back that he doesn't actually care about kids dying in Africa and now he contradicts himself while simultaneously taking the moral highground over people who choose not to donate to charity but do charitable work nonetheless.
As I said in a previous post, it's becoming clear that he's just doing this to tick "doing good" off a list of "Things humans should do".
After all, who needs to face the cruel realities of the world and put himself through the uncomfortable situation of dealing with poor people face to face when you can just have some money deducted from your account every month while fucking around with your Apple devices in the lap of luxury?
Like this, you keep the poors out of sight and out of mind while having the argument that "I'm saving more lives like this", easily accessible in the bag of tricks, quips, quotes and aphorisms at the ready whenever an accusation is thrown your way.
