Ask HN: What talks or videos do you suggest to watch on a long flight? - tarikozket
======
girzel
I can't do anything productive or mentally taxing on long flights, I don't
know if it's the air pressure or premature jetlag or what, but I have a very
hard time exercising my will. What I do enjoy, though (in addition to the
Marvel comics movies – I only watch them on planes) is reading documentation.
It's a great time to sit down with an in-depth manual and just soak up
information you didn't have before. You don't have to do anything, or make
anything, you just learn how something works. Another related activity is
reading a bunch of code that I know I'll be working on in the near future.
There's something very pleasurable about absorbing a codebase while at the
same time completely excusing myself from actually _doing_ anything.

~~~
deminature
I've experienced the same thing. I had planned to spend a 14hr flight gaming
and after 4hrs, had neither the ability not will to continue. I'm completely
uninformed on the subject, but wondered whether it was the effect of a thinner
atmosphere on cognitive abilities.

~~~
nickporter
Same here. I think it's because most of the time, I have to get up early to
catch a flight and I don't get enough sleep.

------
PakG1
Another one of those threads that causes intense navel-gazing, shame, and
mounting disgust in my gut for myself as I realize that everyone around me is
working hard to better themselves while I just binge-watch movies.... and then
my eyes glaze over as I mollify myself with the movies until I forget that
this thread exists.

~~~
byebyetech
Life is short, enjoy your time watching movies. I have wasted a lot of time
being busy (reading non-fiction, TED talks etc) that did not translate into
any noticeable self improvement or progress in my life. I have feeling a lot
of people makes that mistake too.

~~~
skookumchuck
I find I enjoy watching documentaries and reading technical/history/biography
books often more than fiction. Because fiction is, ultimately, fake and
manipulative.

~~~
zaphod4prez
I'm reading your comment as implying that fiction is more manipulative than
nonfiction? If that's true, I'd be curious to hear more about your reasons for
that. Don't mean that in a challenging way, this is just a topic I've been
thinking about.

~~~
skookumchuck
It's manipulative in the following ways:

1\. The good guys win, the bad guys lose

2\. Going along with (1) there's the morality message

3\. The events in the book serve the purpose of the plot

4\. Lots of books are formulaic, i.e. the author found a formula that sells.

5\. There's got to be a beginning, middle, and end.

6\. Many novels are written as a series of cliffhangers. Crichton would do
that, as would the Outlander series, etc.

Real life is much more messy and unpredictable, hence more interesting.

~~~
mercer
The problem I have with biographies and documentaries is that they overlay
order and narrative on this 'messy and unpredictable' reality. If anything,
that's more manipulative than a good novel that is rooted in deep
research/domain knowledge and that doesn't claim to be 'objective'.

~~~
skookumchuck
Historical accounts are always biased, usually according to the political
correctness of the time they were written. For example, the Founding Fathers
went from hero to goat to hero to goat and are now morphing back to heroic
status with the play "Hamilton".

Civil War heroes are goats today, even having their memorials removed.

Edison has gone from hero to goat. He'll be a hero again in a few decades.

It's the job of a professional historian to try and discern the truth from all
this. But whatever truth there is in fiction is impossible to determine if you
know nothing about history.

------
wymy
If you enjoy history, check out Dan Carlin's Hardcore History series on WWI,
"Blueprint for Armageddon." About 20+ hours of content.

[https://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-
history-50-bluepr...](https://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-
history-50-blueprint-for-armageddon-i/)

~~~
jessewmc
The History of Rome is another history podcast among the all time greats of
the medium I think, worth checking out.

~~~
JadeNB
Link:
[http://thehistoryofrome.com/episodes](http://thehistoryofrome.com/episodes) .

------
pro_zac
I'm a huge fan of the series of Ultimate talks from C3 conferences.

The Ultimate Game Boy Talk
[https://media.ccc.de/v/33c3-8029-the_ultimate_game_boy_talk](https://media.ccc.de/v/33c3-8029-the_ultimate_game_boy_talk)

The Ultimate Apollo Guidance Computer Talk
[https://media.ccc.de/v/34c3-9064-the_ultimate_apollo_guidanc...](https://media.ccc.de/v/34c3-9064-the_ultimate_apollo_guidance_computer_talk)

The Ultimate Atari 2600 Talk [https://media.ccc.de/v/28c3-4711-en-
the_atari_2600_video_com...](https://media.ccc.de/v/28c3-4711-en-
the_atari_2600_video_computer_system_the_ultimate_talk)

More here:(Commodore 64, Amiga 500, etc.)
[https://media.ccc.de/search/?q=ultimate](https://media.ccc.de/search/?q=ultimate)

------
TripleH
It's kind of a classic, but I really enjoyed Richard Feynman lectures[0],
especially on subjects I thought I knew well.

[0] -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3mhkYbznBk&list=PLLzGzdSNup...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3mhkYbznBk&list=PLLzGzdSNup63lMYeOpU9Hax6MBsTjdDas)

~~~
thatcherc
Also _reading_ Feynman's Lectures on Physics [0]. He presents loads of topics
in a way that I think captures a lot of the beauty and cleverness of physics
while focusing more on building intuition and understanding than on specific
math techniques that often come up in physics courses.

I think they're a good way to learn about physics without a ton of background.
I also find they're nice to read when studying for my physics exams, just
because of Feynman's unique approach to teaching.

[0] -
[http://www.feynmanlectures.caltech.edu/index.html](http://www.feynmanlectures.caltech.edu/index.html)

------
mcprwklzpq
Never had a mindset to understand what sometimes are they talking about in
humanities. Recently found this series of short and clear leactures on many of
such topics. Philosophy of the Humanities
[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPeStI124dee1ByfcDzRv...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPeStI124dee1ByfcDzRvPxKDNb0GQjmo)

Then this huge series of lectures on western philosophy introduces to a lot of
ideas about everything. Can listen anytime. Arthur Holmes: A History of
Philosophy
[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9GwT4_YRZdBf9nIUHs0z...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9GwT4_YRZdBf9nIUHs0zjrnUVl-
KBNSM)

Then this category theory keeps popping up everywhere, completly
incomprehensible, seems like mathematicians are gone mad. I found that this
lectures help like no others to catch up to them. Category theory for
programmers by Bartosz Milewski
[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbgaMIhjbmEnaH_LTkxLI...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbgaMIhjbmEnaH_LTkxLI7FMa2HsnawM_)

------
scrollaway
I've started watching Raymond Hettinger's talks lately. He's a core dev on
Python. I love them, the guy is charismatic, very smart and his Python
knowledge constantly impresses me.

[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRVdut2KPAguz3xcd22i_...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRVdut2KPAguz3xcd22i_o_onnmDKj3MA)

My favourite:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zinZmE3Ogk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zinZmE3Ogk)

~~~
eric24234
This is cool. I really love these type of posts where the people under
discussion is not in the main stream but should have been popular in
programming groups. John Carmack talks also is of that type. Very charismatic
and delivers his speech standing at the same place with minimal movement for
over an hour and talking from the fundamentals to the extreme details of the
topics.

------
johnsonjo
Just as a side note for all these wonderful youtube resources. You can use
this recently discussed tool on hacker news [0] youtube-dl [1] for downloading
youtube videos. There's also this video transcoder Handbrake [2] that uses
ffmpeg [3] under the hood if the previous tool spits out a video in a format
that is not specifically mkv or mp4 (whichever of those two you prefer).

[0]:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17460060](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17460060)

[1]: [https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl/](https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl/)

[2]: [https://handbrake.fr/](https://handbrake.fr/)

[3]: [https://ffmpeg.org/](https://ffmpeg.org/)

------
sdf43543t345
I like to watch the map that shows the where the plane is. As the agony of
travel bares on after hour and hour, you watch as you get closer closer to
escaping your hellish existence in a tin can at 30k feet.

~~~
coldtea
> _As the agony of travel bares on after hour and hour_

What agony?

> _you watch as you get closer closer to escaping your hellish existence in a
> tin can at 30k feet_

Might as well bring some paint, to watch it dry...

~~~
derekp7
The agony is from body aches from sitting in an uncomfortable chair and not
getting physical movement for a few hours.

~~~
coldtea
> _The agony is from body aches from sitting in an uncomfortable chair and not
> getting physical movement for a few hours._

That sounds no different from my regular day at the office -- except that even
cross-atlantic flights are shorter.

------
crispyambulance
Kung Fu movies. Seriously. Jackie Chan, Bruce Lee, whatever.

You need something engaging but not too mentally taxing while under the
influence of jet lag.

What could be better than the righteous grist of King Fu movies involving good
guys and bad guys duking it out?

~~~
Al-Khwarizmi
A kindred spirit. I always spend long flights watching martial arts movies and
drinking tomato juice. I'm too uncomfortable and tired on flights to do
anything productive.

~~~
factotvm
You might be more comfortable if you drank a less salty drink.

~~~
crispyambulance
I don't know what it is about tomato juice and airlines. The only place I
_ever_ see anyone drinking straight-up tomato juice is on flights!

~~~
Al-Khwarizmi
It is quite well documented (I think at least a couple of studies have been
made) that tomato juice is one of the few things that actually taste better on
airplanes. The low pressure and high noise level affects how we perceive
flavors.

[https://www.dw.com/en/lufthansa-investigates-the-science-
of-...](https://www.dw.com/en/lufthansa-investigates-the-science-of-airline-
food/a-6114748)

[https://www.travelandleisure.com/travel-tips/airlines-
airpor...](https://www.travelandleisure.com/travel-tips/airlines-airports/why-
tomato-juice-tastes-better-on-airplane)

I would never buy tomato juice at home, but I drink a lot of it on planes. If
you have never tried it on a plane maybe you should!

------
coolkarni
I know this is not answering the question from the poster but I found
meditation very helpful during my recent 15 hours flight. It is very rare to
find such a long time alone in an almost quite and non-stimulating
environment. Getting meals served to you on your seat and knowing that you are
stuck here for next many hours takes away the planning ahead part of the head.
I found it easier to be with my breath and thoughts. I also drifted in and out
of sleep during this time and felt very relaxed. It helped me upon landing to
minimize effects of Jet lag. I believe it was more helpful than any talk or
video and could also help getting some good insights.

~~~
kovek
I'd like to add that my morning 1-2 hour commute is much more enjoyable if I
do some exercise before it. If not, I have trouble staying
put/sleeping/concentrating on work/meditating, etc. Also, someone recommended
to me recently to get a massage before a flight. I'll try that next time.

------
pdkl95
Anybody even remotely involved in designing anyth9ing connected to a _network_
should watch Raph Koster's GDC talk about the ethical issues involved in
developing AR and VR games. Except it's not really about "games" as we usually
use the term. "Twitter" is a "virtual world"/MMO where they only bothered to
built the chat feature.

This is really about the ethics and responsibilities that come with managing
social spaces or infrastructure that people use to interact socially (which
necessarily includes the _problems_ that humans always have). The MMOs (and
the MUDs/etc before 0them) have been working on these problems for _decades_.
That doesn't mean they have the solution, but that experience does include a
lot of lessons about what _not_ to do; far too many projects are choosing to
learn those lessons the hard way.

[http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1024060/Still-Logged-In-What-
AR](http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1024060/Still-Logged-In-What-AR)

~~~
gluelogic
Awesome. I've been intending to look for writings and talks by Raph Koster
lately.

For unaware readers: he was the lead designer for Ultima Online.

~~~
Raph_Koster
All of my talks are linked from here:
[https://www.raphkoster.com/games/presentations/](https://www.raphkoster.com/games/presentations/)

Most of my writings are on that site as well.

I just recently put out a new book including postmortem material on Ultima
Online and other games. Should be front page on the blog.

------
DoofusOfDeath
For 5-6 hour flights, it's usually a combination of things for me:

\- Videos related to whatever technology will be pertinent at the meeting I'm
flying in for.

\- Distraction movies: Bourne Identity, etc.

\- Anime I'm currently binge-watching.

\- Games on my phone.

\- Printed technical articles I've been procrastinating about reading.

Honestly, how virtuous/edifying my in-flight activities are depends on how
much sleep I got the night before. This is one reason I dislike early-morning
flights - they leav me zonked and unable to make good use of my in-flight
solitude.

Side note: On Android, I just discovered "Movies Anywhere". It was a great
tool for downloading DRM's movies/shows for my last trip.

------
KirinDave
This is a talk by Professor Fritz Henglein about how to sort general datasets
in linear time. Most people in industry do not believe this is possible, but
it's actually part of a family of well-researched techniques.
[https://youtu.be/sz9ZlZIRDAg](https://youtu.be/sz9ZlZIRDAg)

~~~
AlexCoventry
Actually linear, or O( _n_ log _n_ )?

~~~
KirinDave
Actually linear. O(n) + k.

Check my submission history. I keep trying to show people this work. Sadly, it
never seems to take to a wide audience.

As a consequence, selective joins across 2 fields are also linear time.

~~~
AlexCoventry
Interesting. Can you point me at the timestamp or a paper which shows the
algorithm?

~~~
KirinDave
It's complicated enough that you should just watch the whole talk. The paper
is 90 pages.

~~~
AlexCoventry
It's been six years since the talk... Why hasn't someone drilled down through
all the irrelevant typing goo, and shown how to sort integers in linear time?
Where does the standard proof that optimal algorithms are Ω( _n_ log _n_ )
break?

~~~
KirinDave
> Why hasn't someone drilled down through all the irrelevant typing goo, and
> shown how to sort integers in linear time?

I mean, if that's all you want Radix sort and American Flag sort are wikipedia
fodder.

As for the "typing goo" is, uh, fairly important for how it's derived and what
it does. A lot of advanced CS work uses it now, because it's quite powerful. A
huge amount of pure-CS research is done in that world.

I guess we don't see this work in more contexts because it's just very very
difficult to get it right. Edward Kmett, who is globally recognized for his
talent in the field, did a haskell implementation which we all use and love,
but it's pretty excruciating to implement it outside of a functional and
generic language (and it is genuinely hard to do it in a language without
general side effects, so you get difficulty from both sides).

I think a lot of folks in industry just don't think it matters. Certainly when
I talk to my peers they suggest it doesn't matter to their work at all.

As for "6 years", they author has continued to push the work. It's also been
used in a variety of applications. You can cite search the original paper.
[https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f425/7af9221ca7fe21dc84a049...](https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f425/7af9221ca7fe21dc84a049a8545a28a874ae.pdf)

[https://scholar.google.dk/scholar?oi=bibs&hl=en&cites=180821...](https://scholar.google.dk/scholar?oi=bibs&hl=en&cites=18082135325500003099&as_sdt=5)

One particularly interesting work was computing specific types relational
algebras producing products in linear time, which is pretty cool:
[https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1706372](https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1706372)
(btw, sorry, ACM is down tonight they're showing us their cloudflare).

This is not new stuff in the world of graduate CS, anymore than succinct data
structures or wavelet trees. It's seldom applied in industry, but many of
these techniques and sorts are taught as upper division courses in recent,
algorithm-and-theory intensive CS programs. That stuff just doesn't make it
out of academia very fast these days. Academics face a lot of pushback from
industry now with disruptive findings. Look at how Emin Gun Sirer has been
blackballed by the cryptocurrency community, for example. Look at how
steadfastly folks have stood by JWT despite Lentczner's team's work on a
better alternative in Macaroons.

~~~
AlexCoventry
Where is the Haskell implementation? Are there public benchmarks of its
asymptotic performance?

I'm pretty sure a worst-case linear sorting algorithm would have multiple NYT
articles about it.

EDIT: The edits to the parent since I made this comment make it look a bit
silly. It made more sense in the context I was initially responding to.

EDIT 2: Thanks for linking the paper. From there:

> As Proposition 1.1 and the corresponding well-known combinatorial lower
> bound of Ω(n log n) (Knuth 1998, Section 5.3.1) for comparison-based sorting
> show, we cannot accomplish efficient generic partitioning and linear-time
> sorting by using black-box binary comparison functions as specifications of
> equivalence or ordering relations. Instead, _we show how to construct
> efficient discriminators by structural recursion on specifications defined
> compositionally in an expressive domain-specific language for denoting
> equivalence and ordering relations._

Which sounds like the advantage I speculated on in the grandchild below. I
understand, now, and it's a nice result. Thanks for pointing it out.

~~~
KirinDave
[https://hackage.haskell.org/package/discrimination](https://hackage.haskell.org/package/discrimination)

Which, by the way, contains boatloads of novel work. It uses internal parallel
execution to work around some of the problems with discrimination passes
between two groups. Cutting edge stuff.

It's haskell. People like you have chips on their shoulder about "typing goo."
I'm sure one day someone will write a golang implementation then go to some
inventor-centric conference and be hailed as a genius tho, as per usual.

But, did you not know about Radix sort or American Flag sort? Counting sort is
a common stupid silicon valley interview question, and has been in the ruby
code katas since like 2003. So as keen as I am to see this work widely
distributed, it's not totally unprecedented the way you make it out to be.

Hey, want to know another surprising one? With a proper pre-encoding you can
compress an (extremely long) binary value and answer questions about how many
bits in a given range have occured (a popcount) in constant time. You can
also, by extension, figure out the offset of the Nth hot bit appears, in O(1)
time. Pretty surprising, huh? Especially when you realize that the entire
space of 32 bit integers is only 512mb as a fully realized bitfield, 32x
smaller than actually storing one instance of every integer.

See here: [http://alexbowe.com/rrr/](http://alexbowe.com/rrr/)

~~~
AlexCoventry
> But, did you not know about Radix sort or American Flag sort?

Oh, is it that the types somehow mandate roughly evenly-sized ordered
partitions at any sample size? If so, I get it, now. Thanks.

~~~
KirinDave
No I'm afraid they don't. I confess I regret this conversation. I've gotten
very little out of it other than a confrontstonal attitude from you and a
bunch of confusingly worded challenges.

~~~
AlexCoventry
If you have any suggestions on how I could have been clearer, I'd welcome
them. I'm always glad to learn of flaws in my writing.

Can you get linear time even on Haskell's arbitrary-precision `Integer`s?

~~~
KirinDave
"typing goo". Generally complaining about the methods used by someone with a
novel-peer reviewed result and demanding further and further reductive
summarization on your terms, defining said terms with phrases like "typing
goo" is bad form.

Further suggesting a lack of credibility by suggesting press coverage should
be in place is confrontational.

I lost my temper after you did these things a few times. I apologize.

And yes, it can get O(n) performance with Arbitrary length integers. These
analysis exclude underlying comparison times.

~~~
AlexCoventry
Thanks for the feedback.

> suggesting a lack of credibility by suggesting press coverage should be in
> place is confrontational.

You edited out the context I was responding to, there. As I recall, you were
originally explaining the "six years" in terms of it just being hard to get
academic results into the mainstream. That seemed extremely unlikely for such
a well-known result.

I'm not bothered by your invective or personal attacks, but editing your
comments so that my responses are out of context is pretty disturbing.

~~~
KirinDave
I edited a cloned paragraph with a missing sentence that was accidentally
added. I prepared that reply on mobile, and that can happen because you don't
see scroll bars.

The literal and figurative content weren't changed. I just removed duplication
and improve the flow of the post.

------
mastax
"Breakthrough in Nuclear Fusion?" \- Professor Dennis Whyte.
[https://youtu.be/KkpqA8yG9T4](https://youtu.be/KkpqA8yG9T4)

The title threw me off, but it's a very interesting and grounded talk about
the different approaches to scaling fusion energy.

~~~
Diederich
Looks like they're moving ahead with that approach:
[http://news.mit.edu/2018/mit-newly-formed-company-launch-
nov...](http://news.mit.edu/2018/mit-newly-formed-company-launch-novel-
approach-fusion-power-0309)

------
TaylorAlexander
I really enjoy this Noam Chomsky interview on automation and the structure of
society, and find it highly relevant today.

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=h_x0Y3FqkEI](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=h_x0Y3FqkEI)

I also enjoyed the documentary Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975, which can be
found on torrent sites.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_Power_Mixtape_1967...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_Power_Mixtape_1967–1975)

~~~
mcprwklzpq
There is this youtube channel that regularly uploads short excerpts of Chomsky
speaking on particular topics. Chomsky's Philosophy
[https://www.youtube.com/user/chomskysphilosophy](https://www.youtube.com/user/chomskysphilosophy)

And this channel did a great compilation that introduces to all Chomsky's
works. Table of contents is in the video description. Topics are: War, State
Power, and American Exceptionalism. Capitalism, Neoliberalism, and Corporate
Propaganda. Anarchism, Libertarian Socialism, and Classical Liberalism.
Science, Philosophy, and Language. Noam Chomsky - The Essentials
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1umiaNjOinE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1umiaNjOinE)

------
unixhero
Elevator hacking - 2 hour long walkthrough of elevator security and building
security. So much fun in that one. Search for it on Youtube.

~~~
bouk
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHf1vD5_b5I](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHf1vD5_b5I)

~~~
unixhero
Yes. That's the shorter censored versoion.

I recommend the full 2 hour version, with all the secrets:
[https://youtu.be/ZUvGfuLlZus](https://youtu.be/ZUvGfuLlZus)

My second favourite talk: You spent all that money and your still got owned:
[https://youtu.be/tJsNu0VRKYY](https://youtu.be/tJsNu0VRKYY)

I even watch these again and again.

------
Ologn
For that long time period you might want to watch "A Glorious Accident". Wim
Kazyer sits down with Daniel Dennett, Freeman Dyson, Stephen Jay Gould, Oliver
Sacks and Stephen Toulmin (and Rupert Sheldrake) to do one-on-one interviews.
Then all of them sit down together for 3 1/2 hours at a round table and have a
wide-ranging discussion. Wim Kazyer acts as a kind of moderator, Rupert
Sheldrake, who has written books like "The Science Delusion" acts as a kind of
antagonist.

------
Syzygies
Talking Machines
[https://www.thetalkingmachines.com/](https://www.thetalkingmachines.com/)
Human Conversations about Machine Learning

Podcasts are better for flying. You can close your eyes, and if you don't stay
awake, all the better.

------
jtmarmon
literally anything by rich hickey. especially his presentations on Datomic

------
NVRM
The Flight channel:
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXh6VKhioaeEaMQasii7IfQ/vid...](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXh6VKhioaeEaMQasii7IfQ/videos)

------
bdz
Harvard digital photography course, all (12) lectures are on Youtube

[http://digitalphotography.exposed/#schedule](http://digitalphotography.exposed/#schedule)

------
swlkr
I always suggest this [https://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-
Easy](https://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy)

------
onemoresoop
Bracing for Impact: True Tales of Air Disasters and the People Who Survived
Them (paperback version)

------
lcuff
It won't take up a whole long flight, but one of the best TED talks ever is
Jill Bolte Taylor's talk. She's a neuro-anatomist who had a stroke and reports
from the inside about what goes on, with significant implications for what
kind of choices we make in life:

[https://www.ted.com/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_strok...](https://www.ted.com/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight)

------
metabagel
If you have an iPad, play FTL. It'll make the time zip by.

[http://subsetgames.com/ftl.html](http://subsetgames.com/ftl.html)

------
bmcusick
Snakes on a Plane

------
everdev
Wild, Wild Country on Netflix

------
petercooper
It might be a good opportunity to close your eyes and listen to many of the
amazing (but nearly always way too long, IMHO) interviews available on
developer podcasts like Software Engineering Daily, Microsoft Research,
Hanselminutes, IndieHackers, etc. You get to listen to some great
conversations and if you fall asleep, it's a bonus!

------
acobster
I found Stephen Wolfram's talks about complexity and computation _extremely_
rewarding.

[https://youtu.be/cbu_bCQ2Lkg](https://youtu.be/cbu_bCQ2Lkg)

[https://youtu.be/_eC14GonZnU](https://youtu.be/_eC14GonZnU)

------
baby
Get the coursera app and download a week worth of courses.

------
murkle
Richard Hamming "The Art of doing Science and Engineering"
[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2FF649D0C4407B30](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2FF649D0C4407B30)

------
wnissen
Netflix now lets you download many (most?) of their films, I always get some
documentaries and fictional shows of my destination. For France I watched a
documentary on the national soccer team and a comedy special by Jacky Bloom.

------
mattbierner
Hurtling through the air, surrounded by 200+ of the most fascinating and
complex entities in the universe—fellow beings who share many of my hopes and
fears—I always end up watching Batman vs Superman

------
rorykoehler
Jeremy Rifkin 3rd industrial age talk
[https://youtu.be/QX3M8Ka9vUA](https://youtu.be/QX3M8Ka9vUA)

~~~
bronco21016
I think there was some good info in there but I also couldn’t help thinking
‘this guy is just lumping together all of the tech buzzwords of the last 2
years’.

~~~
rorykoehler
This guy is a chief architect of both the EU and Chinese plans for the coming
years. His words weigh more than the average speakers.

------
jchw
The Ultimate Gameboy Talk from 33c3 is a good one if you haven't already
watched it. Frankly a large amount of CCC videos would also fit the bill.

------
adrice727
Terence McKenna's lectures from the Earth Trust Foundation conference are
really great, if you're into that sort of thing. There are four parts,
totaling ~6.5 hours.

[https://archive.org/details/PsychedeliaRawArchivesOfTerenceM...](https://archive.org/details/PsychedeliaRawArchivesOfTerenceMckennaTalks/EarthTrust1.mp3)

------
dpeck
Split my time between documentaries that can be downloaded from Netflix,
usually of middling quality, and whatever audiobook caught my attention in the
days before flight.

Being a bigger guy, unless I get the upgrade I can’t do anything with a
keyboard so doing much productive is out of the question.

Recent highlights have been Sour Grapes and the Rotten series on Netflix, and
Ray Dalits Principles on Audible.

------
pretty_bubbles
I usually read long articles I have saved in Pocket.

------
wenc
I'm one of those people who are slightly susceptible to motion sickness, so I
can't do anything that requires intense focus on an airplane.

My two go-tos are:

1) Noisli - white noise app to help me sleep.

2) BBC's Sherlock - the slickness of the production values keeps me engaged.

I find I'm more productive when I land if I don't try too hard to be
productive on the flight.

------
Timpy
I like Hello Internet
[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwez9XDNV_wS0WNDZteXjgw](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwez9XDNV_wS0WNDZteXjgw)

It's in the genre of "two dudes talking" podcasts, but technology and
futurology are some of the topics they touch on often.

------
7373737373
I found these great brain anatomy lectures (WARNING, real brains!):
[https://library.med.utah.edu/neurologicexam/html/brain-
disse...](https://library.med.utah.edu/neurologicexam/html/brain-
dissections.html)

------
chrisbennet
I like to listen to the "Coding Blocks" pad cast on long drives (most every
weekend). They go over a book like "Clean Code"[1] a chapter at a time and
distill the high points in an entertaining fashion.

[1] by Robert C. Martin (aka "uncle Bob")

~~~
Maultasche
I love the Coding Blocks podcast. It's one of my favorites. I also recommend
Developer Tea.

~~~
chrisbennet
Developer Tea eh? I'll check that out.

------
s_kilk
All three parts of Adam Curtis's "All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving
Grace"

------
7373737373
This talk, by a DARPA project manager on brain computer interfaces:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVuSHjeh1Os](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVuSHjeh1Os)

------
eigenvalue
If you are interested in machine learning, I thought this was a very thought
provoking lecture:

[https://youtu.be/N5oZIO8pE40](https://youtu.be/N5oZIO8pE40)

------
LarryDarrell
Old episodes of the Computer Chronicles:
[https://www.youtube.com/user/ComputerChroniclesYT](https://www.youtube.com/user/ComputerChroniclesYT)

------
SurrealSoul
I am currently studying a language so long flights are just the perfect time
to "quiz myself" in that language. Either by flash-card videos or un-subtitled
dubs of a movie in that language

~~~
le3dh4x0r
Which language exactly? I am currently studying kanji with anki during my
commute.

~~~
SurrealSoul
I am studying mandarin, I could probably be using my time doing some writing
in my commute. I use a plethora of apps / download youtube videos / rosetta
stone

------
_nrvs
This is a great resource: [https://github.com/JanVanRyswyck/awesome-
talks](https://github.com/JanVanRyswyck/awesome-talks)

------
fenesiistvan
One more flight, and I will be an expert in javascript. At least theorically,
since I never wrote a single line of js code ...i can only read books while on
flight, but not to code.

------
Exuma
My favorite video of all time:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FITJMJjASUs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FITJMJjASUs)

------
Kerrick
Yehuda Katz - Endurance
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYihop9gHj4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYihop9gHj4)

------
hangonhn
Watch something you normally wouldn't watch if you had a choice but might find
interesting. It's a good way to force yourself out of your comfort zone.

------
tmaly
I would recommend the audio book of Thinking Fast and Slow. I have been
listening to it during my commute and it is fascinating.

------
cranjice
Fight Club

------
taf2
Grubby playing Warcraft 3! Let your brain rest

------
Biba89
Course in miracles:

[https://youtu.be/nrmFlDpeF-k](https://youtu.be/nrmFlDpeF-k)

------
royalharsh95
Final Destination

------
seattle_spring
The entire Bojack Horseman series on Netflix.

------
joshuaheard
To answer your question, Jordan Peterson's video lectures series, "Maps of
Meaning" (You would need internet access to YouTube).

For long flights, I buy magazines in the airport shop (Wired and Scientific
American). I also have my music collection on Spotify on my phone with
wireless Bose headphones to listen to. Also, several books on Kindle on my
phone (now reading "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind"). Don't forget a
spare battery. Or, sometimes I check the plane's movie list for a new release
I haven't seen and watch that.

------
gargarplex
write a complete program with pen and paper

~~~
napsterbr
Reminded me of college, when we had to write several pages of assembly code
(that was 6 years ago). Fun exercise, not so much when your grade depends on
it.

~~~
hotdog97
You really wish for a paranthesis counting pen when you have to write pages
and pages of LISP (I think it was Common Lisp in our case) on paper for an
exam.

------
mabynogy
A serie like The Handmaid's Tale.

------
samrohn778
if you like interviews, then check out these podcasts:

How I built this

Masters of scale

Akimbo

Software engineering daily

------
spitfire
Airplane.

------
dustingetz
Read

------
santoshmaharshi
I mostly use a very long form podcast like Joe Rogen, Sam Harris, or videos
hosted on Internet Archives.

------
samirm
read a book

