An editor has performed a search and found that sufficient sources exist to establish the subject's notability.(September 2024) |
Techmoan | ||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Personal information | ||||||||||
Born | Matthew Taylor 18 January 1971 | |||||||||
Occupation | YouTuber | |||||||||
YouTube information | ||||||||||
Channel | ||||||||||
Years active | 2009–present | |||||||||
Genres | ||||||||||
Subscribers | 1.37 million [1] (September 2024) | |||||||||
Total views | 338.4 million [1] (September 2024) | |||||||||
Associated acts |
| |||||||||
|
Matthew "Mat" Taylor, better known by his YouTube handle Techmoan, is a British YouTuber and blogger, specializing in consumer tech reviews and retrotech documentaries about technology of historical interest. [2]
Apart from reviews and tests, Taylor's videos often include disassembling (and repairing when possible) products and, in the case of older technology, reporting on the product's history and reception via references in publications of the time. For audio and entertainment devices this is often Billboard magazine, which at the time covered both consumer and trade electronics devices through articles and old advertisements. Bonus outro skits often feature a trio of muppet-like puppets, parodying YouTube viewer comments. [3]
Taylor's videos have been referenced by sites such as The A.V. Club, [4] Gizmodo, [5] Hackaday, [6] El Español [7] and print publications such as Popular Mechanics [8] and The Daily Telegraph. [9] [10] [11] [12] By ratings on Reddit, MarketWatch listed the YouTube Channel 6th in its "binge-watching" top ten. [13]
Current product reviews on miscellaneous tech items, mainly on consumer products like action and dashcams, sometimes sponsored or donated, participating in the affiliate marketing associates program of Amazon Services LLC, [14] and a Patreon membership, are how the channel is funded. [15] [16]
In 2006, Taylor started a YouTube channel called "Vectrexuk", with videos of similar tech items like installing a home cinema and controlled toasters [17] [18] "just to prove a point that people will watch anything on YouTube". [19] [20]
The channel "Techmoan" started on 31 May 2009, uploading a tour of a 2009 Piaggio MP3, taken at 480p and very basic sound quality. [21] For additional non-tech videos, in 2015 he started another channel, called the "Youtube Pedant". [22] In a 2016 video covering the D-VHS format, he uncovered a 1080i video of New York City filmed in 1993. [23] [24] This footage was uploaded separately to his "Youtube Pedant" channel where as of September 2024, it has gained 7.3 million views as well as being shared widely on sites such as Reddit [25] and The Verge. [26] [27] As of September 2024, the main channel has over 1.3 million subscribers and over 338 million views. [28] His videos often get millions of views, and his video on the Nixie watch has had more than 5 million views. [29]
Documentary videos about forgotten magnetic tape recording formats show the OMNI Entertainment System [30] which used 8-track tape storage, the HiPac, a successor of the PlayTape and related applications of it. Other videos show some of the smallest and largest analog recording tape cartridges ever made like the Picocassette [31] for dictation machines or Cantata 700 background music system. [32] Further videos show other former quarter-inch-tape cartridge formats like the Sabamobil [33] which used existing 3-inch open reels for mobile use, and the portable Sanyo Micro Pack 35, [34] as well as the RCA tape cartridge [35] and the Sony Elcaset [36] with another compromise of playtime and sound quality, oddities and gimmicks on Compact Cassettes as "reinventing the reel", [37] [38] several ways of autoreverse, [39] automatic multiple cassette players, [40] [41] endless loop cassettes, [42] and cassette mass production technology. [43] [44]
Documentary on formats of vinyl recording show the Tefifon [45] [46] endless cartridge, or the Seeburg 1000 background music system, [47] [48] vertical turntables, [49] and other audio encodings CX and dbx for noise reduction on vinyl analog recording. [50]
Other documentaries show the mechanical Curta calculator, [51] devices with Nixie tube displays, [52] wire recording, [53] and the WikiReader. [54]
Techmoan was referenced in a Dennis & Gnasher Unleashed strip in Beano, with Dennis referring to Techmoan as "total Dad-Tube". [55]
The Compact Cassette, also commonly called a cassette tape, audio cassette, or simply tape or cassette, is an analog magnetic tape recording format for audio recording and playback. Invented by Lou Ottens and his team at the Dutch company Philips, the Compact Cassette was released in August 1963.
The 8-track tape is a magnetic-tape sound recording technology that was popular from the mid-1960s to the early 1980s, when the compact cassette, which pre-dated the 8-track system, surpassed it in popularity for pre-recorded music.
Video 2000 is a consumer videocassette system and analogue recording standard developed by Philips and Grundig to compete with JVC's VHS and Sony's Betamax video technologies. It was designed for the PAL color television standard, but some models additionally handled SECAM. Distribution of Video 2000 products began in 1979 exclusively in Europe, South Africa and Argentina and ended in 1988.
PlayTape is a 1⁄8 inch (3.2 mm) audiotape format and mono or stereo playback system introduced in 1966 by Frank Stanton. It is a two-track system, and was launched to compete with existing 4-track cartridge technology. The cartridges play anywhere from eight to 24 minutes, and are continuous. Because of its portability, PlayTape was an almost instant success, and over 3,000 artists had published in this format by 1968. White cases usually meant about eight songs were on the tape.
Cartrivision is an analog videocassette format introduced in 1972, and the first format to offer feature films for consumer rental.
The RCA tape cartridge is a magnetic tape audio format that was designed to offer stereo quarter-inch reel-to-reel tape recording quality in a convenient format for the consumer market. It was introduced in 1958, following four years of development. This timing coincided with the launch of the stereophonic phonograph record. It was introduced to the market by RCA in 1958.
YouTube is an American online video-sharing platform headquartered in San Bruno, California, founded by three former PayPal employees—Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim—in February 2005. Google bought the site in November 2006 for US$1.65 billion, since which it operates as one of Google's subsidiaries.
The Seeburg 1000 Background Music System is a phonograph designed and built by the Seeburg Corporation to play background music from special 162⁄3 RPM vinyl records in offices, restaurants, retail businesses, factories and similar locations. Seeburg provided a service similar to that of Muzak.
The Tefifon is an audio playback format, developed and manufactured in Germany, that utilizes cartridges loaded with an endlessly looped reel of plastic tape. It is somewhat similar to the later 4-track and 8-track magnetic audio tape cartridges, but with grooves engraved into the tape, like a phonograph record. The grooves were engraved in a helical fashion across the width of the tape, in a manner similar to Dictaphone's Dictabelt format. The grooves are read with a stylus and amplified pickup in the player's transport. A Tefifon cartridge, known as a "Tefi", can hold up to four hours of music; therefore, most releases for the format are usually compilations of popular hits or dance music, operas, and operettas. Tefifon players were not sold by television and radio dealers in Germany, but rather sold directly by special sales outlets affiliated with Tefi.
React is a media franchise created and owned by React Media, LLC, consisting of several online series centering on a group of individuals reacting to viral videos, fads, video games, film trailers, or music videos.
The Cantata 700 is a commercial background music system and corresponding cartridge format developed by 3M that was in common use from 1965 until the 1990s.
Sabamobil was a magnetic tape audio cartridge format made by SABA that came to the market in 1964. It used already-available four-track ¼ inch tape on 3-inch reels (7.62 cm), with two mono channels per side, using a tape speed of 3¾ ips (9.5 cm/s), and was compatible with reel-to-reel audio tape recording except the against remove secured ends of the tape in the reel. The cartridge could be opened without the need of any tools by removing two holding clamps. Tape head and capstan were placed between the reels.
The OMNI Entertainment System was an electronic stand-alone game system produced by the MB Electronics division of the Milton Bradley Company, released in 1980.
The Sanyo Micro Pack 35 was a portable magnetic audio tape recording device, developed by Sanyo in 1964, that employed a special tape cartridge format with tape reels atop each other.
HiPac, is an audio tape cartridge format, introduced in August 1971 on the Japanese consumer market by Pioneer and discontinued in 1973 due to lack of demand. In 1972 it only achieved a market share of 3% in equipping new cars. In the mid 1970s, the format was repurposed as a children's educational toy called ポンキー and was used in the analog tape delay "Melos Echo Chamber".
Ricoh Synchrofax is a Japanese dictating machine from 1959, reissued in 1974 as the 3M Sound Page as official teaching material in the US-state of Oklahoma. It is also known as sound paper. Inventor Sakae Fujimoto filed the patents US3074724A and US3046357A in 1959.
The single-hole cassette,, was a concept of a high fidelity suitable magnetic tape cartridge or cassette from Philips for analog recordings. Tape and tape speed were identical to the Compact Cassette. It was never released to the public.
DC-International is a tape cassette format developed by Grundig and marketed in 1965. DC is the abbreviation of "Double Cassette", as the cassette contained two reels; International was intended to indicate that, from the beginning, several companies around the world supported the format with suitable tape cassette tape recorders, recorded music cassettes and blank cassettes. Since DC-International did not compete effectively against the similar Compact Cassette, it was discontinued in 1967.
Clint Basinger, better known as LGR, is an American YouTuber who focuses on video game reviews, retrocomputing, and unboxing videos. His YouTube channel of the same name has been compared to Techmoan and The 8-Bit Guy. Basinger is known for building, restoring and reviewing many vintage computers and reviewing mainly PC games. The channel is funded through YouTube advertising, and through Patreon.
Peter Leigh, more commonly known by the alias Nostalgia Nerd, is a British presenter, YouTuber, author and Twitch streamer, who documents and specialises in ageing technology and software. First appearing on YouTube in 2014, he routinely and enthusiastically explores forgotten computers and the technology surrounding them. He often specialises in historical documentaries on vintage computing, but also delves into technical explanations. Leigh also ventures into modern, mystery, explanation and more frivolous tech videos, with a humorous style and British wit.