YouTube round-up | Beasts from the East

They're coming.
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We are constantly under threat here in the UK. From the East. Every day new reports come of a terrible disaster, by way of Siberia...yes, we are once again under the threat of snow. Cold fronts that have developed in these far away lands are always rumoured to be coming our way, and alas our infrastructure cannot take it -- if one centimetre of snow hits the ground, you can count on societal collapse for at least the next week...meaning that the buses won't run on time and it might take a couple of minutes longer to make it through the morning commute. Still, anything less than abject panic would not be proper. But in times like these when we may be completely snowed in, we at least have YouTube to rely on -- and as ever, here's some of the best work of the past few days for you to gawp at.

  • It may seem like an incredibly bad idea to take a relatively heavy object, place it onto a record and then set it to ride around it automatically, ostensibly producing somewhat low quality sound. But that's what the Record Runner did! Techmoan covers this iconic '70s product -- a great way to play your records anywhere that there's a flat surface, while also completely destroying them.
  • Retro Man Cave has a great video looking at one of the Spectrum's greatest homes -- communist era Eastern Europe. Now while they weren't exactly authentic or illegal, there were a whole host of Soviet Spectrums that were kicking about behind the wall, and the man with the smoothest voice on YouTube has several of them around to look at.
  • Mark Wiens, perhaps YouTube's most popular travelling foodie, has taken himself to one of the more interesting countries on earth -- Laos. You know, the place where the U.S liked to dump most of its unused bombs after its nightly sorties in 'Nam...and also, there's some good eating there! Shock of horrors.
  • Sean Evans reviews some Japanese snacks with one of YouTube's craziest personalities, Filthy Frank!...no, wait -- Pink Guy...nope. Chin Chin?...um, nope. It's actually Joji. Don't they grow up fast these days?
  • Many home computers from the old days are still receiving a whole load of fine releases, even now. Don't believe me? Novabug has a video out featuring the 10 best Amstrad CPC games of 2017. It's worth a look!

  • Octav1us Kitten has a really awesome video out covering the history of the almighty Digitiser! With Mr Biffo's resurrection of the teletext classic  firmly on the horizon, it's a good time to look back at the original and see how it managed to get as much love as all the classic magazines of the day.
  • Defunctland has a video out about Alfred Hitchcock. Being that his channel is about age-old theme park rides that aren't around anymore though, his video is about Alfred Hitchcock: The Art of Making Movies, an early attraction at Universal Studios Florida. Quite interesting.
  • We're rather used to the PS TV being a thing these days, but did you know that there was such a thing as a PS2 TV? Nostalgia Nerd knows, and he's got a video up all about it.
  • Larry Bundy has a special little mini episode of Fact Hunt out with the answer to an age-old question...just why are the joysticks on gamepads always on the left? Have you ever wondered why they aren't on the right? Watch this video, and you shall find out.
  • Lastly, Top Hat Gaming Man has a video out all about the Sega Pluto!...you know of the Saturn, some of you probably know the Neptune...but what on earth was the Pluto? The behatted gentleman will reveal all.

And that does it for another week! I recognise that to some of you Americans, especially those of you who have likely been dealing with foot upon foot of snow since around about October of last year, the opening to this round-up might appear to be somewhat overdramatic. But then this is the home of Shakespeare, and if you're honest with yourself then truthfully, you wouldn't have us any other way. For now, enjoy the videos!