NPR has a podcasts that interviews founders and how they got started, how they made money (likely they didn't, at first) and how they continue to be better than everyone else. It's called How I Built This.

https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510313/how-i-built-this

Do you have a strong preference versus learning this from videos versus other potential form factors, like a podcast or e.g. glossy coffee-table book or less-glossy "this essay times N" book?

It’s clear that there are lots of people that disagree with me but I have a terrible loathing for the YouTube video where someone looks at the camera and talks at you.

Are other people getting a lot out of facial expressions or something?

People like people. It's that simple. We are social animals.

I don't feel quite as strongly as you, but I generally agree. I don't mind if the person is picture-in-picture-style in one of the corners, but I really would rather see something useful on the screen vs. just the person talking to me.

I feel the same way as the parent, and I would say I have a strong preference for Video. I wouldn't need crazy production value, even if you just did something Khan-Academy-style and wrote down terms and showed diagrams of how some of this works it would help me a lot. I found your article pretty interesting but also pretty overwhelming since I'm not fluent in this area.

My next preference would be something like base.cs (https://medium.com/basecs) where, similarly, you at least define terms and draw some diagrams. I find it much easier to follow this stuff when there's something to look at with relations etc.

While I love podcasts, I find learning anything like this pretty much impossible by listening to them. This is partially because it's harder for me to always follow the concepts just by listening, and partially because I'm usually only somewhat engaged (I'm exercising, or driving to work, etc.).

But, maybe I'm also not your target audience, because I have far too basic an understanding of this stuff, so take it with a grain of salt.

I have a strong preference that if you were to do this, you keep it on your blog.

I think a "thick" book is much better than videos:

1) easier to produce high quality content in written form

2) easier/faster to digest the information

Patrick, please write this book :) - happy to provide feedback and read drafts along the way.

For those of us who don't have a strong preference - what sources would you recommend? I prefer reading but when it comes down to it, I'll take any form factor if the information is good.

As much as I would like the coffee table version, I don't know that the long form and fairly technical nature is suited to that style.

Strong preference for writing.

There’s a similarish channel called Company Man. I treat it as purely entertainment, because I have no idea what the credentials of the dude are, but it’s fun.

and a slightly different channel called valuetainment which discusses mistakes/successes of companies https://www.youtube.com/user/patrickbetdavid

Their more recent stuff isn't as good as their old stuff: for example, why GoPro is failing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4fHeiqtGOA

I was going to suggest Company Man too.

Here's a good book on different profitability models if that does it for you.

https://sivers.org/book/ArtOfProfitability

video is good for doing demos. blog with pictures would be better for this imo