The link-sharing community has launched “Explain Like I’m 5”:
The series, an educational comedy, consists of three episodes based on one of Reddit’s user created forums (subreddits) of the same name, where users (Redditors) strive to answer each other’s questions on complex subjects as simply and straightforwardly as possible. “It was more inspired by the content in the thread posts than actually quoting them or using them directly,” Erik Martin, Reddit’s general manager, told The Verge in a phone interview.
Brian Merchant is a fan:
It is, I must say, rather adorable. It warmed even mine own cold, Internet-hardened heart. And it may prove to be a brilliant move for the property—Condé Nast has long prided itself for keeping its hands off the web’s most popular link dump, but it seems to have awoken to the notion there are tons of memes and whole subreddits ripe for the content-mining. Google ponied up the cash for the series (Reddit won’t say how much) and it debuted on YouTube.
They have also recorded episodes on existentialism and the volatility of the stock market.
The Dish 