Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell
Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell
Formation | 2013 | |
---|---|---|
Founder | Philipp Dettmer | |
Type | Privately held company | |
Purpose | Animation studio | |
Location |
| |
Owner | Philipp Dettmer | |
Staff(2019) | 25 | |
Website | kurzgesagt.org [12] | |
YouTube information | ||
Channel |
| |
Years active | 2013–present | |
Genre |
| |
Subscribers | 9.4 million | |
Total views | 694+ million | |
Play buttons | ||
100,000 subscribers | 2014 | |
1,000,000 subscribers | 2015 | |
Updated August 6, 2019 |
Kurzgesagt (/ˌkʊərtsɡəˈzɑːkt/) is a Munich-based animation studio founded by Philipp Dettmer in 2013. The studio's YouTube channel focuses on producing minimalist animated educational content discussing scientific, technological, political, philosophical and psychological subjects. Narrated by Steve Taylor, each video on the channel is typically 4–16 minutes in length, and are available in German through the channel Dinge Erklärt – Kurzgesagt. They are animated in the Flat Design style. With over 9 million subscribers, the studio's channel is ranked as the 511th largest in the world.[1][2]
Formation | 2013 | |
---|---|---|
Founder | Philipp Dettmer | |
Type | Privately held company | |
Purpose | Animation studio | |
Location |
| |
Owner | Philipp Dettmer | |
Staff(2019) | 25 | |
Website | kurzgesagt.org [12] | |
YouTube information | ||
Channel |
| |
Years active | 2013–present | |
Genre |
| |
Subscribers | 9.4 million | |
Total views | 694+ million | |
Play buttons | ||
100,000 subscribers | 2014 | |
1,000,000 subscribers | 2015 | |
Updated August 6, 2019 |
History
Patrizia Mosca from Kurzgesagt speaks at the Internet Days in Stockholm, 2018.
The Kurzgesagt YouTube channel was created on July 9, 2013, shortly after the founder, Philipp Dettmer, finished university. The first video, which explained evolution, was published two days later. The videos were more popular than expected, and the channel went from a project worked on during the free time of a few friends to a design studio with over a dozen employees.[3]
In 2015, Kurzgesagt was commissioned to do a video on the end of disease for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and has worked with the foundation on a number of other commissions since, including the Pan Pan 1010 research for the rehabilitation of Pandas in Chengdu.[4]
Name
Controversy
On March 3, 2019, Kurzgesagt released a video "Can You Trust Kurzgesagt Videos?", in which the channel confirmed that its content had not always been based on reliable, fact-checked, or peer-reviewed research. The channel also admitted that its video regarding addiction supported a controversial study that few if any current psychologists agree with, using only one source that had amassed criticism over the years. They subsequently took the video down (despite it still being up on their German channel), alongside another video that depicted the European migrant crisis in 2015. The studio is currently working on another video regarding addiction.[5]