Strategy, not research. Generates positioned YouTube video ideas with competitive gaps, desire mapping, and shock scores. Consumes existing research (from yt-pipeline, firecrawl-search, or vault notes) — it does not redo deep research; with none available it runs a lightweight competitive scan only. Output feeds straight into /hooks and /outlines.
Triggers: "video ideas for…", "what should I make a video about", "brainstorm video ideas", "content ideas about…", /ideation <topic>.
Workflow
- Gather existing context — search the vault (
research/,projects/) and recent research outputs. If research exists, use it as the foundation. - Lightweight competitive scan (optional — needs a separate
yt-searchhelper not shipped with this plugin): extract saturated angles, open gaps, performance outliers (high views-to-subs), and key creators. Present in 3–5 bullets. - Generate 7–10 idea angles with full positioning (below).
- Rank into three tiers.
- Output structured briefs for each Tier 1 idea.
- Deepen research via NotebookLM (if research is thin) — 2–3 targeted follow-up questions against an existing notebook.
- Save to vault (optional).
What each idea contains
| Field | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Title (working) | Rough title to capture the angle |
| Angle | What makes this different from what exists — one sentence |
| Core Desire | One of the Four Horsemen: Money, Time, Health (less stress/burnout), Status |
| Proxy Desire | "One standard deviation" away — targeting the core desire directly triggers the BS detector. e.g. Money → "Automate your entire content pipeline" |
| Shock Score | 1–100, by the Law of Interestingness (distance between what the viewer believes and what the video reveals). Target 70+ |
| Format | Concept/Educational · Level-Based · Tool Demo · Contrarian Take · Case Study · Listicle · Tutorial · Head-to-Head |
| Competitive gap | The specific gap this fills, referencing the landscape |
Tiers
- Tier 1 — High confidence (2–3): clear gaps, high shock, proven formats. "Film tomorrow."
- Tier 2 — Strong with conditions (2–3): need research, a demo build, or timing.
- Tier 3 — Experimental (2–3): higher risk/ceiling — new formats, contrarian takes.
Brief template (Tier 1)
## [Working Title]
- **Angle:** [One sentence positioning]
- **Core Desire:** [Money / Time / Health / Status]
- **Proxy Desire:** [One standard deviation away]
- **Shock Score:** [X/100]
- **Format:** [Video structure type]
- **Competitive Gap:** [What's missing from existing coverage]
- **Why Now:** [Timeliness signal — trending, just launched, community buzz]
- **Research Depth:** [Sufficient / Thin]
- **Related vault notes:** [[wikilink]] [[wikilink]]Key principles
- Differentiation is everything — an idea without a competitive gap is a wasted video.
- Desire mapping is not optional — every idea maps to a Horseman + proxy desire.
- Don't pitch ideas already done (check
projects/andprojects/archive/). - Be opinionated — "Film this one first because…" beats a flat list.