The Periodic Table of Videos (periodicvideos.com)

Pretty good these, the same people also do this series: http://sixtysymbols.com/

I studied Physics @ Nottingham so pretty cool to see my lecturers getting involved!

I'm from Nottingham (I live in London now), so it's nice to see the University getting a mention on HN :D

While I didn't study there, I have seen the professor (on the far right of the images at the top) walking around, I think he lived near a place I used to work at.

Cool idea! I randomly clicked on chromium (http://www.periodicvideos.com/videos/024.htm) - gotta love the guy who has "very warm feelings about it"!

EDIT: Now I watched the potassium video (http://www.periodicvideos.com/videos/019.htm). If I understand him correctly, the same guy seems to think that potash is called so because it contains potassium. Potassium is called kalium in Latin (from Arabic al-qalyah, "plant ashes" according to Wikipedia). I'm certain it's the same in English (potash -> potassium) and not the other way around.

cool, I know so little about materials. Time to watch one of these day.

I watched sodium video. Guy dropped a chunk of it in water and told that it is going to explode. Duh. Had been impressed had they bothered to tell what exactly was the reaction and why was the heat generated. Instead they laughed, and laughed. btw, I understand basic chemistry so I dont really need explanation.

That's far more interesting than it has any right to be. I went in intending to just see what it was about, and left a half hour later after bookmarking it.

Thoroughly entertaining and informative.