deceptive reviews and shoddy advertisement practices being cracked down on in youtube re Machinima/xbox 1

[nunya bus]

A lot of assumptions being made here.

We don't take money to do reviews. We never have.

We take money to do advertisements, which are never labeled as reviews.

NVIDIA provided the graphics cards (and Cooler Master sent cases and coolers, ASUS sent motherboards, Intel sent CPUs, Kingston sent SSDs and RAM, Swiftech sent water cooling gear) for our editing workstations for product placement in the whole room water cooling series of videos we produced featuring this hardware extensively.

In the grand scheme of things, $6000 of graphics cards (don't imagine that's their BOM cost on them either) is a great deal for 1-2M impressions on a series of videos about using them.. but those videos were NOT a review. They were about a clearly sponsored (we said it was more than once) outrageous project.

As for sending "keeper" vs "loaner" units of hardware, yeah for many products we just don't do loaners anymore, but more than anything else this is to do with me not feeling like it's worth my time to play email tag for shipping labels and spend an hour driving to FedEX and filling out stupid international bill of landing and commercial invoice nonsense over like a $100 item that costs more to send back than to just not bother with anyway.

That and quite frankly even a negative review (for some reason) often generates a lot of sales for the manufacturer.. so as far as I'm concerned they can eat the cost of the item and I'll do whatever I want with it when we're done reviewing it - whether that's continuing to use it personally (Pebble Steel and iPhone 6 come to mind) - or re-visiting it only when we need to re-do our comparative numbers (

)

And on the subject of the Pebble and iPhone 6 - these are both items that were NOT provided by the manufacturer. One was purchased for my own use and the other was provided by a separate sponsor who makes skins for phones (dBrand), but I didn't necessarily mention this at the time because who cares? It doesn't colour my impressions of the device.

Here's an item I wasn't allowed to keep and won one of the two editor's choice awards I've ever given out:

Here's an item was allowed to keep that I ripped apart saying it was worse across the board than the two similar products from other manufacturers that I compared it against:

Here's an item I was allowed to keep that I basically ripped apart on camera and sent it back anyway because it had so little value to me I didn't even want to give it to a friend:

And I could do this all day..

You may notice that most of the items we review we are fairly positive about. There is a reason for this, and it has nothing to do with being paid to review it.

I don't generally bother to review stuff that I already know is stupid junk.

The bottom line is this. You can either trust me or not trust me. Ultimately that's your deal. My job is to do what I do, and the people who recognize it for what it is - my opinion being given to you - will follow, and the others can go find someone who maybe they think "hasn't sold out" but might just "happen to agree with them" to listen to. Enjoy.

so you have never signed a marketing agreement with Intel? or Nvidia? EVER? or shaked a PR managers hand that  you will make a few videos in response for  all the product branding you have? 

the answer is of course you have. you wont admit it. because you think its none of our business. and you know you would be in hot water if you did. 

The truth is if you revealed that you received free stuff for the office, or were given keepers. or anything before you did the review. you know that would sway people away. If you ont think it will. then just follow the rules Linus. and disclose what you got in exchange for it 

Ill end by saying this. 

Linus makes money off people watching his videos. Why else do you call yourself Linus Media Group. Because you are an influencer in a unique position to market this stuff. This is a BUSINESS first and foremost. if Linus didnt make money. he wouldnt be making the videos pure and simple. or it woud still be him just pulling stuff of the NCIX rack and giving honest reviews. Instead now every episode. is at least 50% ad and then the review thats in this weird grey area. where we cant tell exactly why you did the video in the first place. 

the majority of the reviews you do that you say were negative. you never really go after the companies. You say its bad but then you make a weird justification and a weird conclusion about it. 

you didnt say the Fury branded cards absolutely sucked and you still would be hard pressed to find one. 

I just hope more people wise up to this practice. 

 

[Optimus Prime]

so you have never signed a marketing agreement with Intel? or Nvidia? EVER? or shaked a PR managers hand that you will make a few videos in response for all the product branding you have?

the answer is of course you have. you wont admit it. because you think its none of our business. and you know you would be in hot water if you did.

The truth is if you revealed that you received free stuff for the office, or were given keepers. or anything before you did the review. you know that would sway people away. If you ont think it will. then just follow the rules Linus. and disclose what you got in exchange for it

Ill end by saying this.

Linus makes money off people watching his videos. Why else do you call yourself Linus Media Group. Because you are an influencer in a unique position to market this stuff. This is a BUSINESS first and foremost. if Linus didnt make money. he wouldnt be making the videos pure and simple. or it woud still be him just pulling stuff of the NCIX rack and giving honest reviews. Instead now every episode. is at least 50% ad and then the review thats in this weird grey area. where we cant tell exactly why you did the video in the first place.

the majority of the reviews you do that you say were negative. you never really go after the companies. You say its bad but then you make a weird justification and a weird conclusion about it.

you didnt say the Fury branded cards absolutely sucked and you still would be hard pressed to find one.

I just hope more people wise up to this practice.

Linus gave you a perfect response and you practicality ignored.you define have an agenda and IMO you sound like a communist

[Quincy15]

Linus gave you a perfect response and you practicality ignored.you define have an agenda and IMO you sound like a communist

 

You sound like a communist ? Jesus how childish

 

Look when your getting loads of free stuff and access from a company which allows you to run a highly successful youtube channel and basically live your dream life would you compromise that by providing poor reviews for technology?

 

If Nvidia or Intel cuts Linus off his channel is doomed. 

 

If a company gave you 6 Titan X's for free would you honestly say that you were not biased towards them? Does Lunis get paid for reviews nope, he said that. He gets access and free parts for reviews, his personal rig and stuff for employees to use which allow him to produce videos and generate youtube revenue.

 

Not paid but influenced by them. The laptop for students video was a 10 minute infomercial for Best Buy

[Lildirt]

 

this is to do with me not feeling like it's worth my time to play email tag for shipping labels and spend an hour driving to FedEX and filling out stupid international bill of landing and commercial invoice nonsense over like a $100 item that costs more to send back than to just not bother with anyway.

I don't do what you do.. but dear god I know this pain.

 

@LinusTech The real problem (which you have acknowleged) that everyone has with it is that it doesn't feel like you're sincere all of the time. Yeah, I'll say that nVidia has good products and so does Intel. I am an AMD fanboy at heart, I'll gladly admit that. I am naturally biased because of the practices (FOSS-loving Linux user) I live by, simple as. I own both AMD and nVidia video cards and I own actually only Intel CPUs. I do not actively use a system with an AMD processor (I don't buy many CPU's anymore, I have a gallon zip-loc bag filled with them at this point .. why buy more?). I think the one above me said it best.

 

Linus makes money off people watching his videos. Why else do you call yourself Linus Media Group. Because you are an influencer in a unique position to market this stuff. This is a BUSINESS first and foremost. if Linus didnt make money. he wouldnt be making the videos pure and simple. or it woud still be him just pulling stuff of the NCIX rack and giving honest reviews. Instead now every episode. is at least 50% ad and then the review thats in this weird grey area. where we cant tell exactly why you did the video in the first place.

 

 

We don't take money to do reviews. We never have.

We take money to do advertisements, which are never labeled as reviews.

NVIDIA provided the graphics cards (and Cooler Master sent cases and coolers, ASUS sent motherboards, Intel sent CPUs, Kingston sent SSDs and RAM, Swiftech sent water cooling gear) for our editing workstations for product placement in the whole room water cooling series of videos we produced featuring this hardware extensively.

 

This is a reason why some of us have problems with it. It leans you towards the nVidia/Intel spectrum over other options (not just AMD, though I don't own anything beyond AMD/Intel/nVidia CPUs/GPUs). I think it was awesome that all of these companies did that but they obviously did it as, well, product placement (as you said) and it worked out in the long run for both of you. I'm repeating you at this point.

 

I do like your videos and I will keep watching them. Do I look at you for actual advice on products? Not really. I did at first but never bought anything out of it (except for something like the Handy Tech Under $100, which was super helpful because I love this phone stand and the multiconnector bag). It is business, it's simple as that. I like the fact you replied to this thread as well -- it's a matter that needs the intervention. However, you must also understand that very few people will actually believe the comment. Some might, sure. But I can't. I do know the extent of shady business practices (marketing people scare me after all of these years) so that causes me to be like this. Yes, you might state it here and there, but everyone knows that if you say that it was given to you .. they might be swayed. I can't say I speak for how everyone acts. Some people are fairly ignorant (or simply followers) and will swallow what you have to throw at them. I'm not a follower (and it seems like most of the people in this thread are not either), so anyone with a few brain cells left will be skeptical when it comes to videos like that.

 

I want it to be clear, though. I don't mean to look like I'm kissing-ass (because I'm not, I'd like to make sure this doesn't go hostile) but I do hold you in a form of respect. Unfortunately, for myself and many others, you are not that useful when it comes to opinions. You can preview some kind of hardware, device, or whatever else. However, when it comes to the final purchasing decision, everyone should really, really take reviews from someone like Linus with a grain of salt.

 

TL;DR It's Linus' job to do what he does, bear that in mind. Take everything with a grain of salt (as you should regardless).

[LinusTech]

As you've both noted, this is a business.

 

One that relies on having an actively engaged audience that trusts me.

 

So consider this: Would I be a smart a businessman if I purposely deceived my audience for $100? Did that strategy ever make any sense in the history of the universe?

 

Let's assume the revenue of my company grows in a linear fashion with views (and therefore influence), which it basically does.

 

And we are kicking ass right now.

 

If I am as smart as I think I am, I would look at that graph and think to myself "hmm I could take $100 today to sell out, destroying that audience and making myself worthless to advertisers, or I could get $200 or $300 next year if my team and I can keep rocking on the way we are"

 

For very short term gain, I could definitely cash out of this thing, but even if I was a total scumbag who was just in it to make a buck and drive a lambo or whatever, I'd be an idiot to compromise the integrity of the channel for a few bucks today! I'm 29 and I've got a lot of years left in the gas tank.

 

It's very strange to me that you think I have more incentive to sell product today than I did when I worked at a retailer as as Salesman and then Product Manager. My literal job description was to sell product. The only reason I ever said anything negative about anything was the same reason I do it today. Because I want people to buy the right stuff. I'm the same person today that I was 8 years ago when I started making videos.

 

And a last note. We don't deny who our sponsors are or what the money is for. Why would you even bring up the Best Buy video? I was SO straightforward about the Best Buy sponsorship of the notebook back to school guide! I said in the first minute of the video that Best Buy had us make the video. And the rest of what I said (the fact that they let us pick any notebooks we wanted for the guide off their site) was also true.

 

So what's the issue here exactly? You don't agree with the laptops I chose? Then just say so. And I'll either politely disagree with you because I picked ones I liked, or I'll say "good point I didn't see that one. I'm only human"

 

edit: Just for lulz here's some more transparency about my job at NCIX: https://ca.linkedin.com/pub/linus-sebastian/52/a07/578

 

I'm not hiding this stuff.

[kwljunky]

-snap

 

Of-course he has, in fact the phrase.."THIS VIDEO IS SPONSORED BY"...Should be a massive hint!

 

Why would he go after the companies, he looks at the Pros and cons..but unless they practice clubbing baby seals...why go after the company? 

you didnt say the Fury branded cards absolutely sucked and you still would be hard pressed to find one. 

 

..because on release they were hard to come by?? No retailer had them/Were sold out quickly do to supplies being limited..

  

[makomako]

Lots of fanboyism going on here. Everyone seems to worship you these days Linus, that's great.

 

But here's my issue, you're not the same person you were 8 years ago, today you only sell out. Yeah I said it. Your audience also tend to be blind, ignoring most blunders without or little criticism which ends up buried by hate posts.

 

Right before you made the switch to Vessel most if not all videos you put out were fun to watch even if some were not relevant to my interests such as laptop reviews. Now 9/10 videos are cringe worthy, yeah fine I get it you used to work in retail but that doesn't mean every new video has to be a shilling video.

 

What happened to the interesting content that made the channel what it is? I don't see it anywhere anymore. Just advertisements that I get enough of on both Youtube and Vessel.

 

How about releasing something that isn't sponsored by a huge corporation once in a while? Thanks.

[CrusaderNINE]

Even the "best" product reviewers are giving you an opinion, HOPEFULLY a very well informed opinion. In most cases its okay to disagree, but to assume that because you disagree that they must obviously be some kind of shill for the company is too much. Linus seems quite capable of being brutally honest about a product, but if it works for you then thats great.

[astranger200]

As you've both noted, this is a business.

 

One that relies on having an actively engaged audience that trusts me.

 

So consider this: Would I be a smart a businessman if I purposely deceived my audience for $100? Did that strategy ever make any sense in the history of the universe?

 

Let's assume the revenue of my company grows in a linear fashion with views (and therefore influence), which it basically does.

 

And we are kicking ass right now.

 

If I am as smart as I think I am, I would look at that graph and think to myself "hmm I could take $100 today to sell out, destroying that audience and making myself worthless to advertisers, or I could get $200 or $300 next year if my team and I can keep rocking on the way we are"

 

For very short term gain, I could definitely cash out of this thing, but even if I was a total scumbag who was just in it to make a buck and drive a lambo or whatever, I'd be an idiot to compromise the integrity of the channel for a few bucks today! I'm 29 and I've got a lot of years left in the gas tank.

 

It's very strange to me that you think I have more incentive to sell product today than I did when I worked at a retailer as as Salesman and then Product Manager. My literal job description was to sell product. The only reason I ever said anything negative about anything was the same reason I do it today. Because I want people to buy the right stuff. I'm the same person today that I was 8 years ago when I started making videos.

 

And a last note. We don't deny who our sponsors are or what the money is for. Why would you even bring up the Best Buy video? I was SO straightforward about the Best Buy sponsorship of the notebook back to school guide! I said in the first minute of the video that Best Buy had us make the video. And the rest of what I said (the fact that they let us pick any notebooks we wanted for the guide off their site) was also true.

 

So what's the issue here exactly? You don't agree with the laptops I chose? Then just say so. And I'll either politely disagree with you because I picked ones I liked, or I'll say "good point I didn't see that one. I'm only human"

 

edit: Just for lulz here's some more transparency about my job at NCIX: https://ca.linkedin.com/pub/linus-sebastian/52/a07/578

 

I'm not hiding this stuff.

I love you for what you do and believe you all the way. stay the same Linus @LinusTech

[vodkapump]

If you guys really think someone who runs a business with (8? 9? how many is it now Linus?) employees, is going to have a changed opinion because they get to keep a 600usd phone.. You guys need to wake up and try being in a real business, and not serve food at the local McDonalds.

 

No one in their right mind would sacrifice their whole integrity, and the jobs of potentially 10+ people for something like that.

[LinusTech]

Lots of fanboyism going on here. Everyone seems to worship you these days Linus, that's great.

 

But here's my issue, you're not the same person you were 8 years ago, today you only sell out. Yeah I said it. Your audience also tend to be blind, ignoring most blunders without or little criticism which ends up buried by hate posts.

 

Right before you made the switch to Vessel most if not all videos you put out were fun to watch even if some were not relevant to my interests such as laptop reviews. Now 9/10 videos are cringe worthy, yeah fine I get it you used to work in retail but that doesn't mean every new video has to be a shilling video.

 

What happened to the interesting content that made the channel what it is? I don't see it anywhere anymore. Just advertisements that I get enough of on both Youtube and Vessel.

 

How about releasing something that isn't sponsored by a huge corporation once in a while? Thanks.

 

Here are a few hand-selected pieces of content that we had fun making and you might enjoy from the last month

 

 

Conveniently, the consistently positioned ads in the videos (after the intro for a quick mention of something, and after the content is done for a longer one) are skippable, and it's just pure content otherwise

 

Not to mention this whole channel of us goofing around and not making any money: http://www.youtube.com/user/channelsuperfun

 

[,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,]

A lot of assumptions being made here.

We don't take money to do reviews. We never have.

We take money to do advertisements, which are never labeled as reviews.

NVIDIA provided the graphics cards (and Cooler Master sent cases and coolers, ASUS sent motherboards, Intel sent CPUs, Kingston sent SSDs and RAM, Swiftech sent water cooling gear) for our editing workstations for product placement in the whole room water cooling series of videos we produced featuring this hardware extensively.

In the grand scheme of things, $6000 of graphics cards (don't imagine that's their BOM cost on them either) is a great deal for 1-2M impressions on a series of videos about using them.. but those videos were NOT a review. They were about a clearly sponsored (we said it was more than once) outrageous project.

As for sending "keeper" vs "loaner" units of hardware, yeah for many products we just don't do loaners anymore, but more than anything else this is to do with me not feeling like it's worth my time to play email tag for shipping labels and spend an hour driving to FedEX and filling out stupid international bill of landing and commercial invoice nonsense over like a $100 item that costs more to send back than to just not bother with anyway.

That and quite frankly even a negative review (for some reason) often generates a lot of sales for the manufacturer.. so as far as I'm concerned they can eat the cost of the item and I'll do whatever I want with it when we're done reviewing it - whether that's continuing to use it personally (Pebble Steel and iPhone 6 come to mind) - or re-visiting it only when we need to re-do our comparative numbers (

)

And on the subject of the Pebble and iPhone 6 - these are both items that were NOT provided by the manufacturer. One was purchased for my own use and the other was provided by a separate sponsor who makes skins for phones (dBrand), but I didn't necessarily mention this at the time because who cares? It doesn't colour my impressions of the device.

Here's an item I wasn't allowed to keep and won one of the two editor's choice awards I've ever given out:

Here's an item was allowed to keep that I ripped apart saying it was worse across the board than the two similar products from other manufacturers that I compared it against:

Here's an item I was allowed to keep that I basically ripped apart on camera and sent it back anyway because it had so little value to me I didn't even want to give it to a friend:

And I could do this all day..

You may notice that most of the items we review we are fairly positive about. There is a reason for this, and it has nothing to do with being paid to review it.

I don't generally bother to review stuff that I already know is stupid junk.

The bottom line is this. You can either trust me or not trust me. Ultimately that's your deal. My job is to do what I do, and the people who recognize it for what it is - my opinion being given to you - will follow, and the others can go find someone who maybe they think "hasn't sold out" but might just "happen to agree with them" to listen to. Enjoy.

 

I completely trust this reply and trust Linus's reviews. Everything he stated makes sense. You can tell when reviewers are bullshit as they often skip real problems or stupid features. Fakes are easy. Who gives a shit if linus makes a tit ton anyway off his reviews or videos.

 

JayzTwoCents if a good example of a reviewer the kinda rides on the line of being untrustworthy. If you watch his latest videos you will notice many positives but doesn't address the elephant of the room. Might be a subjective thing.

 

Oh well. Just remember Linus is Canadian and Canadians are gooder.

What a terrible response I just wrote but it's like 2am and I'm using  surface with a broken typecover. Excuses...

[burnttoastnice]

Take off your tinfoil hat and calm TF down bruh. I'm not even going to bother reading all the replies here.
 
Linus always gives his honest opinion on things and I'm sure myself and the majority of the forum don't give a shite if you don't believe it.

Even people who attended the meet up pointed out that the rest of the LMG crew are exactly the same in videos as they are in real life, and trust me, they are not actors.

Good day sir.

[Wintyr]

Anonymouse Accusers are a joke accuse with your real name.  keep it up linus i total understand what you doing.  and i love the postive and negitive info you give in your reviews.

[TheProfosist]

Lots of fanboyism going on here. Everyone seems to worship you these days Linus, that's great.

 

But here's my issue, you're not the same person you were 8 years ago, today you only sell out. Yeah I said it. Your audience also tend to be blind, ignoring most blunders without or little criticism which ends up buried by hate posts.

 

Right before you made the switch to Vessel most if not all videos you put out were fun to watch even if some were not relevant to my interests such as laptop reviews. Now 9/10 videos are cringe worthy, yeah fine I get it you used to work in retail but that doesn't mean every new video has to be a shilling video.

 

What happened to the interesting content that made the channel what it is? I don't see it anywhere anymore. Just advertisements that I get enough of on both Youtube and Vessel.

 

How about releasing something that isn't sponsored by a huge corporation once in a while? Thanks.

I wasnt going to reply to this thread but I thought that I ahould actual weight in a bit being a long time viewer and contributor to content on the forum

Please give exaples of how he only sells out. If doing an ad and declaring that is was sponsored is a sell out then I dont know how you plan to make money. This is just one example maybe you werent hinting at that.

If you think im blind your pretty much dead wrong there. I do have some differing very from Linus (as well as other Tech-tubers) which I have and do voice on the forum and elsewhere with sound reasoning to back it up. But looking at LMG's demographic just with age group alone you shouldn't be surprised that they are at least some what blind. The enthusiast segment like where I consider my self is many time smaller than the "gamer" crowd which is something to consider. Also for that sort of stuff there are places like Tek Syndicate.

Examples of these blunder might be good. Usually when arguing something one would lead with examples generally in groups of 3 like @LinusTech did. Its also very hard to counter something like this as its not at all specific enough to make a retort.

Well much of it may be due to the move. They were running out of space, planning, building, moving, etc. Its my guess that they mad what they could with what they had. Heck a new Scrapyard Wars is on the way with a guest how cant you be pumped for that.

Examples of said shilling videos and how they are shilling videos would be nice. Also if he basically labeled it as an ad you cant really fault him. Also if he thought an add would seriously negatively affect his community or viewership he wouldnt do it, who would.

Might want to list examples of interesting content and why you found it interesting as an example. Im not saying this in a bad way its just very hard to get feedback if its not specific.

As for not doping something from a huge corporation, what do you define as that because most of these tech companies are giant. That is also what people are interested in so do you blame him. Besides that over the years he has brought some good unique an esoteric stuff to the table. Much of it just mentioned.

Based on a lot of what your saying I wouldnt be surprised if your a bit fan of Tek Syndicate or at least what they or and how they do it. If so you have to remember that LMG isnt them, everyone has their own niche.

[adi518]

The butthurt is strong with this thread.

[MegaDave91]

Anonymouse Accusers are a joke accuse with your real name.  keep it up linus i total understand what you doing.  and i love the postive and negitive info you give in your reviews.

Anonymous or not these users have valid opinions/concerns, and they are entitled to them.

 

That said, I can almost hear the plea in Linus' posts and he pours his heart into them. I believe you Linus and I've never doubted your integrity, but I also respect these users' concerns because they're not outlandish.

[jk441]

Man these trolls.... If you don't like linus' stuff or thing he's "sold out" just fuckin unsubcribe and stop watching his vids. Linus has all the rights as a company owner to hold his deals and keep the info to himself, yet he opens us about them and you can see this not only in his vids but also in his WAN shows. It is very rare to do for a company who makes money off vids on the internet to do such actions.

 

Yes, and I get the point that Linus can't always be 100% correct, so I also watch other stuff and read other stuff to back up my knowledge if I decide to buy something based on something I have the first look through his vids.

 

The vids that Linus does is good for the general knowledge these days because there are so many vid makers who do the "I always give a positive review cuz my advertizers pay me a bunch of money" specially now that the companies/manufactors actually make their own vis channels. Companies such as Nvidia, AMD, Intel e.t.c in a way don't really need people like Linus now because of their money-power. They can advertise all they want with their money rather than shipping out prototypes to reviewers, which is also a risk to them not just in terms of the money theu spend but also the danger of information leaks.

 

Also vids like the scrap-yard wars are something that's totally on LMG's budget, yes it's not the greatest investment probably, and yet gives us: good advises in buying secondhand materials; also a lot of fun to watch; and provides material for people to discuss in the vid or here in the forums, with pretty much no advertising business in those vids what so ever.

 

Am I a Linus fanboy? Maybe yes on someppl's eyes. I'm subscribed both to their Youtube and Vessel channel, and watch their channel super fun and tech quickie stuff. But even after watching all those I still go and do my research because Linus' vid can't always be the absolute correct answer and even Linus says in some of his vids, and WAN show to go and do your own research. If you guys haven't been doing that already and are just hating... man you should go and find something better to do.

 

If you're making a genuine opinion about it after watching his vids and then comparing from the stuff on the internet? Well then as I said just unsubscribe and walk away.

[step1041]

I don't see any problems in the way that Linus runs his business. Sponsored videos are sponsored videos, they have to make money somehow otherwise it isn't feasible. As for the preference for certain brands like Nvidia and Intel, its probably not because Linus has a bias for them, its simply because they make the best products right now. I'm sure if AMD came out with a stellar new processor or GPU, Linus would praise it in a heartbeat. Why would he continue to recommend using 4 year old AMD APUs when that simply doesn't match up with his bottom line - to review and recommend the best hardware for the money - which just happens to be Nvidia and AMD right now. Very few products today are outright crap (usually this has to do with the price of the product). So all the reviewers can comment on are what are things they liked and disliked - pros and cons. If Linus reviews a product and rips it apart a bit, lets say a case for example, that just means that case might be difficult to use or has some other issues with it. It doesn't mean that it stops being a case, it just means that there are better ones on the market for the price. Maybe if I had to make a suggestion towards Linus it would be to include a rough price bracket that the product falls into. A $100 case will have a different feature set than a $150 case, however it seems like they are almost compared against other cased that have been reviewed. 

 

One thing that hasn't been mentioned that does kind of worry me about other channels that do reviews is lack of proper comparison. This really pertains to smartphones reviews more than anything. I have a OnePlus One. It really bothers me when reviewers compare it against phones that aren't even in it's price range. A $350-450 phone should not be compared to a $700 iPhone 6 or Galaxy S6. Of course those phones will beat the OnePlus 2 in every test simply because you pay more for it.

I may be entirely wrong on these points, and if so, forgive me, but that is my view on this issue as of right now.

[Tijoy]

Linus (and others) are generaly good at disclosing if the unit came from someone, in the 6 titan X video Luke says that Nvidea was sending them 6 cards (while showing 4). That tells you that they are units they did not pay for (from the knowladge we are provided) and are not only doing a review/test with them, but are advertising them for the company. Take that as good or bad, you are your own person to choose, all i know is that for the most part, they disclose that the unit was sent by _____ and there reviews are based not on bias, but on usability.

[LinusTech]

Linus (and others) are generaly good at disclosing if the unit came from someone, in the 6 titan X video Luke says that Nvidea was sending them 6 cards (while showing 4). That tells you that they are units they did not pay for (from the knowladge we are provided) and are not only doing a review/test with them, but are advertising them for the company. Take that as good or bad, you are your own person to choose, all i know is that for the most part, they disclose that the unit was sent by _____ and there reviews are based not on bias, but on usabilaty.

 

FYI the boost video was not an ad. We've wanted to make a video about the variability of GPU boost for quite some time and we utilized the 6 GPUs that NVIDIA gave us to upgrade our editing workstations (the arrangement is that there will be a video where we show our editors upgrading their workstations and putting the GPUs in them, which is coming as a moving vlog) to make that video.

 

Nothing sponsored about it other than that we happened to have the GPUs from a separate deal we struck and wanted to make a video.

 

Hope this helps

[TheProfosist]

OK so am I the only one that has trouble following a thread when a good number of people just done have an Avatar. That should almost be mandatory on a forum...

If you guys really think someone who runs a business with (8? 9? how many is it now Linus?) employees, is going to have a changed opinion because they get to keep a 600usd phone.. You guys need to wake up and try being in a real business, and not serve food at the local McDonalds.

No one in their right mind would sacrifice their whole integrity, and the jobs of potentially 10+ people for something like that.

Correct is the same thing like stealing from a job. Why risk loosing your job for something. Almost nothing you could steal generally in retail would make it worth it.

Kinda on the same not is like during the interview when they ask if you have though of stealing, almost everyone has but why would they due to the thing above...

Here are a few hand-selected pieces of content that we had fun making and you might enjoy from the last month

-snip-

Conveniently, the consistently positioned ads in the videos (after the intro for a quick mention of something, and after the content is done for a longer one) are skippable, and it's just pure content otherwise

Not to mention this whole channel of us goofing around and not making any money: http://www.youtube.com/user/channelsuperfun

Some of those expecially the 4K thing also the titan's were really cool and stuff I would have liked to look into myself. heck video encoding in general interests me.

I completely trust this reply and trust Linus's reviews. Everything he stated makes sense. You can tell when reviewers are bullshit as they often skip real problems or stupid features. Fakes are easy. Who gives a shit if linus makes a tit ton anyway off his reviews or videos.

JayzTwoCents if a good example of a reviewer the kinda rides on the line of being untrustworthy. If you watch his latest videos you will notice many positives but doesn't address the elephant of the room. Might be a subjective thing.

Oh well. Just remember Linus is Canadian and Canadians are gooder.

What a terrible response I just wrote but it's like 2am and I'm using surface with a broken typecover. Excuses...

Yea Jay has kinda been doing that and its been irking me as well. I dont know if hes just missing it or what.

FYI the boost video was not an ad. We've wanted to make a video about the variability of GPU boost for quite some time and we utilized the 6 GPUs that NVIDIA gave us to upgrade our editing workstations (the arrangement is that there will be a video where we show our editors upgrading their workstations and putting the GPUs in them, which is coming as a moving vlog) to make that video.

 

Nothing sponsored about it other than that we happened to have the GPUs from a separate deal we struck and wanted to make a video.

 

Hope this helps

I would actually be surprised if Nvidia would want that video done

Are you really going to trust Dennis with handling a Titan X???

[HikariNoKitsune]

Ok This is just plain old stupid...

 

Yes LMG gets things... BIG... FREAKING... WHOOP.... Why the heck does it MATTER?! Because they're getting awesome gear to perform their JOB, while you don't? Suck it up buttercup...

 

As some of the idiotic people have pointed out: Yes, LMG is a BUSINESS. They get 'free tech' from big name companies.

 

And as Linus has pointed out: They don't do 'loaner' items anymore. Why? Because they are a BUSINESS. It costs more to ship the items back, than it does to receive them. What sort of crappy business model do you want them to have? One where they hemorrhage money on a daily basis trying to just ship back a product they aren't even being paid to review? 

 

Oh, that's another thing. Why the hell is it such a horrible thing, for a person to be PAID for something? You guys get paid for flipping other people's burgers don't ya? Should we be complaining about how you guys should be providing us free service? Oh, what about those who work for software companies and have to slave away at programming all day. They get paid too don't they? Maybe we should go pounding on their doors demanding free service too? 

 

WHAT. THE HELL. IS WRONG. WITH EVERYONE!?

 

Do you care if your cable/satellite provider is being paid to run advertisements? NO. Do you care if a movie theater is being paid to run commercials? NO. Do you care that Google (now alphabet I guess) is being paid to show advertisements on their search results or on non partnered/monetized youtube accounts? NO. 

So why the flipping hell do any of you care if someone is being paid to make a VIDEO or not? "Oh its cause we want honesty and have a right to know!" BULL F-ING CRAP!!! You guys simply put people up on shiny gold pedestals and think of them as gods, then you start thinking "wait, maybe they're being paid to do this? is this their real opinion?" and you start spiraling out of control. Who really cares!? You clicked on the video for ENTERTAINMENT. Maybe a few people out there clicked on it for the sake of actually needing information about the product so they can make a purchase, but that ISN'T what LMG is about! They were about ENTERTAINMENT... Hence the word, ya know "Media" in their company name! They found it fun to make videos, and people enjoyed watching them! Sure they also thought 'we can help people make better buying choices' probably, but they didn't get into this business for the sake of 'swaying public buying habits'... they did it because it was FUN for THEM!

 

All of this, is just moronically stupid... They get to keep products. Big whoop. They get given products to do 'product placement'.... BIG WHOOP. You know who else does that? Movie companies, music 'artists', TV studios... Just because YouTubers aren't big like Warner Brothers, or CNN, doesn't mean you can suddenly bash them for things you just simply ignore elsewhere. "Oh look mommy! There's a giant McDonald's sign behind Captain America's shield!" "Daddy daddy look! That man's drinking a Coke as he talks to Spider Man!".... Do any of you guys give a flying crap? NOPE. You either don't even notice it, or just flat out don't care. They don't even TELL YOU that they were sponsored to do those product placements! But YouTubers go out of their freaking busy way, to let you all know! 

 

Linus, Luke, everyone else at LMG. Just do what you've been doing. Sure I personally think you've gotten way too advertisement heavy lately, but I can deal with that because now you've been putting the advertisements at the end of videos, allowing me to get right to the meat of the video right from the start, then idly listen to the adverts as I reply to a text message or something. 

 

For everyone else: Get your freaking heads out of your collective butts, and start thinking like a DECENT, HUMAN, BEING for once. They get paid by SPONSORS to cover costs of producing the videos. They get given electronics because why the heck not? nVidia, AMD, intel, Microsoft, HTC, and whomever else they've managed to 'review' or get some sort of 'item' from, just wants publicity. They don't NEED to pay YouTubers to give them good reviews... or reviews at all! Simply mentioning their name is probably enough to drive sales up .2% or something. And the sales they'd get simply from reviewing a unit, has NOTHING to do with the fact that they gave it a positive or negative review. The sales go up because people KNOW about the product!

 

Would you buy a product you saw on amazon that was $200+ and had no idea who the manufacturer was? Most likely not! So what do you do? You go to YouTube or some other place and search it up. It doesn't matter WHO you find doing a video about it. So long as someone had it in a video, You know that it might be worth buying because you weren't the only one considering to buy it. 

 

So just stop all this BS already. They are a business, they make videos, they get sponsors... Oh, that's another funny point! "Professional Gamers" get sponsored all the time, and get products given to them by vendors and companies... does anyone complain? NOPE!  This is just so freaking PATHETIC it just simply isn't funny! NO ONE CARES about all these sponsorships given to all these different people... Movies, TV Shows, Commercials, Movie Theaters, and/or "Pro Gamers"... But whenever it comes to YouTubers, all hell breaks lose!

 

There is not a SINGLE reason you give that can justify any of this crap going around. Not. A. Single. One.

 

So again:

SUCK IT UP! STOP YOUR WHINING! STOP YOUR COMPLAINING!

If you think it should be done differently, THEN GO DO IT YOURSELF!

If you think this sort of stuff is easy to do, THEN GO DO IT YOURSELF!

If you think you can give entertaining reviews without gaining money from any outside sources, THEN GO DO IT YOURSELF!

 

Leave people alone to do their freaking jobs. Get a life or something for instance... Go build something maybe? Be productive for society hopefully? Nah, who am I kidding...

[Tijoy]

FYI the boost video was not an ad. We've wanted to make a video about the variability of GPU boost for quite some time and we utilized the 6 GPUs that NVIDIA gave us to upgrade our editing workstations (the arrangement is that there will be a video where we show our editors upgrading their workstations and putting the GPUs in them, which is coming as a moving vlog) to make that video.

 

Nothing sponsored about it other than that we happened to have the GPUs from a separate deal we struck and wanted to make a video.

 

Hope this helps

 

Oh i didnt mean to imply it was, i guess i didnt word it correctly. I was trying to say that in this case Nvidea got a little bit of free advertising because of the Titans being in plain sight. Im not trying to say the Video itself was an ad, just that having a titan x(or 4) instead of a Fury X (and i know this video it wouldnt work cause you were testing a specific thing on Nvidea hardware) gave them some product placement. Hopefully that gets what i was saying across better.

[SuperAwsomeOne55]

Honestly, at this point I don't see the issue anymore. Linus has posted multiple comments clearing up any issues you may have had or any concerns people seem to be showing. The only issue now is you yourself saying that you don't believe him. Honestly, if that's the case, then you need to figure that out on your own. Unsubscribe if you need to. Honestly, I find Linus to be less bias than other youtubers as I do find him criticizing even the little flaws in good products.