Not too happy about the Verified Actual Gamer Program

[RobLatour]

So I know Linus Tech is just trying to do good - but from where I stand they aren't.

 

I'm a LT youtube subscriber, but more to the point also a developer who writes shareware and (mostly) freeware who is trying to build a new machine in support of that. 

 

Wouldn't mind a decent graphics card to go with it, but you know what ... scalpers, miners, and now LT are scooping up all the cards, while at the same time some short sighted retailers have done some silly things along the way.

 

Also, just to be clear, I have never bought, sold or mined crypto coins. 

 

Having that said, I know LT is trying to help gamers beat out scalpers and miners - but there are those of us who aren't gamers, scalpers or miners - and we are people too.

 

I have no solutions, I'm just saying. 

 

Thanks for listening, I feel better now!

 

[Chris Pratt]

How are they not doing good? Maybe you just don't understand what this is about. The whole point is basically making LMG a retailer that actually tries to make sure the cards don't end up in the hands of scalpers or miners. They're not discounting or giving anything away for free, nor are they obligated to in any way. The cards would either go to LMG or to a retailer like Best Buy. If they went to some place like Best Buy, they'd just be instantly scooped up by bots. Not sure what you were expecting.

[AnonymousGuy]

I had to google what the fuck "verified actual gamer" was.  What a stupid concept.  Makes me want to get one from it just to scalp it on ebay to prove how stupid it is.

[RobLatour]

7 minutes ago, Chris Pratt said:

How are they not doing good? Maybe you just don't understand what this is about. The whole point is basically making LMG a retailer that actually tries to make sure the cards don't end up in the hands of scalpers or miners. They're not discounting or giving anything away for free, nor are they obligated to in any way. The cards would either go to LMG or to a retailer like Best Buy. If they went to some place like Best Buy, they'd just be instantly scooped up by bots. Not sure what you were expecting.

How are they not doing good - well I'm not a "verified gamer", so that means for me just another bunch of cards I can't hope to get at. 

[Helpful Tech Witch]

1 minute ago, RobLatour said:

How are they not doing good - well I'm not a "verified gamer", so that means for me just another bunch of cards I can't hope to get at. 

You do realse how they are testing that right? Its pretty easy to pas the quiz. More its a "Verified actual human" program.

 

[IkeaGnome]

10 minutes ago, RobLatour said:

How are they not doing good - well I'm not a "verified gamer", so that means for me just another bunch of cards I can't hope to get at. 

If you can't Google, then it is just another bunch of cards you can't hope to get...

[Dredgy]

2 hours ago, RobLatour said:

How are they not doing good - well I'm not a "verified gamer", so that means for me just another bunch of cards I can't hope to get at. 

You don’t have to be actual gamer. Developer is fine.

[WereCatf]

2 hours ago, RobLatour said:

How are they not doing good - well I'm not a "verified gamer", so that means for me just another bunch of cards I can't hope to get at. 

News-flash: you are not the mark to be measured by as to whether they are doing good or not. There are a lot of people who aren't eligible, but that's just life; it's quite literally impossible for everyone to be eligible for everything everywhere -- someone always loses. That does not invalidate the greater net-effect.

[dkoudijs]

So because you can't buy one, it makes LTT bad? The program is really just a long capcha that has a higher chance of working. So instead of buying from newegg, your buying from LTT. The cards are still making it out to people, just not through normal channels.

 

Not sure how selling an item differently makes them bad? I mean other stores do the same thing, but are they bad? (Many purse stores do a lottery style thing as they only get so many of the new purse) Remember just because your not used to it, dosn't mean its bad, just different from what you are used to.

 

Oh and the number of cards being sold daily vs. the number LTT has is so out of wack that they could do nothing with them and still have no real impact on your chances of getting a card normally.

 

My rough 30 seconds of research of proof. (Yes I don't have raw numbers, but you get the point they made way more bank, and its not just due to them having higher msrp, its due to selling at least 2x as many cards)

https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-announces-financial-results-for-fourth-quarter-and-fiscal-2021

https://www.theverge.com/2021/2/24/22299505/nvidia-earnings-q4-2021-quarterly-gpu-shortage-revenue

[givingtnt]

4 hours ago, RobLatour said:

So I know Linus Tech is just trying to do good - but from where I stand they aren't.

I'm a LT youtube subscriber, but more to the point also a developer who writes shareware and (mostly) freeware who is trying to build a new machine in support of that. 

Wouldn't mind a decent graphics card to go with it, but you know what ... scalpers, miners, and now LT are scooping up all the cards, while at the same time some short sighted retailers have done some silly things along the way.

Also, just to be clear, I have never bought, sold or mined crypto coins. 

Having that said, I know LT is trying to help gamers beat out scalpers and miners - but there are those of us who aren't gamers, scalpers or miners - and we are people too.

I have no solutions, I'm just saying. 

Thanks for listening, I feel better now!

 

I'm curious, what kind of programming for regular old software requires an RTX card exactly ?

[RollinLower]

23 minutes ago, givingtnt said:

I'm curious, what kind of programming for regular old software requires an RTX card exactly ?

it's super CUDA intensive, okay?!

[givingtnt]

2 minutes ago, RollinLower said:

it's super CUDA intensive, okay?!

Ah, yes. Visual Studio RTX..

 

No but I'm serious, I wanna know what kind of development he's doing.

[AlexP11223]

4 hours ago, RobLatour said:

gamers beat out scalpers and miners

More like beat bots. A gamer can be a scalper or miner.

But at least the cards are not bought by bots within seconds.

[AMD A10-9600P]

Just because you personally haven't get a card from VAG that doesn't mean they're not doing good. For the gamers who have got the card, which is the intention of the programme, they're doing a lot of good.

 

Anyway, just because you're a developer, that doesn't mean that you can't try to get a card from LTT.

[AlexP11223]

 

4 hours ago, AnonymousGuy said:

I had to google what the fuck "verified actual gamer" was.

lol, there is a quite active thread about VAG in this forum.

 

4 hours ago, AnonymousGuy said:

What a stupid concept. 

What exactly is stupid about it?

 

Of course anyone can sell their GPU after getting it, but at least there are no bots, and the scalper has to be a gamer or they will spend too much time googling.

Professional scalpers will not be interested in this, too much work for a small amount of GPUs.

[RobLatour]

5 hours ago, WereCatf said:

News-flash: you are not the mark to be measured by as to whether they are doing good or not. There are a lot of people who aren't eligible, but that's just life; it's quite literally impossible for everyone to be eligible for everything everywhere -- someone always loses. That does not invalidate the greater net-effect.

I think you may have missed the point.  There is a shortage, so of course not everyone is going to get what they want.  Its about equality.  In the same way gamers can be unhappy because of what bots do, I can be unhappy because of what LT does.   There is of course a difference, gamers can build / leverage bots (as can I), but when LT phones up a manufacture and gets cards set aside for the purpose of 'the greater net-effect' as defined by them (and you), to the detriment of others who wouldn't define it in that same way, well that's the point.

[WillOfTheLand]

28 minutes ago, RobLatour said:

I think you may have missed the point.  There is a shortage, so of course not everyone is going to get what they want.  Its about equality.  In the same way gamers can be unhappy because of what bots do, I can be unhappy because of what LT does.   There is of course a difference, gamers can build / leverage bots (as can I), but when LT phones up a manufacture and gets cards set aside for the purpose of 'the greater net-effect' as defined by them (and you), to the detriment of others who wouldn't define it in that same way, well that's the point.

I think you missed the point. The whole point of the VAG (yes we all know it's a stupid acronym, that was the point, it could have been "verified actual person" but VAP doesn't get giggles out of people) program was about equalizing the playing field, instead of the average shmoe having to compete against a army of a hundred thousand bots and hoping by some miracle they come across a card, they can catch a video alert and get a chance to get a card by verifying he is not a bot, but a actual person and charging them MSRP, not some giant markup. It was s system designed to help people like you, who can't get a card. 

 

Does ltt get something out of this? Of course, this is without a doubt boosting their view numbers on videos which results in a overall boost in revenue, having staff manage all this has gotta be payed for somehow. Nvidia has moved 30 million in 2020 alone, and AMD 10 million, LTT has moved less than a thousand into the hands of people they knows are individuals that either need or want the cards, this is less cards than a typical bot operation picks up in a hour.

 

If you want a card so badly, set up your own bot or turn on notifications for LTT videos, all honesty you're more likely to get a card through the bot than the videos because of how many people are clamoring for them, but undoubtedly you will be paying more, a lot more depending on your country (here in canada some shops are selling them at almost double MSRP).

[AlexP11223]

12 minutes ago, WillOfTheLand said:

this is less cards than a typical bot operation picks up in a hour.

Where would they get such amount of GPUs? It's probably more like 3-5 GPUs per week for a good bot setup. Bots compete with other bots too.

 

12 minutes ago, WillOfTheLand said:

person

no, currently it's gamer because

 

4 hours ago, AlexP11223 said:

has to be a gamer or they will spend too much time googling.

 

[Guest]

I stubbed my toe while watching an LTT video.

I was not too pleased with Linus after that.

I feel your pain. Literally.

[RobLatour]

39 minutes ago, WillOfTheLand said:

I think you missed the point. The whole point of the VAG (yes we all know it's a stupid acronym, that was the point, it could have been "verified actual person" but VAP doesn't get giggles out of people) program was about equalizing the playing field, instead of the average shmoe having to compete against a army of a hundred thousand bots and hoping by some miracle they come across a card, they can catch a video alert and get a chance to get a card by verifying he is not a bot, but a actual person and charging them MSRP, not some giant markup. It was s system designed to help people like you, who can't get a card. 

 

Does ltt get something out of this? Of course, this is without a doubt boosting their view numbers on videos which results in a overall boost in revenue, having staff manage all this has gotta be payed for somehow. Nvidia has moved 30 million in 2020 alone, and AMD 10 million, LTT has moved less than a thousand into the hands of people they knows are individuals that either need or want the cards, this is less cards than a typical bot operation picks up in a hour.

 

If you want a card so badly, set up your own bot or turn on notifications for LTT videos, all honesty you're more likely to get a card through the bot than the videos because of how many people are clamoring for them, but undoubtedly you will be paying more, a lot more depending on your country (here in canada some shops are selling them at almost double MSRP).

 

It was s system designed to help people like you, who can't get a card. 

 

How does this work?

So far the known information is following:

• Video is posted on Youtube and Floatplane at the same time.
• There's segment in video where Linus gives a hint about what link you need to use in order to enter. The hints are words and Linus uses his fingers to state what parts of the link they are. The links start with http://www.lttstore.com/. Link is temporary and will only show note about drop ending afterwards.
  • UPDATE: Previously there was actual cut-scene, latest drop had just voice-over during b-roll.
• There will be challenge on store page. The first two drops had 15 question quiz about video games. You have 3 lives and 3-4 options to choose from. Fastest to finish will get their chance to buy items.
  • UPDATE: Besides 3 lives, you can skip 2 questions. The latest drop had questions in video format with some answers shown as "A/B/C/D" and some as written normally.
• Item of the drop is shown on store page before taking the quiz. You will see the price and other details too.
• Prices are before VAT, tariffs etc. and shown in USD. Price after tariffs (US only) are shown on page.
• You are allowed to buy one CPU and one GPU from this event.

 

"The first two drops had 15 question quiz about video games. You have 3 lives and 3-4 options to choose from. Fastest to finish will get their chance to buy items."

 

Again, I am not a gamer.  Nor am I especially lucky at randomly picking right answers. I'll just have to write a bot for that I guess  

[RobLatour]

27 minutes ago, Den-Fi said:

I stubbed my toe while watching an LTT video.

I was not too pleased with Linus after that.

I feel your pain. Literally.

My favourite reply yet! Sorry to hear about your toe though.  Hope you're feeling better soon.

[tikker]

Now, this is why I tend to be sceptic when people post "solutions" to the GPU shortage, because they are solutions to get them  a GPU. Anything an entity does will "wrong" or "hurt" some other demographic that is not the intended one of that entity. First people are upset with "paper lauches", then came the hate on scalpers and miners. Now companies like LTT start something small scale (in the grand scheme of things) to get at least some cards to people that aren't miners or scalpers, and in this case are gamers, and they still get hate (not targeting you specifically, just a general statement). I'm convinced if they started a Verified Actual Creator program to get GPUs to creators we'd see some gamers posting this exact thread, just with programmer/creator replaces with gamer.

 

I would love a 3080 as well, but I'm not paying 2k for it. I understand the frustration, and you have every right to be frustrated, but at the end of the day it's just a GPU. We'll have to accept we probably won't get one for the price we want anytime soon.

[AlexP11223]

7 minutes ago, RobLatour said:

I'll just have to use a bot I guess.

It's not that easy. Setting up a monitoring-only bot like streetmerchant is easy, but it will not help you much, maybe for some smaller local shops, especially UK/Germany. And a good buying bot + proxies, etc. may cost similar to buying a GPU from scalpers, and may get your Amazon/Newegg/etc. account banned (usually not permanently though).

[freeagent]

Just pretend the program doesn't exist. You never saw it. Do you understand the demand right now? I have been trying not too hard to buy a card since November. I refuse to pay scalper prices so I do without. There are literally hundreds of thousand of guys just like me wanting a card too, so you aren't the only one. I saw a 2060 on newegg.ca sold by them to for 600. That was yesterday.. not sure if its still there.

[AlexP11223]

2 minutes ago, TimsTips said:

They should have just made them available to Float Plane subscribers who already had accounts.

  

On 3/31/2021 at 12:07 PM, LogicalDrm said:

Why they don't collect list of people? Why aren't forum members, Floatplane subscribers etc. prioritized?

List wouldn't do anything. There would still need to be draw of sort needed, and the list would consist more of non-gamers the longer it was left open. Prioritizing forum members would discriminate towards other parts of audience.

 

Having payment as requirement to join or as something making "winning" more likely is classified as lottery under laws. This would require permit, it would exclude several regions which require local permits or don't allow any lottery, and it would put age limit of 19 years in place.