LMG Sponsor Complaints

[Chiyawa]

12 hours ago, QwertyChouskie said:

Today's video was sponsored by Samsung...

Meh, they all are shady. They sometimes sell second grade product to many Asian market. One of the worst product the Asian market has is their DVD burner drive, which can eject without any intervention, failed prematurely, and of course out right deny RMAs. I don't trust them at all. Chip fabrication is good, but their electronic product, not so much.

[Other James]

16 hours ago, MagicianMountain1835 said:

 

Or any LMG staff member, I don't mind

Hey all!

 

I just wanted to check in regarding the few points raised up around Pulseway. We do still have a project or two with them coming soon. But I still wanted to let you know your complaints are heard.

 

The older two points are a bit easier to address. The "fake employee" problem is surprisingly common in account rep and support spaces. Due to things like online harassment or just people wanting a layer of security, some companies allow employees in certain positions to use aliases/alternate photos. 

 

The rental space it turns out has more to do with work from home options and just the scale of Pulseway. And getting a chance to look at photos of the actual rental spaces at the address, nothing seems to out of the ordinary there (they're honestly pretty nice offices).

 

Now, Kaseya. I see and acknowledge some of the issues with how they acquired Pulseway and seemed to have kept it hush hush. While it doesn't seem to be causing too many problems with how Pulseway operates currently, I did find a line in the EULA I'd like to bring up with my contact. If they can't put our teams' minds at ease, are there any RMM options you do prefer to use outside the Kasyea umbrella?

 

As always, thank you. 

[Colty]

5 hours ago, jamesscott said:

-snip-

Back when I was working for an MSP, I quite liked N-Able/N-Central, I haven't touched it in a long time, but it was a good package.

That being said, SolarWinds did have their security breach issue. Though, I'm not sure if that directly affected N-Able users. 

[SansVarnic]

On 2/11/2023 at 2:02 PM, Taradiddle said:

Dont know if this is in correct thread but, after watching this video i generally felt sorry for the guy trying to make a living at content creation, and sounds he got really screwed..

 

Went to the "influencer stuff" site and see he LTT pride of place on his homepage,  https://influencerstuff.com/

It's still there. 

 

Just my opinion on the matter, (in no way represents LMG)

Honestly, I watched the video, I feel a little sorry for this guy, but he is lazy not to pursue a court case because he does not want to be "sue happy", enforcing a contract the other party refuses to honor is what a court is for and he thinks it's going to cost him. If he wins the case Stuff has to cover his expenses that how it works in the us. Dude needs to get over his assumptions of how the US works or suck it up and move on and never do work with a US company again and go cry in a corner. <- I know that sounds harsh but really. To borrow his own phrase, in the "real world" it doesn't work in the manner he thinks. Grow up, do your due diligence, and stop sobbing about it. 

 

To address the issue though if Stuff really did this to this creator, they should be held accountable and that yt creator needs to pursue it rightfully or otherwise they are letting a theft, crime go unpunished and will only encourage Stuff to do it again. 

Spoiler

 

[Taradiddle]

8 hours ago, SansVarnic said:

It's still there. 

 

Just my opinion on the matter, (in no way represents LMG)

Honestly, I watched the video, I feel a little sorry for this guy, but he is lazy not to pursue a court case because he does not want to be "sue happy", enforcing a contract the other party refuses to honor is what a court is for and he thinks it's going to cost him. If he wins the case Stuff has to cover his expenses that how it works in the us. Dude needs to get over his assumptions of how the US works or suck it up and move on and never do work with a US company again and go cry in a corner. <- I know that sounds harsh but really. To borrow his own phrase, in the "real world" it doesn't work in the manner he thinks. Grow up, do your due diligence, and stop sobbing about it. 

 

To address the issue though if Stuff really did this to this creator, they should be held accountable and that yt creator needs to pursue it rightfully or otherwise they are letting a theft, crime go unpunished and will only encourage Stuff to do it again. 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

FYI barney is female : look tag on twitter "@Barny"

 

i dont agree its out of laziness, how would a struggling content creator from the UK with little money start a lawsuit against someone in the US? sounds expensive and a lot of work that they may never get the return from.

 

better to try making money to live and call it a loss, while call out to avoid others having the same result  

 

[D4M14N]

I know I'm new here with my several-minutes-old account, but I saw Pulseway brought up again, and I just wanted to put my 2 cents in. 

 

I love LMG, I've bought some merch and love the screwdriver, but every time I see a Pulseway spot, it personally pains me to see LMG accepting what is basically blood money to me. 

 

To give some background, I'm a small business owner, I own an IT Consultant / MSP / Software Dev studio and employ 12 full time staff. We used to be a Kaseya Customer, we got burned HARD by them. It cost me a lot of money and sleepless nights. They are not a friendly company at all, and they know it, that's why they go around steal acquiring their competitors to lock in more customers. It is my understanding that after owning a controlling stake in Pulseway for about 5 years now, they have recently acquired the rest of the company and now own it outright. Their ToS change last year hinted at that (it is now the Kaseya ToS with the company name replaced). Their sponsor spots make it seem like it's a simple month to month low commitment product. I actually went through the process of checking it out a while back, it tries to lock you into a Kaseya 3-year contract. They WILL send debt collectors after you if you try to get out of it. They WILL make it impossible to cancel and not auto-renew after 3 years. They don't care that those practices are illegal in many places they serve customers. 

 

I was a customer of IT Glue, then it got acquired by Kaseya. Once my contract finally expired, we closed our account, this was over 2 years ago now. For those who don't know, IT Glue is a documentation and password management platform for IT teams. I just checked, it looks like our data is still on their system, and they had a security breach a few months back. They of course will lie and say data is deleted, but it's there still. Links still work. 

 

I was also a customer of RapidFire tools, and then it got acquired by Kaseya as well. I was on a month-to-month plan, but when i decided to part ways with Kaseya, they told me i was now on a 3-year plan that they sent me an email about at some point (i never got the email, i never agreed to a 3-year plan). They kept trying to chase payment. 

 

Finally, I was a customer of Kaseya directly when they got hacked. We were on the cloud platform of VSA and BMS, the hack took it down for well over a week, and when it finally came back up, many features were disabled, and we had to spend a lot of time running around making sure things were secure. For our troubles, we were only ever offered a 20% discount on that month's service fees for the inconvenience and claimed that the breach was not grounds to end the contract. We dug into the details of the breach, and it was nothing short of negligence in how they managed their code. The vulnerabilities had been reported to them well over a year prior to the breach, and they never acknowledged or patched them. 

 

I know they will do the same with Pulseway, they already have started with the 3-year contract in their new ToS. I don't want to see any other business tricked and destroyed by their shady practices. I know that by bringing this all up LMG will probably ask them about what I've said, and they will see this post, and then their Legal team will get involved and send me letters, but whatever, it's more important to me to do the right thing and try and save someone else from what I and many others have gone through.

 

For the record, I really don't want to recommend other RMM/PSA tools, because that's just going to come across as shilling (especially as I'm a new account) but have a look in the MSP subreddit and you will get some idea of the company's people prefer there. While I don't use them, I have heard good things about HaloPSA/HaloRMM and NinjaRMM. But I struggle to understand how LMG's target audience would benefit from an ad spot from something that can only be used by companies, and not something to use personally the way Pulseway is marketed (even though it also isn't good for personal small-scale use)

[Basitikhlaq]

Hi fellow peeps,

 

I ordered an order from Dbrand on Fed 07, 2023 and received it on Fed 11, 2023. I ordered 1 Ipad pro skin and two airpod cases. When i received the order it  was in a envelope and i clearly knew something is off as additional Two airpods cases cant go in a envelope. When i opened it didn't had the air pod cases. I submitted the inquiry on Fed 11,2023 with picture as proof. Haven't received any help from them, just and generic robot reply.

 

I am stressed before i am flying on the fed 25, 2023 and these were gifts for family. Kindly someone from dbrand look into this or anyone form the forum can guide me as to what i should do.

[Erioch]

5 hours ago, Basitikhlaq said:

Hi fellow peeps,

 

I ordered an order from Dbrand on Fed 07, 2023 and received it on Fed 11, 2023. I ordered 1 Ipad pro skin and two airpod cases. When i received the order it  was in a envelope and i clearly knew something is off as additional Two airpods cases cant go in a envelope. When i opened it didn't had the air pod cases. I submitted the inquiry on Fed 11,2023 with picture as proof. Haven't received any help from them, just and generic robot reply.

 

I am stressed before i am flying on the fed 25, 2023 and these were gifts for family. Kindly someone from dbrand look into this or anyone form the forum can guide me as to what i should do.

"Due to high ticket volume, please note that you can expect a response to your inquiry within 4-9 business days (not including weekends or holidays)."

 

Sounds like they're outsourcing support to LTT.

[Chiyawa]

5 hours ago, Erioch said:

Sounds like they're outsourcing support to LTT.

Huh, didn't know you can outsource support channel to other company.

[Erioch]

8 hours ago, Chiyawa said:

Huh, didn't know you can outsource support channel to other company.

Most big companies outsource support.

[ToboRobot]

13 hours ago, Chiyawa said:

Huh, didn't know you can outsource support channel to other company.

I've worked customer service/tech support for companies like Bell and Apple, but I've always worked for a third party, even though they did employ people in the same roles directly and paid them more money.

[Middcore]

On 2/20/2023 at 11:57 PM, Chiyawa said:

Huh, didn't know you can outsource support channel to other company.

 

It's extremely common. 

 

I am pretty sure that @Erioch is just making a joke about how the "high ticket volume" warning on Dbrand's site reads just like the ones on the LTT store, though. 

[SansVarnic]

On 2/18/2023 at 6:35 PM, Taradiddle said:

FYI barney is female : look tag on twitter "@Barny"

 

i dont agree its out of laziness, how would a struggling content creator from the UK with little money start a lawsuit against someone in the US? sounds expensive and a lot of work that they may never get the return from.

 

better to try making money to live and call it a loss, while call out to avoid others having the same result  

 

I dont twitter. I dont know who this is and only watched the video to gather my opinion on the issue.

 

I said "is lazy not to pursue" I didn't infer they weren't doing out of laziness in general, let's not mince my words.

 

There are plenty of low-cost options and even some decent pro-bono stuff out there they can look into. My beef is this is not right, and they should at least try to pursue it. Inquiring doesn't cost money and if they find the effort is not worth it then fine, but at least give it a go around and make sure first. Just assuming one thing and giving up from the onset is what every scam wants you do; you give up and they win. Hence the being lazy part. Being lazy about one aspect doesn't mean they are lazy people in general, I was being specific. 

 

Sometimes calling it a loss is fine, but don't just call it a loss without trying first.

 

I am rooting for this yt creator to take a stand in more ways than making a rant video, do what's right by them but if they won't that is their choice, and that's sad to see.

[Chiyawa]

1 hour ago, TechlessBro said:

Plus they have the most annoy YT ads so as soon as any video mentions them I just skip.

Yep, too cheesy to my liking.

 

And besides, what are you doing in school back then? That's what English class is for, right? Somehow I found that Grammarly should not need to exist. I mean, spell check and grammar context checking is okay (we can't get everything right if the report has 10,000 words, right?), but dictating the way you write? That's over the line.

[QwertyChouskie]

On 2/15/2023 at 11:01 PM, Chiyawa said:

Meh, they all are shady. They sometimes sell second grade product to many Asian market. One of the worst product the Asian market has is their DVD burner drive, which can eject without any intervention, failed prematurely, and of course out right deny RMAs. I don't trust them at all. Chip fabrication is good, but their electronic product, not so much.

This is not "meh" or just "shady".  Given it seems very unlikely you watched the video(s) linked, here's a TL;DR:

 

Samsung is seeking to have the United States Customs and Border Patrol block import of ANY OLED or AMOLED screen not manufactured by Samsung.  If Samsung succeeds, this would mean that any person or company in the US purchasing OLED displays would have to get it from one source: Samsung.  Given how ubiquitous OLED are in phones, TVs, smartwatches, even some computers, it's not hard to see just how bad this would make things for everyone.

 

Remember how awful GPU prices are right now?  Imagine if AMD GPUs were banned by customs and border control.  Oh, Intel has integrated graphics?  Ban Intel non-f SKUs then too.  Oh, phones have GPUs?  Banned, unless it's based on an Nvidia Tegra processor.  PlayStaton? Xbox? Steam Deck?  Banned.  Hope you really enjoy the Switch as the only allowed game console in the US, also it's probably gonna cost you at least $800 now.  This is what Samsung is attempting with the OLED/AMOLED market.

 

I don't say this lightly (honestly I find repairing Samsung devices easier than many manufacturers [cough Apple]), but...

 

FUCK SAMSUNG.

 

[Jessomadic]

On 2/16/2023 at 6:15 PM, Colty said:

Back when I was working for an MSP, I quite liked N-Able/N-Central, I haven't touched it in a long time, but it was a good package.

That being said, SolarWinds did have their security breach issue. Though, I'm not sure if that directly affected N-Able users. 

We use N-Able at work and it's pretty good for the most part!

[RunPotatoRun]

Created an account to post about Ugreen since Linus mentioned in the latest WAN show that they haven't received any complaints about UGreen.

I was seriously considering buying a Ugreen charger (I believe it was one of their 3 or 4 port Nexode 100W chargers, but I can't remember exactly). As travel ramps back up, I wanted 'one charger to charge them all' for laptop, phone, etc.

Seems like UGreen doesn't have UL cert marks on their devices. They claim to use TUV as their certification test lab, but there's no good reason in my mind not to put the certification mark on the device. 

One of their PR reps went on Reddit and posted some responses saying the cert marks aren't required, but they shared some test certificates. This isn't acceptable. The certification exists to assure consumers that the product is safe to plug into their wall. One shouldn't need to ask the company, their model number should be listed in the appropriate certification database, and the product should carry the associated certification mark. I can't think of a reputable brand that doesn't include a physical certification mark on the device.
 

After reading up on the the r/USBCHardware subreddit, it sounds like they have serious discrepancies between claims on different websites, and their products are not USB-IF certified, which would seem to be important for higher power USB-C devices (compatibility, at the very least).

 

 

I spent quite a while watching YouTube videos of the charger and looking at product photos to see if the cert mark was on the device, it wasn't. I looked for their device at the time to see if it was in the certification database, couldn't find it. Although, tbh, I could have spent longer, but knowing it didn't have a certification mark, I didn't look that hard.

I have a few lower amperage UGreen USB cables that seem ok, but I'm pretty careful what I plug into the wall, and/or use for high energy applications (100W charging) because of the fire risk. UGreen's lack of USB-IF certification on expensive high wattage chargers is bad enough, but lacking transparency with safety certifications (no physical mark on the device) is enough for me to avoid them until something changes.

[creesch]

In this weekend's WAN Show at the end @LinusTechmentions/recommends UGreen as a brand. He disclaims it with the fact that they are a sponsor, but they haven't had complaints yet. In November, I posted a question about them in this very thread, for which I haven't received an answer yet.

 

The tl;dr is that I have had some mixed experiences with them, some of their products are alright, but I have others break quickly and some of their products are out of spec.

 

At the time, I asked if the sponsored products are lab tested before they are endorsed. I am still interested in the answer to that question. Going a bit further, I would like to think that besides the specific products that are being sponsored (which I figure Ugreen made sure are of the quality expected) some other random products of their lineup are also tested. Simply because even though specific products are featured, it is the whole brand that basically is getting an endorsement. 

 

See also the comment just above mine. 

 

[Msting]

Jackery, based on this review video, 

seems to insist on "favorable" reviews before agreeing to send review units. Pretty bad practice for a major (and reputable) LTT supplier. I wonder if they only get away with this with "smaller" reviewers.

Has LTT had to sign such a contract?

[Jackeless]

Just a heads-up regarding the mention of Anker as a sponsor on some LMG linked websites.

 

Some of the recent LMG Clips video descriptions (i.e. https://youtu.be/J0Hy_cEg2oo) include "AFFILIATES, SPONSORS & REFERRALS" links which lead to a Geniuslink site that is still listing Anker as a sponsor: https://lmg.gg/lcsponsors (redirects to https://geni.us/lmgclipsponsors)

 

And under some LMG Clips videos (i.e. https://youtu.be/vNKcw3fQvb8) the wrong link was used (and it still lists Anker as a sponsor as well):

https://lmg.gg/masponsors (redirects to https://geni.us/masponsors)

 

I have seen that https://lmg.gg/partners (redirects to https://throne.me/linusmediagroup/sponsors-affiliates-partners) and https://lmg.gg/sponsors (redirects to https://geni.us/lttsponsors) have been used in some video descriptions. These two sites seem to be updated already.

[mynameGeoff]

On 2/26/2023 at 3:00 AM, creesch said:

In this weekend's WAN Show at the end @LinusTechmentions/recommends UGreen as a brand. He disclaims it with the fact that they are a sponsor, but they haven't had complaints yet. In November, I posted a question about them in this very thread, for which I haven't received an answer yet.

 

The tl;dr is that I have had some mixed experiences with them, some of their products are alright, but I have others break quickly and some of their products are out of spec.

 

At the time, I asked if the sponsored products are lab tested before they are endorsed. I am still interested in the answer to that question. Going a bit further, I would like to think that besides the specific products that are being sponsored (which I figure Ugreen made sure are of the quality expected) some other random products of their lineup are also tested. Simply because even though specific products are featured, it is the whole brand that basically is getting an endorsement. 

 

See also the comment just above mine. 

 

 

On 2/25/2023 at 12:45 PM, RunPotatoRun said:

Created an account to post about Ugreen since Linus mentioned in the latest WAN show that they haven't received any complaints about UGreen.

I was seriously considering buying a Ugreen charger (I believe it was one of their 3 or 4 port Nexode 100W chargers, but I can't remember exactly). As travel ramps back up, I wanted 'one charger to charge them all' for laptop, phone, etc.

Seems like UGreen doesn't have UL cert marks on their devices. They claim to use TUV as their certification test lab, but there's no good reason in my mind not to put the certification mark on the device. 

One of their PR reps went on Reddit and posted some responses saying the cert marks aren't required, but they shared some test certificates. This isn't acceptable. The certification exists to assure consumers that the product is safe to plug into their wall. One shouldn't need to ask the company, their model number should be listed in the appropriate certification database, and the product should carry the associated certification mark. I can't think of a reputable brand that doesn't include a physical certification mark on the device.
 

After reading up on the the r/USBCHardware subreddit, it sounds like they have serious discrepancies between claims on different websites, and their products are not USB-IF certified, which would seem to be important for higher power USB-C devices (compatibility, at the very least).

 

 

I spent quite a while watching YouTube videos of the charger and looking at product photos to see if the cert mark was on the device, it wasn't. I looked for their device at the time to see if it was in the certification database, couldn't find it. Although, tbh, I could have spent longer, but knowing it didn't have a certification mark, I didn't look that hard.

I have a few lower amperage UGreen USB cables that seem ok, but I'm pretty careful what I plug into the wall, and/or use for high energy applications (100W charging) because of the fire risk. UGreen's lack of USB-IF certification on expensive high wattage chargers is bad enough, but lacking transparency with safety certifications (no physical mark on the device) is enough for me to avoid them until something changes.

Hey,

 

Sorry for the delayed response! Thanks for your responses regarding UGREEN. Whenever we take on any sponsor, we always vet their products internally and evaluate them before we move forward. The products we've used in-office have been their SD card readers, cables, and Gallium Nitride chargers as those were the products sent to us for our sponsor spots and sponsored videos and found no immediate problems after months of day-to-day use.

 

Integrating Labs into vetting our sponsors' products is definitely something we want to explore (as long as the product vertical is something they plan on testing), but it'll take time. Until then, we've been providing evaluation samples to our broader team, and getting opinions from everyone on if certain products are worth promoting. This isn't a foolproof solution, as everyone experiences with products are different from one another, but I wanted to provide some clarification.

 

I'm meeting with my contact from UGREEN to see if I can get a response regarding the certification on their products and will follow up when I can.

 

Thanks again, we really appreciate the input!

[creesch]

5 hours ago, mynameGeoff said:

 

Hey,

 

Sorry for the delayed response! Thanks for your responses regarding UGREEN. Whenever we take on any sponsor, we always vet their products internally and evaluate them before we move forward. The products we've used in-office have been their SD card readers, cables, and Gallium Nitride chargers as those were the products sent to us for our sponsor spots and sponsored videos and found no immediate problems after months of day-to-day use.

 

Integrating Labs into vetting our sponsors' products is definitely something we want to explore (as long as the product vertical is something they plan on testing), but it'll take time. Until then, we've been providing evaluation samples to our broader team, and getting opinions from everyone on if certain products are worth promoting. This isn't a foolproof solution, as everyone experiences with products are different from one another, but I wanted to provide some clarification.

 

I'm meeting with my contact from UGREEN to see if I can get a response regarding the certification on their products and will follow up when I can.

 

Thanks again, we really appreciate the input!

Thanks for the clarification! I did figure that the products that are explicitly sponsored have been evaluated to some degree, but it is good to have that acknowledged. I still have some reservations about some of their line-up given my previous experience. However, I do realize that with a brand that sells this many products, it is an impossible ask to have their entire line up vetted before a sponsorship deal. 

 

At the same time, even if only a specific product is sponsored, it still benefits the brand in general and people are more likely to check out other products they might sell. So from that perspective I could see LMG not only asking for the specific sponsored product for validation but also a few random (or best selling) other products of the same brand. I do realize that currently with labs no fully set up this might still create too much of a workload, but I wanted to suggest it anyway for consideration. 

 

On a related and positive note about Ugreen. I just had a look at their website (generally I only dealt with them on Amazon) and noticed they show customer review score averages as well as the reviews themselves. Which isn't all the uncommon, but the averages actually appear to be real and they also do show all negative reviews and even allow to sort by negative reviews. 

 

 

[Taradiddle]

On 2/24/2023 at 7:08 AM, SansVarnic said:

I dont twitter. I dont know who this is and only watched the video to gather my opinion on the issue.

 

I said "is lazy not to pursue" I didn't infer they weren't doing out of laziness in general, let's not mince my words.

 

There are plenty of low-cost options and even some decent pro-bono stuff out there they can look into. My beef is this is not right, and they should at least try to pursue it. Inquiring doesn't cost money and if they find the effort is not worth it then fine, but at least give it a go around and make sure first. Just assuming one thing and giving up from the onset is what every scam wants you do; you give up and they win. Hence the being lazy part. Being lazy about one aspect doesn't mean they are lazy people in general, I was being specific. 

 

Sometimes calling it a loss is fine, but don't just call it a loss without trying first.

 

I am rooting for this yt creator to take a stand in more ways than making a rant video, do what's right by them but if they won't that is their choice, and that's sad to see.

and I refereed to the "laziness" of not pursuing it aspect of what you were saying, someone who works for them self is not lazy in general, but your forgetting one thing, they are British, the "manager" is from US, Barny would have to throw more money to get some kind of legal representation in US, even to serve on her behalf (i'm not from US either so legal process confuses me, as a brit myself a running joke to us is how much the US sue each other  ) 

 

and even if they do, and win... what then? if they sue in the UK and the manager has no financial presence in the UK the paper is worth as much as the contract is... nill

in the US, file for bankruptcy and get the dept cleared (if what barny says in the video is true and he owes more than just her (that it is if they win))

 

I dont see how they would recoup the losses... better to name and shame and hope they are wanting to save face

[PyroCF]

Hey there, big War Thunder and Mac Address fan here!

 

There have been major issues with War Thunder on MacOS for over a year since the Winds of Change update last year. Issues range from missing textures/artefacting to completely locking up the OS. The game launcher itself has also been bugged for a year where it will always auto default to Ultra HQ models causing you to have to revalidate files every time when you swap back to standard. https://forum.warthunder.com/index.php?/forum/602-macintosh-related-problems-advice/ Plenty more on the rather quiet mac section! Plenty of bug reports submitted too, Gaijin just seem to be very quiet in the change logs regarding MacOS. I have resorted to just streaming War Thunder from another PC for now.

 

It would be great if this could be validated your end. I've no problem with War Thunder as a sponsor in general but maybe not specifically on Mac Address!

[Chiyawa]

On 2/25/2023 at 8:40 AM, QwertyChouskie said:

*Snip*

Ho ho, you haven't met one of their big shot yet. I did explain a bunch of thing in a post but I think it got deleted (maybe my rant became extreme, happens to me sometimes). TL;DR, we Malaysian working for most Korean company are not having pleasant experience. I don't say I'm surprise if they try to pull that stunt. Remember how they pay Apple? If that didn't give you an idea what they are, then I'm not sure how to explain further without getting too out of hand.