Gamers Nexus alleges LMG has insufficient ethics and integrity

[Empyreal]

4 minutes ago, VeryScary said:

I challenged a user or I asked a question? 

 

Keep reaching 

Yea, because you don't understand context. I'm also pretty sure you do not understand the definition of reaching because that's basically all of your replies, you're also grasping at straws real hard.

 

I've followed LTT for almost a decade. If anything, I want LTT to improve. I thank GN for trying to open Linus's eyes and trying to remind Linus that it's quality over quantity that matters.

 

 

[perryckd]

1 minute ago, Bunaryblitz said:

Not sure Linus or anyone from the team will read this, but I wanted to give my $.02 (or whatever you call your crazy money up in the great white north )

 

 

I’ve watched Linus since the NCIX days and followed GN since it was only a website. I love both of your channels. 
 

With that said, Steve is in the right here. Your videos carry a LOT of weight and “Labs is a work in progress, we’re getting better” isn’t a valid excuse for some of the fuckups. ESPECIALLY the BilletLabs fiasco. Regardless of the product, you CHOSE to review it and REALLY hurt a small company with the logistics of the video. The finial opinion doesn’t even matter. If they don’t take you to court, you’re lucky. 
 

I want nothing more than to see you succeed (if for nothing more than keeping my wardrobe looking good; lttstore.com). But if you want to play with the best (GN) on their field, you have to compete at the same level. If labs isn’t ready, don’t use their data yet. If that means you’re losing money for a time, that’s the cost of doing business. 
 

For now, this video (and Linus’ response) have proven my “LTT for entertainment, GN for purchasing decisions” motto correct. I’ll still watch your videos with pleasure though and wish you nothing but good luck. 

 

just be aware guerillanexus is not immune to errors and letting it pass go

 

 

[MrSuperb]

There is so much speculation all coming from speculation and assumptions from GN.

 

There is plenty things wrong with LMG and LTT, but you people could brought this up countless times. What GN is doing is taking one incident by one of 100 employees of a media company and blowing it up with lots of drama (complaining that they don’t fix videos at the same time, as complaining that they do, because they have tools he has not). It rather have LTT that makes human mistakes, that it owns up to, than a company that avoids public mistakes by all means and loses all humaneness.

[Neroon]

5 minutes ago, Reclus said:

How does this simple thing causing you confusion? Linus and Steve know each other! If Steve were to contact Linus and give him the heads up that would be straight up collusion in covering the issue! The amount of deflection you have to use to not see this is just enormous. This was said here a 100 times and you are still not getting it. The way LTT is handling this issue is precisely the reason Steve should not under any circumstance contact Linus to ask for comment! LTT's mistakes are LTT's mistakes. Steve is not under any obligation either professional or moral to inform LTT on what he is working on in this instance. The more you dig your heels and not grasp this, the worse the problem will be. You clearly don't realize how thin of a line LTT is walking here. 

Steve should not contact Linus under any circumstance, for what reason? You do get that he can contact Linus, listen to his response, not find it valid or relevant, and simply not include it. Or he can state that he contacted Linus, repeat what he said, and conclude that he does not find his answers sufficient or whatever.
More information can never be bad if you want as much as the truth out there.

 

So yeah, what reasons are there for not doing it? I don't know. Is it because of time? Is it because he didn't want to have this chat with Linus? Did he felt he would get a lot of BS? Did he want to be able to wildly speculate without knowing the 'official' response? Nobody knows but the people at GN.

[dustypaws]

2 minutes ago, atxcyclist said:

Then you’re making a bad argument, because the people showing-up here to sling dirt will just leave after they’re done; They don’t care about LTT or the community, they’re just drama-seekers and trolls.

I disagree. I'm a "fan" since the early days in the Langley house. I haven't had the urge to post here until now because that's just not my thing. Now however when he managed to build a company that actually has a lot of reach in the tech community, there's responsibility and accountability. And if he and his company needs to be remembered that people and companies rely on him to be thorough and basically not be an asshole, I'm here to remind him as well (for what it's worth...) What doesn't help is staying silent and "just take it"...

[throwawayManMode]

3 minutes ago, perryckd said:

 

just be aware guerillanexus is not immune to errors and letting it pass go

 

 

How many times are  you going to keep calling them that? You made your point, move on and go touch grass dude

[m9x3mos]

13 minutes ago, VeryScary said:

removes the conflict of interest

That doesn't remove a conflict of interest. It just informs the viewer that there is a relationship in a competitor.

[BlackAsthesky]

Hey,

 

I really hope someone at LMG is reading this. Probably not, but if so: Please take these five minutes and read though this in its entirety. When you started expanding into the realm of more data-driven, "scientific" reviews, that sounded like a great idea. The sheer scale of the investment you made to build the LAB was promising for the quality, the benefit for the viewer and the impact of your future videos (or written media, even).

This massive expansion of the company (mostly in terms of staff) seems not to be without side effects, though. Since the LABS project is on the way -- as a reminder: which I am eagerly awaiting -- we have seen a significant rise in data errors and miscommunications. Generally, errors in the gathering and processing of data are to be expected in the early stages of building such complicated, high throughput workflows in testing. Errata can happen, but a good data collection and review process is characterized by the net of safe guards to prevent such problems from seeping into the end product -- be it an article or a video. There should be measures in place to prevent things like the Pwnage or the Thermaltake PSU incidents, where the error was caught after publishing. "Safety" measures will naturally not catch everything, but the error rates in LTT content has risen so dramatically recently, so that it almost seems like there exist none. There is an entire field of study out there that focuses on this kind of stuff. In a scientific work process, there are lots and lots of standardized measures to not only prevent and catch simple factual or measurement errors, but also ensure objectivity both of the data collected and the media published. LMG should probably consider implementing automated and manual, statistical and practical safe guards deep into its workflow to allow for the high throughput they are aiming for.

Hiring a "fact checker" has frequently been proposed to LMG by its viewers and handwavingly pushed aside for not being a viable option. While in some regard, this is true -- a single person or a small team won't be able to efficiently work through each and every piece of media -- having specialized people not only reviewing scripts, but also the process of data collection and processing in general and for each single video could be a part of said implementation. Having a third person surveilling every step of the way to a finished piece of media while not being completely tied into the process directly would bring the pipeline closer to a truly scientific approach. This could be extended so that a whole team of people would review a script in the end, similar to a peer review process, trying to find errors and maybe improvements in general. Of course this is expensive and will not magically cure all diseases, but it is one out of many possible solutions.

On to the second big problem: Internal communications seem to be problematic lately. This becomes especially apparent to the viewer in cases like the Billet incident. While the exact matters of the really obvious error in this video have been pointed towards many times, I want to comment on LMG's reaction to the whole case instead. The prototype of the block has been given to LMG in trust, while clearly communicating that it is to be returned after the whole review process. After publishing an obviously flawed review of the not-yet (and probably never-to-be, at this point) product, the prototype has been auctioned off publicly instead of it being returned to the owner, in contradiction to what was communicated earlier. In the best case, it has been bought by a curious tech nerd who will keep it forever. Anyways, this is obviously a case of internal communications just failing miserably. Similarly, in the LTT Lab tour video, such a slip could have been prevented with clearer communication and a more thorough review process of the output media.

Thirdly, on top of that, LMG has handled criticism poorly in some of these cases. Of course -20° on the GPU (the correct one, mind you) would have changed the review's verdict, rightfully so. The Billet incident is a very effective nutshell of the state of things. The complete production process of this video was flawed to the point where it seems like such a thing would never happen to an outlet like LMG. A truly consumer focused, high quality outlet would have re-shot the thing, or at least just not published it in the first place. The data was meaningless because there was no suitable GPU at hand due to a communications problem, it went through the whole pipeline anyways, the video got published, there was backlash, the criticism was ignored, and then the prototype was auctioned off against the existing agreement of the owner. I wish LMG would focus more on quality instead of quantity. And almost all of your employees do openly agree with that.

@Linus, you always talk about how you have to raise the bar with each video: This is not what you are doing at the moment. You now have more data to back up your claims, but the data is flawed. You now have really awesome looking and sounding videos (that is to say, your production value has risen dramatically, which is awesome), but you keep pushing out videos with false information and preventable errata -- sometimes even knowingly! And you will have to change something about this fundamentally, or else this will massively hurt your brand name. And that would be a shame.

I am a long-term viewer who actually is excited about the future you envisioned for LMG. I am not one of these drama queen people who make an outcry out of every single controversy. And this is exactly why I am so frustrated about this.

But I mean what I am writing in this comment: You will probably need to take all of the criticism out there seriously going forward. You are operating at a different scale now, so you will have to spend some money on accuracy of your content, and you will have to be willing to take down videos that contain errors as dramatic as the Pwnage one, for example. You should do that quality above quantity thing now, that you always talk about. You are becoming the company you always criticize for their poor quality products and blindness or ignorance for criticism. Of course you'll probably not read through this whole thing, who am I kidding. I mean, why would a company need to listen to legitimate criticism and then making improvements to the product anyways. That costs money and time, after all. "We are working together here", yada yada. Your words.

[fartmuncher69_420]

1 minute ago, Kisai said:

That's a strong disagree.

 

A time sheet is for "factory work", so you always have X many people working on Y product to have Z output.

 

Timesheets should not exist for work that is specialized, because you aren't paying for their "time" you're paying for their expertise, and thus if one video editor takes 20 hours to do something, and another takes 10, you're not going to demand the 20 hour guy work like the 10 hour guy, nor are you going to try and find another 10 hour guy.

You also want to make sure that your video guy isn't working weekends and putting in 80 hour weeks because that's illegal.

[Legitsu]

Steve/Gamersnexus aren't jorurnalists

they sure as hell aren't acting like ones when they post mud slinging videos 

data? where was the data here: this is a mud piece

 

I don't buy this "we are doing this for your own good non-sense" 

thats virtu signaling bullshit being used as justification for a mud slinging campain because he was called out 

 

 

[Legitsu]

7 minutes ago, Caeradwyn said:

Right. First things first:
The way GN went about this, was... Questionable. And Steve has a way of presenting content, that can come across as a bit arrogant and "high horsey". Gamers Nexus should also have gotten in touch with LMG before posting the video. It's only fair to allow them to present their side, although, that shouldn't prevent them from posting their concerns.

But, Linus isn't "one of the guys". He's not "just some random member of the wider public who loves computers". He's a businessman. He's somebody who has built up a business from basically nothing, to become one of the absolute biggest tech youtubers in the world. And I think that he sometimes forgets that this means that he's no longer "one of us". He's not part of this community, he's part of the media. He's adjacent to the computer industry. And so he will be under scrutiny just like other companies. When running a company, and especially a large company, there will always be a conflict between integrity and making money. And for us as consumers, integrity is what matters, not how much money these companies earn. And if they want our trust and respect, they have to earn it. They have to show they have integrity. And along with that, comes displaying quality over quantity. It requires showing that you're willing to prioritize quality of content and journalistic integrity over maximizing profits. If you can't do that, then you'll simply have to accept not getting our trust and respect. It's that simple.
10 years ago, Linus was a young pimply nerd who made videos about what he loved. Today, he's a grown man doing a job. There's a huge difference between LTT back then, and LMG today.

@LinusTech You are not our "bro". You're "that guy on the internet who doesn't even realize he's become rich, and thinks he's still just like us". It might hurt to hear that, but it's the reality of it. You can't both be our "bro" and a successful businessman. Those two things are mutually exclusive. And I understand you have paychecks to cover and expenses to pay and all that. I DO get that. But the quality of content will always be what we, the viewers, care about. If it's impossible to keep up quality, while also keeping the company profitable, then perhaps you've grown too big. Perhaps you've branched out too far into the realm of entertainment over journalism. I don't know. All I know is that "trust me bro" has to be earned. Not by making promises. Not by selling high quality screwdrivers and excellent hoodies (I love mine), but through constantly showing that you can make the highest quality content, not only for entertainment value, but also in terms of journalistic quality and integrity.

Thanks.

says who ? who are you to be an authority on buisness. money and community reliaionships ?

 

you got PhD id love to see it

now whos on a high horse seesh 

its the pot calling the kettle black up in here smh 

[B_aker]

Companies are not your friends, Linus is not your friend people. He's a man who's built a successful business from the ground up with the ashes of his former employer (and probably carries a bit of success bias into his operations). Companies need to grow to be successful. Frequently (and necessarily) this comes at the cost of moral (not fiscal) integrity. I haven't watched LTT for performance data in many years as almost every other creator in the space does that content better and I don't feel it was necessary of Steve to even make this piece as its fairly evident their hardware reviews are more form than function. I mean who in their right mind would wait for an LTT video to finalize their purchasing decisions? That said their tech news is top notch and they have the resources and creativity to play with and test fun quirky hardware both past and present. They also make some of the only mainstream Linux content on YouTube and aside from a few noobish challenge videos show the platforms strengths and viability. They used their muscle to pressure Nvidia to back off of Hardware Unboxed and generally do a lot of good things in the space. But lets not pretend that we all just noticed their benchmarking is bottom rung, because it is and he shouldn't have to apologize for his busniess model if it works.

[atxcyclist]

1 minute ago, dustypaws said:

I disagree. I'm a "fan" since the early days in the Langley house. I haven't had the urge to post here until now because that's just not my thing. Now however when he managed to build a company that actually has a lot of reach in the tech community, there's responsibility and accountability. And if he and his company needs to be remembered that people and companies rely on him to be thorough and basically not be an asshole, I'm here to remind him as well (for what it's worth...) What doesn't help is staying silent and "just take it"...

You can disagree all you want, but you essentially just walked clear in a circle around my statement and got to the point I’m making: You didn’t care to engage in the community except to come in and be negative about it. If all you’re doing is showing-up to point fingers and make disparaging remarks about someone/something, you’re not really a fan of that thing. 

[filpo]

Just now, Legitsu said:

says who ? who are you to be an authority on buisness. money and community reliaionships ?

 

you got PhD id love to see it

now whos on a high horse seesh 

its the pot calling the kettle black up in here smh 

Ah he's back everyone

[dustypaws]

Just now, Legitsu said:

says who ? who are you to be an authority on buisness. money and community reliaionships ?

 

you got PhD id love to see it

now whos on a high horse seesh 

its the pot calling the kettle black up in here smh 

You're not adding value...

[dustypaws]

1 minute ago, atxcyclist said:

You can disagree all you want, but you essentially just walked clear in a circle around my statement and got to the point I’m making: You didn’t care to engage in the community except to come in and be negative about it. If all you’re doing is showing-up to point fingers and make disparaging remarks about someone/something, you’re not really a fan of that thing. 

You view criticism as negative... I don't want to live in your world...

[Legitsu]

1 minute ago, dustypaws said:

You're not adding value...

pot meet kettle ... kettle this is pot ... 

[ToboRobot]

9 minutes ago, Kisai said:

That's a strong disagree.

 

A time sheet is for "factory work", so you always have X many people working on Y product to have Z output.

 

Timesheets should not exist for work that is specialized, because you aren't paying for their "time" you're paying for their expertise, and thus if one video editor takes 20 hours to do something, and another takes 10, you're not going to demand the 20 hour guy work like the 10 hour guy, nor are you going to try and find another 10 hour guy. At best, everyone agrees on a production pipeline that is more efficient by maybe cutting out "quality" steps that people don't notice or care about. But if you decide you'd rather have 10, 10 hour guys instead of 10, 20 hour guys to save money, you're in for a reckoning when stuff like this blows up, because perhaps 20-hour guys actually give a care about what the result is, and 10 hour guy just wants to get it out the door.

 

On the flip side of this. things like Grocery stores , have ZERO specializations except for Bakery, Deli and maybe if they still have a Photo department. Everyone is replaceable at the drop of a hat, which is why those stores only hire part time, because they know there is no lack-of-supply. Some grocery stores have gotten rid of their bakeries and replace them with stuff trucked in from somewhere else outside the city, where the bakery can be run like a factory for all their locations.

 

If you don't care about someone's experience, then why aren't you just hiring anyone for the position? The fact is, most businesses would rather poach someone with experience from a competitor than train someone to do the job.

Time sheets are used to track peoples time, and if you have a company with multiple lines of business and products or services, you need to track time to bill clients.

LMG does work for hire work (eg produce videos for supermicro), so they would track time spent on that project to bill the client.

Internally they are useful as well, to learn how long processes take for estimating schedules, and tracking costs on projects to determine financial viability. 

[VisibleXela]

4 minutes ago, MrSuperb said:

There is so much speculation all coming from speculation and assumptions from GN.

 

There is plenty things wrong with LMG and LTT, but you people could brought this up countless times. What GN is doing is taking one incident by one of 100 employees of a media company and blowing it up with lots of drama (complaining that they don’t fix videos at the same time, as complaining that they do, because they have tools he has not). It rather have LTT that makes human mistakes, that it owns up to, than a company that avoids public mistakes by all means and loses all humaneness.

Which incident? Billet Labs? The errors in the 4090 review? The 4060 review? The CPU cooler test? Linus' relationship with Noctua? His investment in Framework? Which one is the "one incident," just so I have my facts straight?

 

These are all separate issues, to be sure, and with wildly different consequences and reasons for concern. Some of these I think are straight up blown out of proportion. But saying "you're just pointing out one issue," to me, is the same as saying "I didn't want to watch the Gamers Nexus video so I didn't."

[filpo]

1 minute ago, Legitsu said:

pot meet kettle ... kettle this is pot ... 

Que?

 

Either your break has done something to you or you're speaking a new language

[VisibleXela]

2 minutes ago, dustypaws said:

You're not adding value...

They're a troll, they're not supposed to add value, they're just supposed to make typos.

[Ottoman420]

5 minutes ago, filpo said:

Ah he's back everyone

Pretty sure its Colton or Dennis- Fck you Colton x

[Jignesh Chauhan]

35 minutes ago, joeygreco1985 said:

 

Nope, time sheets are what keeps employers from getting free overtime out of their staff. Time sheets keep BOTH employer and employee honest, and thats the way it should be. 

Fair point on over time, but if time sheets are used for only focus on churning work and book time of time sheets is not productive. Need to encourage quality even if it takes more time to do a task. Even if the task takes more than SLA. It is always a balance. 

[Srishocked]

@LinusTech I am a long term watcher! Joined the clan of LTT viewers when you guys had moved into the Langley house (sorry if I got the name wrong but the one with the videos in the Kitchen ), but I strongly believe that this the moment you as owner (not as the ex-CEO) need to establish that LMG has been always been a "for" the tech community channel which I know you guys to be! The sheer transparency I see in WAN every weekend should be used here to reiterate the steps being taken to address the issues that were raised (irrespective of if they exaggerated or not) in the GN video. It takes a very long time to establish trust but sometimes a shred of doubt can completely change the way the videos are evaluated from now on! The mistakes seen as simple goof ups till now will suddenly become incompetencies and every tiny element of the videos will be very heavily criticised. Although I am not a paying supporter (dollar to rupee conversion here in India is brutal) but this literally is the only channel I wait every night for the video to drop! And strongly believe that guys truly are a for the community company. 

[VisibleXela]

2 minutes ago, Ottoman420 said:

Pretty sure its Colton or Dennis- Fuck you Colton x

Nah, I'm pretty sure both Colton and Dennis are over the age of 14 so it couldn't be them. Linus's son maybe?