Linus's personality - has money changed him?

[Caphenning]

It has, in ways he doesn’t recognize. He failed to recognize where the money comes from. Every last dollar he has made, all the debt he holds, comes from Coltan Slavery. Serving the priveledged for your share of the profits from human suffering has a deleterious effect on a person’s quantum field as it feeds on those that suffer, and it turns people into psychopaths as a result. Humans are prone to psychopathic narcissism anyway, which is why we have chosen this mafia run 7000 year old economy that runs on war and slavery. That’s the basis of most all the mental health issues among humanity.

 

Everyone has the responsibility to do what they can to get humanity through this evolutionary transition, and as Professor Nash proved back in the 50s, “Only when everyone has what they need can anyone achieve their potential.” 
 

By climbing as high as he has in his influence without addressing Coltan Slavery and the multi trillion dollar industry that pays children $1 a day for the Tantalum ore all these products require, Linus has created a quantum physics problem for himself that isn’t easy to get out of.

 

[aaradorn]

Money changes everyone, in this case, I don't think it changed him too much, but he has become quite arrogant, saying that it costs 400 bucks to retest a device, which, to be CLEAR, it was stated multiple times in the video that they were using the wrong GPU, is just too much and is an awful mindset. LTT reviews can destroy a small company like this and they:

1. stated in the video it was improper testing

2. went ahead with those wrong tests anyway

3. Took the results of those wrong tests as the defacto standard of the product

4. told people not to buy it....

I HIGHLY doubt old linus, 2015 or so, would have done the same. 


(This is like putting Diesel in a Ferrari, because that's what you had in the jerry can and you refused to walk 20 meters and grab a gas can, and then complain the engine blew up)

[mikaelus]

Only people who know him could answer but, at the same time, it's clear that popularity (more than money, actually) goes to people's heads. They start to believe they are infallible and can speak about everything. 

 

In that regard Linus is no different than grandstanding celebrity actors who think they can talk about climate change while flying around the world in private jets. You just want to scream at them - "dude! you're popular because you're really good at pretending to be someone else on camera!". It's the same with Youtubers. Popularity in terms of views or subs is not a measure of accuracy, knowledge or competences. It simply shows how many people found the content attractive, that's all.

 

But then Linus (and other reviewers, actually, as all of them are guilty of that to some degree) thinks he can grandstand about everything - how tech companies are run, how they price their products, how some small startup builds their water block - even without proper testing because, bro, HE'S LINUS! HE *KNOWS*

 

No, dude, you just make entertaining tech videos, that's all. 

[Diddlydennis]

I said this so many times before, but people just develop parasocial relationships that are just unhealthy. The Linus we see on screen is not the Linus off screen, it's similar to actors, who are the characters they portray. Sure they have some aspects but overall, they're there to sell a product which is the movie themselves, or in this case the content for LTT and now merch.

 

Do I feel like money has changed Linus, yes I think it has. Not that I agree he's become some Scrooge McDuck but because LTT has become bigger and expensive. I can't imagine the headache and stress to run a company like this now. It's not just him and some buddies living in a house, he has to think of the cost, maintaining and be on the cutting edge of putting videos out against the swarm of tech youtubers.

[Tumwum]

1 hour ago, Diddlydennis said:

I said this so many times before, but people just develop parasocial relationships that are just unhealthy. The Linus we see on screen is not the Linus off screen, it's similar to actors, who are the characters they portray. Sure they have some aspects but overall, they're there to sell a product which is the movie themselves, or in this case the content for LTT and now merch.

 

Do I feel like money has changed Linus, yes I think it has. Not that I agree he's become some Scrooge McDuck but because LTT has become bigger and expensive. I can't imagine the headache and stress to run a company like this now. It's not just him and some buddies living in a house, he has to think of the cost, maintaining and be on the cutting edge of putting videos out against the swarm of tech youtubers.

I agree, i don't want to mix his on-screen personality with his real life personality.  That being said the comments he made on WAN show about retesting costs, I can attribute that Linus to what I assume is the more "real" Linus?

 

Someone on another thread mentioned something very true, why spend $20k on a machine to test something if you don't want to pay a few extra hundred to make sure you're testing something correctly.  It's a very odd way to think, and contradicts the goal you're setting for yourself.

 

As for calling him arrogant, I'm not sure if It's that or just having too many people saying yes to him and not pushing back enough.

 

It's telling that even Luke seems to walk on egg-shells on the wan show at times, if his closest peer / friend DOESN'T LOOK COMFORTABLE talking to him? How can a newish worker push back?

 

At this point, i think Linus should have a large segment on the Wan show about this, and obviously the nexus concerns.  Although it's unlikely to happen.

 

[Alcarin]

Has money changed Linus? Yes. Money changes everyone, no matter what their intentions are. Does not always have to be all doom and gloom though.

 

But in the interest of pursuing a living, running a fully fledged corporation, and getting set up in life, it is beginning to change him in some ways. But compared to many other influencers, the changes have been relatively benign and mild. Relatively... And yes I'm aware of the current controversy.

 

LTT is an influencer platform, first and foremost, and has been for several years. That's the paradigm now, unfortunately.

 

Disclaimer: I don't actively follow LTT politics, as I have more important things to deal with in life. So if there's something else I've missed or overlooked, please let me know.

[throwawayManMode]

He does seem different than he used to be imho. I don't think he even realizes it.

[SomeRandomDude111]

On 8/15/2023 at 11:54 AM, ColonelSupremePizza said:

he can't stand when he isn't getting paid for things he sees that he deserves, like calling Adblock Piracy because people don't want to watch over sexualized gambling ads.

Did you watch his segment on Adblock being piracy at all? He never said not to do it; he simply stated the fact that it is piracy because you are not honouring your end of the agreement by blocking the ad, but that it is up to you whether or not you are okay with it.  

[SomeRandomDude111]

10 hours ago, mikaelus said:

But then Linus (and other reviewers, actually, as all of them are guilty of that to some degree) thinks he can grandstand about everything - how tech companies are run, how they price their products, how some small startup builds their water block - even without proper testing because, bro, HE'S LINUS! HE *KNOWS*

 

No, dude, you just make entertaining tech videos, that's all. 

I mean, to be fair, he has maintained relationships with actual industry professionals for well over a decade by now, so he probably has learned a great deal from them. It certainly also helps that he was a product manager at NCIX in the past, so he also has some unique insight there. 

[dilpickle]

Money doesn't change people. It only brings out their true personality.

[Caphenning]

49 minutes ago, dilpickle said:

Money doesn't change people. It only brings out their true personality.

Kinda true, it is Debt that changes people.

[OneBigBug]

To ask if the money changed him is to ignore all the other potential causes of change.

 

Maybe it's the amount of work (if it's taking a toll on the lower level employees...he's been doing it longer, and probably more), maybe it's the lack of time for personal development, maybe it's the accumulation of reading comments and developing an...inverted parasocial abusive relationship with "the community" where his skin needs to be both super thick, because there's an endless firehose of hate, but also be responsive to feedback. Maybe it's years of having people talk about how great he is and defend him even when he's in the wrong. What do all those mean for someone's ego? And if someone has sacrificed quite a lot of the rest of their life to be successful in business (which he's fairly plain about), then won't their ego lean into financial success? All of these are plausible, and maybe none of them are right.

 

Did the money change him? Probably. It usually does. But I couldn't claim to know, and it doesn't really matter if the money changed him, or something else changed him, or he was always this way and his environment changed. What matters is the position he's in now, and where to go from there. If his content is too much about money stuff, I fairly trust that he'll be able to read that room. Surely if he has professional competence at anything, putting out content that performs is it. But the ego stuff? Where he's clearly (from outward communication alone) taking things as personal attacks and responding emotionally in ways that hurt him, the company, its employees, and the community. I don't think anyone wants that.

 

This whole machine is built on his name, his face, his personality. Unless there's a potentially business-ending sea change away from that fact, he needs to change to avoid these situations in the future. And he should probably change anyway, just because...I mean, I'd want to, in that situation. Wouldn't you? Does it seem like a fun emotional experience to feel attacked, feel like you need to do anything you can to defend against it, no matter how ill advised, and then have to eat crow because of the results? It could be therapy, it could be from dedicating time to directly fostering healthy relationships where he can talk about this stuff with more people, more broadly, it could be from literally just taking more time to gain perspective on everything, and that "his life's work" isn't just "work". Probably all of the above, but whatever the right answer is, I'm sure I don't know the specifics because I don't know the man.

 

Most of us don't have the luxury of doing what is required to meaningfully work on ourselves. Having a boatload of cash can remove a lot of the barriers that stand in the way of that. I don't know if the money changed him, but I hope he uses it in ways that do.