What started as criticism over errors in recent YouTube videos has escalated into allegations of sexual harassment, prompting the company to hire an outside investigator.

Linus Media Group CEO Terren Tong also responded via email, saying he was “shocked at the allegations and the company described” in Reeve’s posts. He went on to note that “as part of this process, beyond an internal review we will also be hiring an outside investigator to look into the allegations and will commit to publish the findings and implementing any corrective actions that may arise because of this.”

unscholarly_source, (edited )

Wow quick and decisive action by CEO to call in external investigation. Reading Linus’ response, it doesn’t even appear that he would consider external investigation. He states that HR would conduct a thorough review. I’ll be frank, I don’t trust Colton to run the HR review.

I bet once this issue is resolved, we might see Terren bring in external subject matter experts to completely overhaul LMG business operations. HR consultants, Operations and Logistics consultants, Finance, etc. Up until now, LMG was/is run by a self-taught/self-made/learning-on-the-job crew. Can’t do that when you’re now a corp.

Edit: I would love to sub to a channel called TBT (Terren Business Tips) 😂

HughJanus,

Up until now, LMG was/is run by a self-taught/self-made/learning-on-the-job crew. Can’t do that when you’re now a corp.

Linus hired an experienced CEO who, I’m sure started these kind of discussions of creating a cohesive work environment several months ago.

unscholarly_source,

Correction to my original comment: up until 7 weeks ago…

But while I’m sure discussions have been started, having been exposed to new leadership in my experience, it does take a while before new leadership can really roll out required changes. Most of the time spent in the first 30-60 days is to listen and understand the lay of the land (which Terren also mentioned). But even then, grave issues like the ones Madison called out usually won’t be known to new leadership until later, unless a report/exposure is made (like what Madison did).

HughJanus,

Most of the time spent in the first 30-60 days is to listen and understand the lay of the land

I heard the smart thing is to walk in the front door, “let that sink in”, and then immediately burn everything you just inherited to the ground 😅

unscholarly_source,

LMAO

Now I’m just trying to imagine Terren walking into LMG with a sink 😂

steakmeout,

You mean Linus hired the amoral cowboy he learned from.

Vinnyboiler,
@Vinnyboiler@feddit.uk avatar

Realisticly he was brought in last month so he wouldn’t have had time to properly analyse the corporate side of the company. Right now this is the best time or a fresh face on the top who could create change from the top down where these kind of discussions now has real weight behind them.

I think the best way to discourage misogyny is to suspend Linus who would be looked at as the source of it for 30 days and demote Colton who failed in his duties to protect every employee at LMG. Get someone outside LMG to manage Human Resources. Maybe one day that trust might return.

HughJanus,

Realisticly he was brought in last month so he wouldn’t have had time to properly analyse the corporate side of the company.

I understand that. The person I replied to said “up until now” and I pointed out that that wasn’t true as of a couple of months ago.

OsrsNeedsF2P,

Gen Zers speedrunning why big corporations have the structures they have

dot20,

Are you suggesting that Linus Sebastian, age 36, is somehow a Gen Zer?

Casmael,

Not just gen z - genzzzzzzsponsored by this vidéos sponsor - Tim’s Big Ol’ Shovels. Are you in process of or thinking about renovating your garden? Tim’s Big Ol’ Shovels is your go-to one stop shop for all your shovellin’ needs. Have you recently dug a hole for yourself so big you might need a step ladder to get out? I doubt Tim’s Big Ol’ Shovels can help with that, but they sure can make things a whole lot worse by selling you a bigger shovel so you can go ahead and keep on makin that hole a hole lot deeper. Tim’s Big Ol’ Shovels aren’t messing about, with their patented composite handle weight is always on your side. And with drop forged hardened steel components, no hole is too deep to keep on diggin. Try Tim’s Big Ol’ Shovels today and get 25% off your first shovel with code ‘help’ in their online store.

JokeDeity,

Bro, everyone on Lemmy is highly autistic, they can’t understand jokes. You get my worthless upvote.

Casmael,

Thanks and praise be to the JokeDeity 🙏

unscholarly_source,

Are you okay?

isVeryLoud,

They glitched, just give em a reboot and they’ll be fresh again.

unscholarly_source,

Ah yes, how could I forget the age old and time-tested restart trick.

isVeryLoud,

Percussive maintenance sometimes works too

gravitas_deficiency,

You know that a cultural and organizational happy medium somewhere between LMG’s YOLO approach and IBM exists, right? It’s not a binary XOR.

JokeDeity,

Americans view everything in binary, it’s either right or wrong, no other variables exist.

randomname01,

I’ll be frank, I don’t trust Colton to run the HR review.

Exactly lol, he seems like the type of dude who closes ranks and thereby perpetuates the culture of misogyny.

Also, and this might just be negative halo effect, but he just gives off really weird vibes to me - but that’s verging into needlessly speculative territory.

Tangentism,

he seems like the type of dude who closes ranks and thereby perpetuates the culture of misogyny.

Perfect for HR then!

randomname01,

Lmaooooooo

shiveyarbles,

Say no more, you’re hired! You had us at closing ranks

Deceptichum,
Deceptichum avatar

Oh yeah, let’s jump to thinking people are creeps because of the way they look.

You’re clearly coming at this from a mature and well thought out area, not one of sexism and abuse.

randomname01, (edited )

It’s the other way around; I think the vibe is weird when I see him in videos and I feel like he is weird in interpersonal interactions. He seems pretty awkward and not the best at expressing himself. But at the same time I can admit that my judgement might be unfairly influenced by his looks.

I don’t think he’s weird because of how he looks, but at the same time I need to acknowledge that there’s a chance his looks do affect my impression of him and how he interacts.

Deceptichum,
Deceptichum avatar

So you're judging a guy for "acting weirdly"?

Oh wow, huge improvement.

And adding your own little disclaimer at the end like "Sorry to poison the well, it's just my biases in action but I'm going to share it with others in hopes more people can attack this man for nothing but it's also not something you should do" doesn't make it better; Admitting your problem and still doing it isn't a solution, it just makes you look like a bigger arse because you know you shouldn't yet have decided to.

randomname01,

You do make a fair point, but I want to emphasise I absolutely wasn’t trying to get anyone to attack him. That’s just a logical leap you made.

As for me judging him for how he acts, it’s the sort of awkward behaviour I’ve seen from dudes who did turn out to not be too swell. But idk, it is true that it’s just speculation and you’re right in calling me out for it being based on too little.

Kecessa,

Not to say Colton can’t do the job, but HR is a department that needs to be independent of all other departments and the voice of the HR manager needs to be considered more important than the voice of most of the other managers because they’re the ones dealing with the humans that make the company.

unscholarly_source,

Oh exactly, he oversees many functions that are traditionally held by separate people. You can’t juggle those functions in parallel without degradation in quality and proper oversight… Which seems to be the theme over the past couple of days…

MotoAsh,

It is HIGHLY silly to even imply these woes are from a, “learn-on-the-job” crew/etc.

Many of the allegations are about basic factual information being wrong and a terrible work environment.

Those DO NOT naturally show up in any ol’ little work environment. They show up when there’s a lack of professionalism and basic respect for fellow humans.

AssholeDestroyer,

This reminds me of sexual misconduct allegations in the electronic music scene. When EDM blew up it elevated a bunch of basement dwelling computer nerds to rock star status. Musicians like Datsik and Bassnectar let that status go to their heads and immediately abused it.

MotoAsh,

At least if it’s popularity based like with an artist, people are directly supporting them.

It always blows my mind when fcking business dipshts start acting like rock stars. Yea, money’s attractive to some, but nothing like musical talent! Those f*cking goobers.

unscholarly_source,

Of course, there are many “learn-on-the-job” organizations that have gone forward and done amazing things.

However, while I agree that these issues don’t naturally manifest themselves and stem from unprofessionalism and basic respect, I would argue that specialists and professionals in those functions (HR, Finance, Ops, etc) can help establish policies that mitigates and discourages such behaviors. If people can’t do that voluntarily, then policies and consequences are enacted to enforce it.

This is why many companies (and I’ve worked in a few in the tens/hundred thousands of employees) have clear business conduct guideline policies and enforcement, because people who lack professionalism and basic respect for fellow humans are actually quite prevalent in any and every company. I’ve witnessed a few myself that led to immediate termination of my colleagues.

MotoAsh,

Oh I agree in that all those things help. I just want to push back against the idea that this is expected in a small business. It should not be.

This only happens when unqualified people become the boss of too many others. Regardless of the sequence of events, unqualified people are in charge of far, far too many businesses.

unscholarly_source,

If I implied that this was expected in a small business, I apologize as that wasn’t my intended message. I was referring to the current maturity of LMG. LMG is worth $100M, with 100+ employees, putting it in the midsize business category.

And in that league and above, it is not just expected, but required. The stakes are just too high for an unstructured/informal approach to running the business, which is what LMG is learning/about to learn, hopefully.

The sad thing is that many orgs go through these exact transitional problems, the only difference is that LMG is under the scrutinizing lens of the internet.

squaresinger,

I’ve seen the exact same thing on a company that went from 5 to 50 employees in a similarly short time frame.

The issue happens if you start with a friend group without decent structures or leadership “because we are friends/anyway”. This works if you got 5 people but it doesn’t if you have 50 or 150. Because you don’t just have friends who are enthusiastic about the mission there, but you have to fill the ranks with people who actually want to treat this like a job. Now the “bro” culture starts to fall apart.

With this size you start to get real issues at work that need to be handled with a correct structure, which you don’t have because senior management still feels this is just a startup full of bros.

Bros don’t mind working 60 or even 80h/week, every week, because of the mission. Employees do mind. So now you have a workload designed for 60h/week per employee that is shouldered by a 40h/week employee. So either they work 60h (probably without compensation for the overtime) or they cut corners and deliver crap quality.

Same with the way people interact with each other. Bros don’t mind some rough jokes, but employees usually don’t like it that much if their real concerns get brushed aside with the suggestion to maybe “calm your tits”.

When going from startup to real company, you need to make big changes to the structure and work culture. If you don’t, an LMG ensues.

MotoAsh, (edited )

I’m still not a fan of speaking as if these are small business problems. They ARE NOT “small business” problems. It is a problem of failed management, full stop, regardless of how common or explanable it is.

Yea, startups and groups of “bros” are highly likely to mess things up in this way, but again… It’s a basic lack of professionalism and respect for others. That shouldn’t be accepted as “bro culture”. It’s being an immature twat.

galloog1,

Management is a part of that business and as all small businesses grow they hit a point where they deal with this. It’s extremely well documented.

PerCarita,

Precisely! I’ve seen many startups in Berlin that had to fold because they didn’t realise soon enough that they can’t run a company the same way as organising a group of friends. That, and that products have to make a profit sooner rather than later…

steakmeout,

Also, and this is key, Linus comes from the boom PC hardware market of the late 90s and early to mid 2000s. He learned at the feet of amoral cowboys in an industry that was peaking right before critical mass. He has only seen bad behaviour rewarded and bad actors escaping consequences. And he grew a brand based on being an irresponsible kid who would say literally anything to get views. As authentic as he may seem remember what he learned and how he learned and most importantly who from. His CEO is one of those amoral cowboys.

galloog1,

That culture comes from a lack of process and experience of large organizations. The second that a team grows beyond 7 people it has grown beyond the direct control of any one person and the culture takes on a life of it’s own. If not addressed early in growth, issues typically spiral and are either not caught or are allowed to exist out of a perceived necessity.

Small organizations are nimble so they do not need to formalize cultural and HR processes in the same way that large organizations do. If the leader sees something they don’t like, they address it. It isn’t just about basic respect. We all bring our own cultural issues to an organization. A lack of professionalism comes hand in hand with smaller creative organizations. That’s what makes them entertaining. It also enables the toxic tendencies of some people as they are allowed to slip in and as the pressure builds. Don’t confuse professionalism with respect.

These things don’t happen immediately either. It happens over time as people get tired and impatient so they are not on their best behavior. We all go through a storming process. That’s when toxic culture can set in if good lower level leadership doesn’t catch and address it. That takes training and a formal approach to organizational structure, not just production processes.

I am one of those outside consultants.

theroz,

Well said. I’m not sure I believe this former employee either. I read the “reasons they left,” and it’s simply too unbelievable. It sounds like more of a personal cry for help than a legitimate accusation. The more I read, the more buzzwords for media I saw. And every community is reacting as those buzzwords intend.

June,

Her entire story rings very true for my experience at a tech startup that grew from 50 employees to 500 in 3 years. It was 100% believable for me.

theroz,

Me too, though I’m not female. I’ve seen some of my female friends treated poorly - by clients, though, never my org. I just don’t think it happened to this person. The fact that, well, they’ll share the whole story to the world right now - but never told anyone else while it was occurring? Seems sketch. Doesn’t jive.

That whole notion of, “I was embarrassed and couldn’t tell anyone” to suddenly pronouncing accusations to the whole world over social media; as opposed to the legal authorities… seems damned sketchy to me.

PerCarita,

Look, Madison probably talked to someone about it while it was occurring, but we’re not part of her personal support group. We don’t have that privilege and that’s ok

theroz,

But we’re privy to the rest of the rant? HR or the local authorities should have been the first step. Not waiting [duration] and then shitposting.

Weak.

PerCarita,

You’d be surprised how many women don’t come forward with harassment, sexual harassment, even sexual assault cases. We often think, unfortunately, that the system is not on our side. It’s not weakness, more like mistrust and fear of being re-victimised.

Countsheep,

lol what? This just sounds like ignorance to me.

It’s hard for individuals to speak up by themselves, yet we all assume we would in the same situation. This seems like a simple “Gamers Nexus says something and noted complaints by some workers of a bad environment, so now I feel I can say it without more harassment”

Did we all forgot a kid killed himself from the harassment LMG fanboys brought on them?

galloog1,

I honestly think that it doesn’t matter what we think. Perception is reality for inside the organization and outside. Let the external investigation take place. Implement policies moving forward to protect the employees, leadership, and organizational perception.

theroz,

It absolutely matters. The employee chose to take accusations public, rather than following appropriate channels of either the corporate HR or legal authorities. I don’t know how it works up there in Canada, but these accusations get taken seriously in the U.S.

adrian783,

corp HR is not your friend, especially in a toxic workplace. HR or the lack thereof is what enables a toxic workplace.

if you can’t understand a victim just want it to blow over and never have to think about it again. then you’re either severely lacking in imagination, or empathy, or both.

theroz,

So I guess Madison just isn’t a strong person then.

abraxas,

I’m not sure I believe this former employee either. I read the “reasons they left,” and it’s simply too unbelievable

Statements from actual victims often do. That’s part of the problem with the culture of not believing, or even alienating, victims. I’m not saying it should be treated as evidence against the company, but the company absolutely should make sure this believe is not happening internally and those of us on the outside should be charitable towards this former employee’s testimony unless contradictory evidence shows up.

Using the Depp/Heard thing as a point of reference. There were good reasons to suspect her claims were fabricated or exaggerated, but I’ve also known people who have gone through many of the relationship experiences she testified about. Until she had her day in court and showed the world her (probable) dishonesty, even she deserved the benefit of charity. Or else by sheer misfortune we will start telling real victims they made it up.

theroz,

Yeah. It just seems far too fabricated. For someone who is willing to share their life on social media, it seems very strange that they wouldn’t have told a single person they know about it. Then, all of a sudden, other accusations arise and - oh yeah, look at all the things that happened to me! Too many things to never have been mentioned.

abraxas,

You understand that people who are victims of abuse, especially sexual abuse, are often afraid to come out, to tell anyone? What you are calling evidence of being fabricated is a symptom of abuse, and people who are trained to understand and report on those types of abuse are also trained to do so from victims who will go so far as to deny it had ever happened.

For your own benefit, please read this National Domestic Violence Hotline article on exactly why people’s loved ones never share that they have had situations worse than Reeve alleged. Yes, it’s about domestic abuse and not workplace abuse, but it is the same type of trauma and helplessness.

theroz,

All of this just solidifies, in my mind and those who can think critically outside of a herd mentality, that this is fabrication. The accusations made didn’t happen in a family behind closed doors, they happened out in the open. Do we think that the LTT facilities don’t have cameras covering every square inch? Get with it. They record everything, I’m sure. This person didn’t go to the police because there probably isn’t anything to go to the police about.

Unless we’re all to believe that everything that happened was in the one place where cameras never went, every single time? That none of it occurred on any kind of technology that would or could be audited, right?

Use your brain brochacho. These are the fabrications of someone who is mentally unstable. Not of a victim. Unless… a victim of their own mind.

abraxas,

Wow. You’re giving off some heavy misogyny vibes right now accusing me of having a herd mentality for pointing out actual symptoms of actual problems. We’re not even talking about the LTT accusation anymore, but about specific behaviors you used to decide that she was probably lying. That is the shit that makes people afraid to tell anyone when they are abused.

Do we think that the LTT facilities don’t have cameras covering every square inch?

I’ve worked at some big paranoid companies, cameras everywhere (full lockdown, fwiw), that have dealt with abuse issues. My own boss was stuck in a toxic environment regarding another coworker for MONTHS before she got the courage to speak up and deal with it. Guess what. The cameras don’t do much when a large part of the abuse is verbal and the abusive moments are just that - moments.

Thing that made me feel like shit? I witnessed some of it, and took it as consenxual because she wasn’t saying anything about it. I was young, dumb, and raised to have the same mindset you’re showing me right now.

That none of it occurred on any kind of technology that would or could be audited, right?

Not sure. I’m using Reid’s Principle of Credulity at this point and time. Should evidence come out she is lying, I will stop giving her the benefit of a respectful response. The presence of cameras at LTT’s office is not that. People are abused in front of, or around, cameras all the bloody time.

Use your brain brochacho. These are the fabrications of someone who is mentally unstable. Not of a victim. Unless… a victim of their own mind.

I’m going to give this to you straight. I’ve heard someone say basically the same thing with the same attitude about a domestic abuser. Then the “lying” victim was hospitalized. If you had lived that life experience, would you act that way?

theroz,

As a side note, I’m in the tech world for a career. Predominantly male. Perhaps predominately white, though I can’t speak to those statistics - the environment is more diverse every day. That said, I met a friend back in 2015. She’s smart, eloquent, and overall extremely talented. I’ve seen her get passed over for promotions; I’ve seen clients engage her unfairly, by making statements like, “are you getting the engineer?” Because they were expecting a man. Anyway, a lot of us in our inner circle suspected her boyfriend of physically harming her. For years. But there was never any concrete evidence. After 8 or 9 years of friendship for me, perhaps 12 or 13 for others in our circle, she cut off all contact with us. She sent a message saying, “I can’t talk to any of you, it’s not right. You are all married and I’m engaged.” She never spoke to us again. This was about 6 months ago.

Said circle, also, is not all male. 3 males, 2 or 3 female, plus spouses. One trans man and his wife. Pretty diverse in all aspects.

So anyway, 2 months ago she up and quits her job. Straight up leaves. No exit interview, no reason, nothing.

I am about 99.99% sure that she’s in some kind of mentally abusive relationship. Her boyfriend had control over her when she was at work with us. We gave her opportunities to tell us. She chose her path.

It saddens me often when I think about it. But it doesn’t affect my opinion on this LTT story…

theroz,

Bottom line, beyond any contestation - the right thing to do would have been to report it to the the correct authorities; not us.

That they didn’t, alone, is enough to completely discredit the entire story. To claim ignorance, in 2023, of what should have been done is just bullshit.

What happens, then, when the storm blows over and this is all proven to be false? Are ya’ll gonna come back here and admit you were wrong? Going to start following LTT again? Nah, the herd has left and moved on. Ya’ll will pretend to be enthused by the delivery of the dude at Gamer’s Nexus, despite his content being less thrilling than simply reading the spec sheet. (Just saying, his delivery is terrible, though I respect the channel.)

If it comes out that this was all a lie, it might just be too late.

abraxas,

Bottom line, beyond any contestation - the right thing to do would have been to report it to the the correct authorities; not us.

You actually think that’s easy? And how do you know she didn’t, and that they didn’t just say the same shit you did? There’s a LOT of documentation of authorities in some areas (and Az is one of those) not taking those types of complaints seriously enough, especially when made against a person of power. There’s literally been a huge outcry about it.

But more importantly, that’s why most people who finally admit to being abused don’t do so to the authorities. They do so to friends, or yes, a public forum. You’re telling me that IF this is true and IF this is actually her responding as many/most victims do, it’s still her fault?

And if it actually happened and she finally got the courage to say it, why exactly should those who care enough to follow her NOT be made aware of it?

What happens, then, when the storm blows over and this is all proven to be false?

With that attitude, it WILL be proven to be false regardless of the facts.

Are ya’ll gonna come back here and admit you were wrong?

Wrong to give the potential victim the benefit of credulity? FUCK no. I hope she’s lying because it means she wasn’t abused, but I’m not going to add to the abuse by denying her life experience. I’m not saying we should globally cancel LTT. I’m saying we shouldn’t cancel HER, like you seem to be doing.

If it comes out that this was all a lie, it might just be too late.

You really have more sympathy for a corporate machine with their ability to hire professional troubleshooters for bad press, than a person who might have been highly abused by that corporate machine? Well there’s the disconnect.

Let me make this clear. If LTT is destroyed by her coming out, that’s on **their ** failure to be a business that can prove itself safe for workers. Note the word “prove”. If they did everything right, they would have mountains of structure and evidence to support that they are a safe environment, not people coming out of every little crack recounting consistent stories about them. If they do everything right moving forward, they change this from being a toxicity issue to an HR issue and whether or not you believe it actually happened they make sure it can’t ever happen again.

theroz,

You really have more sympathy for a corporate machine

This tells me everything I need to know about you.

No matter what I say, you’ll never contest a single point; and we will never have any middle ground. So engaging with you will be a waste of time.

Crashumbc,

Toxic environments can also be brought in by toxic leadership. Like a VP that intentionally pissed workers off because “they work harder”

squaresinger,

My sister once worked for a guy who’s management strategy was “Employees should be so unhappy that they are close to quitting but just content enough to not quit.”

He thought, that way he’d get the most value out of the employees.

Needless to say, his business wasn’t going well because all employees were pissed all the time and that’s not a good thing when they all have to work with customers. Also, the turnover was really high. But the boss didn’t really notice.

galloog1,

Absolutely! The training I bring up is for the leadership at all levels. The fun challenge as a consultant is to make changes to the people who are paying you without being fired. It can be frustrating but also really rewarding when it works out.

unscholarly_source,

I need to learn how you do it… I’m not in a position or authority to bring in people of your expertise to my leadership, so trying to make changes in my org without getting fired…

galloog1,

Honestly, you fail a lot before you learn where the line is. You frame the training as industry best practice with a certification that they can sell. You frame them going to the training as leading the organization through it and from the front. You then let them learn and put their own spin on it during the instruction.

The real trick is getting them to think it was their idea. Start with a quantified problem statement. Your recommendations to address the problem should come with multiple courses of action that they can choose from. It helps if these COAs are framed as beneficial to the organization outside of addressing the issue. As long as they accept that the problem exists, they should address it. If your preferred COA has other organizational benefits, they’ll pick it and align behind their decision with resources.

Go look up some industry certifications and congrats, you can now be a (lower level) consultant. Congrats

unscholarly_source,

Post saved. Thank you

corvaxL,

From what I can tell, LMG has, for some time, run HR through an outside firm (in the leaked meeting audio, he mentions this firm multiple times), so he’s probably referring to them rather than Colton.

UmbrellAssassin,

So it isn’t an external audit. They work for him.

unscholarly_source,

Yeah I’ve recently come across the same understanding… In my management career I’ve never worked with a third party HR, so I don’t know how effective that model is.

killa44,

It is useful for parts of HR like properly filing tax forms, employee leave requests, onboarding/off boarding, etc. Basically they can handle paperwork type things, but are generally not so great at conflict resolution and culture type things.

finthechat,
finthechat avatar

Out of the loop, can someone give me a tl;dr on who this guy is why I keep seeing this everywhere?

sverit,

knowyourmeme.com/…/gamers-nexus-vs-linus-tech-tip…

ExoMonk,

This is my best summary, it is long so sorry about that but there’s a lot to it.

Linus is probably the largest tech youtuber there is.

He’s been rapidly expanding his company, building out a full lab that is trying to rigorously test products (mostly in an automated way) so that consumers can have confidence that a $50 power supply isn’t going to shit the bed, or that this GPU will get you the same performance in these games at this resolution so save your money, etc.

The initial controversy is that they have issue with the automated testing where results were often super wrong and that slipped it’s way to multiple videos and instead of taking the videos down and correcting them, they left them up and just had a little text graphic over the video with the correction. Many youtubers do that kind of post video correction, but LTT does it a lot. Additionally they tested an $800 prototype watercooler on a 4090 when it was built only for a 3090ti which pretty much invalidates the entire test, but they still gave a conclusion that the watercooler sucked and was a bad product. That could tank that company. They did not bother re-testing with the proper GPU because Linus felt no one should buy an $800 watercooler block anyway. Additionally(x2) they reviewed a mouse and said it was terrible because the glide was really bad. Turns out there were protective stickers on the mouse feet that needed to be removed. They took multiple days to correct the video and by that point the damage was done.

The second controversy is around a Madison (former employee) where she received tons of verbal abuse, degradation, from various LMG employees/management and some even sexual harassment. There was a lot of hand-waving of her raising those complaints as “causing drama” and to “calm your tits” and other various things. She suffered a lot mentally from it and even “cut her own leg” just to go to the ER to have a day off. Her write up is pretty long and fairly brutal.

I think a large part of the issue is everyone is incredibly overworked at that company and crunching every day to release as much content as possible which leads to a fuck ton of errors, very heated and emotionally charged employees and lack of oversight over serious issues. Couple that with rapid expansion of employees without a functional HR (I think someone was hired recently) and the vast majority of people effectively “learning on the job” how to be a manager, director, leader, etc. and it’s just an explosion waiting to happen. And it has exploded quite spectacularly.

I’ll be curious to see if they turn it around and also what comes from the outside investigation.

SquishyPandaDev,
@SquishyPandaDev@yiffit.net avatar

Large tech reviewer. Runs his own company called Linus Media Group (LMG). Called out another review channel called Gamer Nexus(GN). GN hit back with a video detailing gross inaccuracies in LMG published test results. For example outliers of 300%. This has opened the flood gates for people to remind the Internet what a horrific company LMG has been for many years. Basically LMG glorifies the grind mindset and promote the typical hostile work environment that is the epitome of startups

sab,
sab avatar

He's some guy who had a YouTube channel talking about computers and stuff. His channel got very popular, to the point where he started hiring people to produce more content. Suddenly he was running a company, and had a lot of influence over the market.

With great power comes great responsibility and all that. Apparently he made some videos with factual errors, and didn't do much to fix these issues. This can really hurt people trying to sell their product, and resulted in the current drama.

That's literally all I know, but I think it gets the gist of it. They made some effort highlighting products I appreciate a couple of times (Fairphone and PineBook), and I thought they did a good enough job with that.

520, (edited )

Linus Sebastian is a YouTube tech guru that rose to prominence in the last few years with his channel, Linus Tech Tips, and has created something of an enterprise around his content called Linus Media Group

More recently his work has become somewhat...sloppy, with errors here and there, recommended practices ignored on the odd occasion, but nothing so big as to cause anyone major damage. Linus has a default PR mode for when these issues come about, and it usually worked...

Until last month.

Last month, Linus reviewed a prototype of an all new type of water-cooling block (basically a replacement for a fan that can be way more efficient) for GPUs. This block was expensive, and expensive to make, but by all reasonable measures, has a very good cooling impact to show for it. It was made by a startup firm of two people, and they sent Linus a prototype with a supported GPU.

The GPU ended up disappearing into the aether, and Linus opted to use an unsupported GPU to test the cooling block, which resulted in inferior cooling performance. Linus ended up trashing the block in his review.

He then went and auctioned off the prototype without the knowledge of the manufacturer, only offering to make them whole once it had already been auctioned off.

Linus tried to deal with it in his usual PR way, once Gamers Nexus started reporting on the goings on. But these weren't small errors, these were the mother of all PC tech journalistic fuckups, and he refused to acknowledge them as such. That is not only enough to get someone immediately fired, it's enough to get them industry-blacklisted.

It's gotten so bad that the CEO and CFO of Linus Media Group have come out directly and thrown Linus under the bus for his fuckery.

And that's before we come on to the topic of this post, the SA allegations...

Edit: minor name corrections.

Tangentism,

He then went and auctioned off the prototype without the knowledge of the manufacturer, only offering to make them whole once it had already been auctioned off.

There’s a few bits more around this that have come to light that makes it even worse…

The manufacturer emailed asking for the cooling block to be returned as it was their only prototype and LMG said they would return it, with the manufacturer chasing several times before LMG admitted that they had auctioned it off for charity.

They only offered compensation once the situation had been revealed in that expose video the other day.

520,

The way I see it, this could well be a career ender for Linus. He gets his hands on novel, unreleased hardware, and then he botches the review and gives it to the highest bidder. Potentially a competing company.

No one is going to trust him with their pre-release hardware ever again after this.

Heck, if this was any reasonably sized company, I suspect we'd already be hearing about lawsuit settlements of significant sums of cash.

Tangentism,

Its definitely going to wipe out any standing he has with others in the industry: he gave a scathing review about a prototype that they had failed to correctly install, despite clear instructions with a compatible GPU card sent to them. Add that to the constant incorrect and misinformation that is often caught in post production with on-screen corrections

It seems that allure of increasing revenue streams with a ridiculous production turnaround had a direct impact on their quality and integrity and now with the allegations that Madison has come forward with, it would appear the rot had set in long before it was noticeable to external parties.

Its going to play out over the next week or so whether LMG is in a death spiral.

520,

Yeah...any one of these issues would be bad enough...the whole trifecta does not bode well at all for Linus.

Fades,

These YouTube companies almost always end up like this. Reminds me of the rooster teeth shit

killa44,

Which time? lmao

moitoi,

The more I read about LMG, the more the structure of the company looks like a mob.

There is one guy with his wife at the top of the pyramid. The CEO and others are below. If the top of the pyramid has what it ask for, nobody will care about what’s happening.

ipkpjersi,

That’s how a lot of small businesses operate, unfortunately.

echodot,

That’s how companies are structured. What you want staff to be higher up the chain of command and CEOs I’m not quite sure what you’re asking for

Misconduct,

I mean… Yeah? CEOs suck if you’ve been paying attention. Most “chains of command” are just privileged people with connections. Then you have the lower management (let’s be real fuck middle management they’re almost always useless) and workers doing the actual labor and making the least. That always feels stupid to me 🤷‍♀️

whereisk,

“we hired”: there’s going to be the findings they tell management, the report with the findings management allows them to add, and the findings that management tells us about.

This means nothing until you hear independently from the employees themselves about substantive changes.

shiveyarbles,

I don’t watch his videos, or frankly any YouTube or Twitch or whatever… it seems like he is just a regular guy with faults, and people are projecting sainthood on him. Maybe he’s a bit of an ahole, just like you and me.

Infinity187, (edited )

Wow, that’s a huge assertion coming from someone who does not watch YouTube or knows nothing about the guy in question.

Edit: Also, YouTube is a place where many go to look up information from trusted sources. Many content creators on YouTube rely on putting out good quality content to make a living. What used to be a great source of information back in 2012 (speaking about Linus Tech Tips), has turned into a money grab, which puts quantity over quality to make money, thus feeding end users erroneous data and steering said users to bad decisions.

icepuncher69,

This situation is awfull and, i mean, i know sexual harasement is very serious and its really insensitive to joke about but i really cant help it, so if you are sensible to that type of comments then dont read it and feel free to downvote, ill understeand, so here i go, you have been warned:

Linus sex tips.

Milk_SDF_Possum,
@Milk_SDF_Possum@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

Thanks. Though you don’t need to tell oversensitive people to not be offended as they’ll be offended anyways.

jossbo,
@jossbo@lemmy.ml avatar

Don’t be so sensitive then, it’s just a joke!

HRDS_654,

Easy as.

Dalinar,

I can’t believe you said that

Milk_SDF_Possum,
@Milk_SDF_Possum@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

I can believe.

squaresinger,

Do you believe?

7heo, (edited )
@7heo@lemmy.ml avatar

expired

ComradePorkRoll,

Believen’t.

squaresinger,

I find your lack of faith disturbing.

Milk_SDF_Possum,
@Milk_SDF_Possum@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

I believe I do believe.

kilgore_trout,

An essay of a premise for a three-word joke, this is the only way forward.

eestileib,

People like you?

dylanTheDeveloper,
@dylanTheDeveloper@lemmy.world avatar

Linus give us a sex tip

Saneless,

Is it safe to say if the dude in the video wasn’t passively crapping on HUB and GN this would never have happened?

Empricorn,

What are you talking about; is your brain broken!? Them throwing shade at established testing sources has nothing to do with allegations of sexual harassment! That’s not how causation works…

Or are you one of those “she’s lying!” people that never believes women, despite the fact that 81% of US women experience sexual assault/harassment in their lifetime? Glad their new CEO is taking this more seriously than people like you…

KyuubiNoKitsune,

No, but the comments by their staff that op was referring to stoked the fire that created all the exposure and I imagine prompted her to come forward too.

Saneless,

Exactly. Thanks for getting it

echodot,

Jesus Christ you’ve got a problem. You’re picking fights which aren’t there.

You have to admit the timing is interesting. Why come forward now, perhaps, if it is true, she never would have felt comfortable coming forward unless she felt that there was public support. I literally think that is the only point the comment was making, and here you are, going off the rails accusing somebody of not caring. That is absolutely not what I read from the comment.

Saneless,

Thank you

I care a lot about this shit. I make damn sure I’m not toxic at work. Especially around women. I’ve worked as a minority as a man on teams and they are absolutely always just bracing for some dude to be a shithead to them. It’s just constantly in the back of their heads, if not the front

I’ve been a part of a sexual harassment investigation as a witness to someone’s terrible treatment and I hope my testimony helped get the guy ultimately fired.

It’s something we all have to be good about and speak up about

Saneless,

What in the god damned milky way are you going on about?

Linus’s dude shitting on GN about testing -> GN responding with a very thorough takedown of how bad they are with their mistakes, largely because they focus on content quantity even though the employees all say they’re too fast and kinda burned out on it -> People chat around how LTT is probably a bad place to work and Linus doesn’t care about employees -> Madison sees that the narrative of a bad LTT workplace being accepted and it is a good time to bring up her terrible experience with a very good chance she’ll be listened to this time

That’s it. The original comment in LTT’s video set it in motion. And if Steve never responded I seriously doubt we’d be at a place where people would be talking about how employees there are treated.

But please, continue on with the insults, I’m sure in your not-broken brain it all makes sense.

phillaholic,

Probably not. All the issues were there, someone would have pointed it out for some reason at some point.

AngryAnusHornets,

I dont understand why this needed to be pointed out. LTT was always a joke, but somewhat mindlessly entertaining. I didn’t know he was meant to be taken seriously, I thought he was in on how horribly flawed everything he puts out is.

phillaholic,

imo it’s the natural outcome of the kind of growth they’ve experienced while not putting significant effort into using outside consultants or hires to get their corporate structure right.

echodot,

I think the problem was the lab idea. When they started going along the lab idea I did feel like it was not really there area of expertise and I thought it was odd that other companies were so interested. In order for the lab results to be trustworthy the company has to be far more open and professional than LTT really is. They probably have to allow external auditors to come in and have a look from time to time which wasn’t something they really seem to account for.

Like don’t get me wrong, it’s a great idea and it’s probably something the world needs, but I wouldn’t have thought that they were the people to carry it out. I’ve always seen LTT as Top Gear but with computers.

spuncertv, (edited )

GN probably would’ve done it anyway. He is not completely in the right because as unbiased as he wants to be, at the end of the day, he is still criticizing a competitor. I doubt those comments actually prompted his response. They had a lot of examples in their video and have probably been compiling it for a while.

Edit: I mean to say that criticizing a competitor can damage your reputation. I think GN was entirely justified in creating the video. The point I was trying to make is that, after the backpack warranties scandal, Steve basically came out saying that they would be paying closer attention to LMG’s credibility. So I think this video would’ve come out eventually regardless of whether or not staff at LMG made those remarks about GN.

Ilandar,

He is not completely in the right because as unbiased as he wants to be, at the end of the day, he is still criticizing a competitor.

You can use this to question whether his motives are pure, but suggesting he is “not completely in the right” is just weird. He is well within his rights to criticise a competitor. Absolutely nothing wrong with that.

spuncertv,

I agree. I worded my initial comment poorly. I just meant that it can be damaging to your own reputation to criticize competitors. GN is completely in the right.

Dubious_Fart,

Yes, how dare he criticize a competitor in the hopes of making them a better competitor

What unassailable logic.

spuncertv,

I worded my original comment poorly. It can be bad for your reputation to criticize a competitor, but GN was completely right to make this video. It just has a lot of potential to backfire.

lowleveldata,

So it’s basically wrong to criticize a competitor?

spuncertv,

I worded that poorly. In general it is not in your best interest to criticize a competitor. GN was absolutely right to make that video, I’m just saying that due to them being competitors, it has more potential to backfire.

AssholeDestroyer,

Steve pointed out that most of the errors were caught by himself and not addressed previously. I’d imagine with their previously close ties that the GN crew planned on reaching out privately, but after being thrown under the bus they decided to go full on ass blast.

spuncertv,

My point was that Steve has probably been keeping these examples on hand for a while, because he seemed pretty skeptical of the ethics at LMG after the backpack scandal. At most, I think the comments from LMG might have pushed GN to release that video sooner than they had originally planned.

SpacetimeMachine,

GN gave LMG a rope to pull them up with so they could be better, LMG tied it into a noose and hung themselves. GN did pretty much exactly the right thing to allow LMG to improve themselves.

spuncertv,

True, Linus is absolutely terrible at handling criticism. Dude needs to just lets himself cool off for 24 hours and have some people read things before he posts and it wouldn’t have become such a mess.

HRDS_654,

I mean they were already starting the process of changing things, though not as much as they should have. In reality LTT should have started restructuring years ago to account for their bigger size. If they had started around 2021 the allegations probably could have been avoided. Unfortunately hindsight is 20/20 so they are stuck with the consequences of past mistakes and being reactive, an almost always worst position to be in, instead of proactive. I really do hope that everyone emerges on the other side of this okay, and by everyone I do mean the victims as well, provided the allegations are true.

NSA_Server_04,

Hope we can get some more memes out of Linus now that he’s more useless.

spiderkle,

no matter what happened…It’s definitely not the best idea to advertise how you shut down production for over 100 people over something that could have been done through the proper and existing channels…it screams narcissist.

unscholarly_source,

Seems like every mistake Linus makes he gets called a narcissist. If he sneezes do we call him a narcissist?

Production needed to shut down for various valid reasons.

  • with 15+ million subscribers across however many channels, not everyone might be in the loop. They have to be informed. This is evident with constant posts asking what’s going on.
  • the current and existing channels are not working, and require a review. You need to shut down production to fully assess the problem.
  • if production didn’t shut down, I bet he would be called a narcissist for continuing to release videos.

Linus fucked up. Bad. But I don’t envy his fame. Everything he does, whether right or wrong, if damn if he does, damn if he doesn’t. Let him and Terren have the time to try to fix it.

Oha,
@Oha@lemmy.ohaa.xyz avatar

That escalated quickly

TBi,

It really feels like the pitchforks are out. People want blood and don’t care if the allegations are true or not.

Probably mistakes were made, hopefully just innocent mistakes or bad communication. But it really feels like people don’t care. They see LTT doing well and want to tear them down, even if bringing LTT down will be bad for everyone.

I’ve had a disgruntled employee before. Their version of events was very different to how the rest of the team saw it. If something innocent could have been taken badly it was. I’m not saying that happened here. But let’s investigate and presume innocence.

phillaholic,

How many times are you going to give them the benefit of doubt?

TBi,

Honestly getting close to not hinging any more. But will see how it goes. I like the content and am hoping the truth has a nuance that we are missing. Let’s see.

puppy,

I like the content

Huh, you like wrong and misleading data then. Hmm ok.

Girtablulu,

Yep, this is and was always when something came up with LTT, people going ape shit, with no clue and do not care but they emotional believe

elouboub,
elouboub avatar

The reactions are so... reddit-ey:

I always knew it

I fee so gratified

It's what I've been saying all along

and all that stuff.

arefx, (edited )

Its human nature not exclusive to reddit. You guys sure love talking about that place.

shiveyarbles,

That sounds exactly like what a Redditor would say

just_a_peasant,

I knew it all along.

lapommedeterre,

I feel so gratified

unscholarly_source,

It’s what I’ve been saying all along

Rambi,

And my axe!

Rose,

It’s almost as if we’re on a platform that imitates it.

TBi,

Feels like the pitchforks are out. People want blood and don’t care if the allegations are true or not.

SpeakinTelnet,
@SpeakinTelnet@sh.itjust.works avatar

LTT is down, the community has made clear what they expected and they’ve acknowledged it. It’s time to let them grow and recover from the situation.

People who are just looking at a reason to hate on them and fuel their anger are just gonna be left behind once everyone moves forward without them.

monkeyman512,

I think an important thing people forget is even if they hate Linus, there are a lot of other people who work there that will be negatively impacted if LTT is “burnt to the ground”. I am hoping they step up, take the criticism professionaly and improve. Anything else is a major disappointment.

Duamerthrax,

No one today plans on staying with their company for 20+ years. Every working adult should have an exit strategy for any job from day one.

If the allegations are true, even more so if you’re working at LTT. If they’re competent, they’ll find another job.

kilgore_trout,

If they’re competent, they’ll find another job.

Ironically, one of the things Madison claims is that it was said to her that her coworkers could afford that, while she could not.

I don’t believe you ever suddenly lost your job.

Duamerthrax,

And that’s a huge red flag. If they thought so low of her work, they would have fired her.

Duamerthrax,

Did I claim to? I’m looking at the pattern followed by people who jumped ship from Channel Awesome and Rooster Teeth.

kilgore_trout,

I am the one claiming that if it happened to you once, you’d have a different opinion.

Duamerthrax,

Are we obligated to support a company they we dont like just because they’re “job creators”?

ProvableGecko,

Yeah, what are the chances that a company mismanaged by a bunch of incompetent unrepentant techbros also fostered a culture of sexual harassment?

oldlamps,

Are we even living in the same reality? Tech bros? They’re a bunch of goofy nerds.

Ilandar,

Are these labels mutually exclusive?

OonTaaKissa,
OonTaaKissa avatar

People are leaning into the hate circlejerk way too hard, apart from the forum rant they have handled this situation pretty well. They addressed GN's concerns in their apology video by improving their workflows and communication, and are now hiring an investigator for Madison's claims. I can't really think of anything more that they could do, but I guess some people just want to be mad.

AssholeDestroyer,

They already did the damage. If someone steals something from me and slanders my name, I’m still going to be mad after they say sorry.

SloppyPuppy,

I thought people loved LTT. Theres only hatred now in the internet.

I really like LTT. All the stuff about mistakes and inaccuracies dont feel that bad to me personally and I feel like LTT would be in a better place regarding accuracy and testing after this.

Regarding the sell of the cooling system, yeah its bad. But I do believe it was a miscommunication and mismanagement within LTT. And int that case at least money can solve it.

Regarding the sexual harassments or “sexually bad environment” yeah this is really bad. I do attribute this to their male dominant eviornent. All those little sexual jokes are so fucking lame and really belong to the distant past of history. They behave like they are 16. The fact that they dont have women in the front of as presenters really shows they are all so sexist. Or at least the one at the top. I do hope justice will be done and everyone accountable gets the proper punishment. And I hope that after this the company will finally grow up and realize they can be still funny and with high quality without the need to oppress women.

I want to keep having fun and getting informed from LTT and i hope they can solve all that.

No pitchforks and no hatred.

Afrazzle,

I thought most people stopped liking LTT years ago after they started going full corpo.

SloppyPuppy,

Why so many people watch them then? And put a lot of time into watching them…. Literally 4 hours of a podcast

Appoxo,
@Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Arent the most refugees from reddit? M That would explain why so many being the culture with them.

SkyNTP,

Yes and no. Only a fraction of Redditors migrated, and that fraction is overrepresented by people who care about privacy, ethical business models, community projects and stewardship. And we’ve seen that the Lemmy discussions have been a lot more humane and productive.

I myself have remained pretty silent through this entire LMG saga. Maybe I represent a silent majority? Or maybe just a few? It’s time to put down the pitchforks. The company has responded, let’s wait and see what comes of it. At the end of the day, vote with your wallets. The LMG fanbase is starting to move out of “concerned citizenry” territory and into “self perpetuating angry mob” territory.

Appoxo,
@Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Agreed. I will stay subbed (for now) and see what comes from it.

oldlamps,

I think you’re right about the silent majority. This whole amplifying rage over thing is wild to see in real time. It’s scary how many people have Internet brain rot, check these ratios on most any push back to the rabid behaviour.

mctoasterson,

I have made very few posts to Lemmy but a recent one was a neutral-ish post saying that I liked the Madison videos etc. but I’m also not jumping to boycott LTT based on the testimony of one person and also a YouTube expose. The responses I got were negative and I was also told not to “deadname” another creator… who I wager nobody would know who I am talking about if I used that name.

Long story short, the comparisons to reddit seem downright charitable so far. Pitchfork brigade bullshit. How about having a nuanced opinion on literally any topic? Or is the average Lemmy user a sanctimonious 19 year old basement socialist?

Polar,

Hopefully Madison isn’t making shit up, or she’s in for a world of hurt. Serious allegations like that won’t be taken lightly.

thisfro,

That’s one of the reasons why she is probably not making things up. And also all the hate she’s getting for speaking out.

stratoscaster,

Yeah she was already getting death threats, not much of a reason to lie given the rabbid fanbase

FoxBJK,
@FoxBJK@midwest.social avatar

Comments like these are exactly why people don’t come forward, or take years to do so.

jimmydoreisalefty,

Watched YT vid, not looking good for LTT.

Looks like a PR response politians make, with sponsors and store shoutout, just like any other video they post…

Hopefully the pressure keeps coming and LMG workers start a union, a the minimum.

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