From the majority of the team, this is a pretty good and textbook PR mea culpa. "Here's how we screwed up, here's how we're fixing it."
The pushing the merch was tone-deaf and the defensive whining from Linus was NOT on-point, though. I appreciate it ended with "how I'm going to fix it," but he should keep the defensive shit to himself.
Glad to see this video, even with some of the drawbacks mentioned in the comments. I think everyone needs a path to redemption and LMG should get a chance. I think that this “reflection” should be more regular. LMG is no longer a small company and like it or not, they need to regularly be ahead of these situations. I really hope that they will take a week ever month or two to review any new screw ups and remedy them. Process will not solve everything, ensuring a company culture that has key values will triump process. It takes time however. I wish them the best.
I run a small company, at what size do I need to start worrying about treating people respectfully? My belief is companies shouldn’t get a pass, no matter the size. Why are we ok with it happening at all at this point? It’s not 1960 anymore.
I was referring to what was stated in the video. The issues with poor benchmarking and the billetlabs issue (email sent to the wrong recipient). I am not sure why you think any of it implied that it is ok to treat people without respect if the organisation is below a certain size. I was referring to ensuring that a company culture of being humble, responsible and accountable via a monthly or bi monthly review. It could have potentially caught the issue with billetlabs and even several issues with the benchmarking. This is perhaps easier done in a small company but needs to be nurtured and reinforced in a bigger one. I hope my position is more clear.
EDIT: did not know about the allegations from the former employee and it just saddens me. I was only aware of the cooling block and it’s auctioning when I wrote this.
This thread you made is cringe. Grow tf up and try to have some understanding for once in a while.
Big corporations will always pull fake apologies and complain that consumers are beligerent little hotheads who’s opinion doesn’t matter in the long run. You’re proving their point right now.
But if say LTT actually does pull out of this amicably and their words are followed by prompt action that remedies the situation, we can in turn look at Intel, AMD, Nvidia and the likes and say “see? That’s how it’s done”.
As tech jesus himself said in his expose video is that we all make mistakes.
Do not attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity, and the way LMG has been working has been stupid.
Don’t give the bastards an inch, I understand. But let us be clear about who the bastards are and I still don’t think LMG has gone over to the side of evil.
Now they’re stepping back, taking the time to make amens (I hope they really give that company they shafted a much needed boost for instance, as a bare minimum) and we should be here for that.
If you’re just here to whine, fine. But don’t think you’re adding to the conversation or saying anything meaningful, because you are in fact just trolling.
Again, try and have some understanding. It’s very important for us to do that, because secterianism and feudes will in the end hurt the community, and also the consumer, because we have to stay on top of this.
They definitely have a default description set. Bitching about that kind of small detail is pointless when there are plenty of more serious things to talk about.
How about the multiple merch plugs in the video itself or that the video was monetized, in direct contrast to the original video from GN not being monetized?
On YouTube, creators don’t earn anything unless a new video is released frequently. They have to sustain a huge corporation based on that. I think that it’s a bad decision to go for that income structure in the first place, but there they are.
They don't "have" to do anything. LMG chose to hire dozens and then hundreds of people in an effort to grow as fast as possible. Linus could have prioritized accuracy or quality over quantity, but that would have made less money, so he didn't.
Not entirely sure what you mean. Are you saying we should criticize YouTube for making the algorithm that creators have to cater to, and not LMG for bowing to the demands of that algorithm?
If so, I agree that YouTube should be criticized, but that doesn't excuse LMG. Plenty of other channels have chosen not to go all-in on quantity and they have likely suffered financially for that decision. That is exactly what I mean by "priorities".
Their priorities are keeping their people fed. Honestly, it doesn't seem unreasonable, especially considering that they said that they're going to likely end up taking a week off or longer before the next video, which will hurt their ranking in YouTube's promotion algorithm.
It’s possible to release videos frequently while not rushing the production for each video. They’ll just need more editors and writers to spread the load. e.g. instead of 3 teams working on 3 videos in parallel and rushing them to finish in 3 days, they can have 6 teams working on 6 videos in 6 days to achieve similar output (releasing 1 video per day) without overworking the team while keeping the attention of detail high. GN even mentioned it in their video. LTT has over 100 full time employees already, so they definitely have the resource to scale up their production team.
They chose to financially put themselves in a situation where they are forced to release content at that frequency because they chose to expand operations and drastically increase expenses compared to other channels. It’s their decisions that created the work cycle that is needed in pursuit of exponential growth over a more financially sustainable model that affords the luxury for a less hectic release schedule.
It’s getting old seeing people keep making they have to do it this way when it is the situation they created for themselves.
Not trying to make excuses for them, I just think that picking on a low hanging fruit like the description which is more or less exactly the same for every video, feels a bit cheap to me. There are plenty of examples of them being in the wrong with far worse impact than that.
Perhaps, but I see it as indicative of the problem in general. A slapdash attitude where they don’t pause for a second to consider what they’re actually doing, which, you’d think they might try and do under a 20 minute video where they grovel and scrape and beg forgiveness.
100% this. Whoever is in charge of uploads is almost definitely using a macro to auto-fill every description. If you look, the description credits the intro/outro music which weren't even used in this video at all.
Most YT channels do this, very few big channels actually put anything besides their own links in descriptions.
Their action was to monetize the apology video, which is especially funny after Gamers Nexus explicitely didn't monetize their video. They advertised their shop and floatplane and teased a new product. Just incredible.
I loved LMG and watched their videos for years, but if you are going to put out false or exaggerated data knowingly, or auction off a one of a kind prototype, would pass me off but I might tune in from time to time for the entertainment.
But if you are called out on this and instead of trying to do the right thing you double down and even straight up lie to try to make a case where you aren’t the bad guy, then I am done with LMG channels as I can not support a company with this clown.
In fairness, they would have been absolutely stupid to have not done a 100% prewritten, teleprompted PR riddled pre-written response given the situation. Linus sitting down in front of a camera and just letting his mind do Linus things isn't gonna help anyone lol.
How many takes do you think each of them needed before they all managed to look at the camera while talking, read the script appropriately, and move their head and hands enthusiastically?
Believe it or not, I think he has a point and isn’t at all a hypocrite. He’d show you how to pirate and torrent stuff (and has before) while also telling you he doesn’t recommend stealing. What he was saying is that the content isn’t meant to be free. The ads pay for the content. So not watching ads means the producer doesn’t get paid. Its a soft form of piracy but he wasn’t telling you what to do about that. He just said “Be aware you’re not giving people anything for their content”. I don’t know why thats controversial, he’s not even suggesting its illegal or even immoral. I never understood the arguments here but I also dont visit twitter
I do not block ads. I however use Privacy Badger to block tracking cookies, which means that I don’t see ads. I will see all ads that are not tracking me, which seems to be none. Is protecting my privacy also piracy?
It is, yes. It’s a separate conversation of if it should be illegal or immoral to keep your privacy this way. But as long as you are violating the intended method of revenue for the content you’re viewing, that’s piracy to me.
I think most people hear piracy and think it’s immoral or illegal, but there are very valid reasons to pirate content such as game and movie preservation.
The implicit contract is to show an ad for a service, but they are actually violating the contract by attaching other things to the ads. They then use the ads to steal information that they then sell without my consent. So, if anything we are discussing honor amongst thieves.
It’s not like you see the ads that have trackers, they get blocked. So it’s still part of the agreement sort of. And you’re also aware that it’s revenue for them. People assume it’s a moral argument, it’s not. You can pirate from absolutely evil people, but it’s still piracy. That’s why I don’t view it as worth arguing over for the most part. I WANT people to realize that it’s piracy but that they’re actually doing something ethical.
Yup, illegal does not mean immoral or unethical. It just means some rich or powerful person doesn’t like what you’re doing. There’s a lot of overlap, of course. Many illegal acts are also immoral or unethical. But it’s not a 100% overlapping Venn diagram. Also YT is kind of evil, so it’s piracy against an evil corporation as much as the content creator. The smarter content creators have sponsors and embedded ads and don’t rely on YT for anything.
Piracy I associate as an illegal act that carries penalties of fines and imprisonment. Like real piracy…
As blocking is legal and something even the FBI recommends. This is more a website shortcoming than an act of piracy. Which if blocking ads is piracy then at that point the word just becomes diluted, and at that point who even cares.
Which if blocking ads is piracy then at that point the word just becomes diluted, and at that point who even cares.
Isn't "taking something without paying" what piracy is? With YouTube, the "payment" is your time spent watching an ad. If you bypass that "payment", are you not effectively pirating the content?
It doesn't seem that diluted to me. I actually agree with Linus's take that adblocking is piracy. It's just a much more socially and legally-acceptable form of piracy.
If anything, I feel like adblocking on YouTube does even more direct damage to content creators than pirating blockbuster movies does to movie studios, honestly. If ten thousand people pirate a new Marvel movie, Disney's not going to hurt too bad from that. But if ten thousand people adblock a YouTuber, that can significantly hurt their income by damaging their ad impression ranking. Advertisers on YouTube set their rates based on the engagement they get from a channel, and drops in engagement will typically result in drops in CPM.
It's the reason I pay for YouTube Premium, myself. I use YouTube pretty much all day long, and I want the creators whose content I spend my day watching to get paid for their work. And if not for YTP, I would 100% be adblocking YouTube, otherwise.
No, taking something without paying is theft. Piracy has many definitions, but none of them that simple.
-Robbery or other serious acts of violence committed at sea.
-The hijacking of an airplane.
-Copyright or patent infringement.
-The illegal interception or use of radio or television signals.
-An instance of piracy.
-In geology, that process whereby, because of a higher natural gradient, and therefore more efficient eroding power, one stream cuts back a divide and taps off the head-waters or a tributary of another stream. The captured stream usually turns a sharp angle into its new course and leaves a wind-gap where it formerly flowed. Also called stream-piracy.
-Robbery upon the sea; robbery by pirates; the practice of robbing on the high seas.
-Literary theft; any unauthorized appropriation of the mental or artistic conceptions or productions of another; specifically, an infringement of the law of copyright.
I would say no, because that's broadcast in real time to everybody, literally over the air. YouTube is on-demand. Just because they're both video formats doesn't make them fully comparable.
I think a more apt real-life comparison would be to video rental stores; for a small cost, you have the right to view the video for a short time. But you're still not supposed to just take videos without paying for them, even if you're bringing them back and not making copies to share.
It’s not illegal to look away from a billboard or to close my eyes during a trailer at the movies, which seems more akin to using an adblocker in a browser.
That’s a whole lot of words for what in the end is not piracy with no laws being broken. There’s a difference between a moral argument and law breaking.
Lots of piracy is also not breaking the law. Copyright violations are illegal, but that involves making copies, which you don’t do when you stream a movie from a pirate site. It’s the site provider that is breaking the law, not the viewer at the other end.
In the end it doesn’t matter if you call it freeloading, piracy or whatever. You can twist the definitions of those words any way you want. What matters is that the content provider isn’t getting paid.
Yeah, I feel now it is out that he is a narcissist and it just feels so obvious. He is gaslighting everyone and people try to clean up after him, that’s just symptomatic. He won’t change, he will maybe get managed better by the people around him to reduce the damage. But there isn’t anything else to hope for.
Just recently a creator I watch talked about how YouTubers sometimes create drama between each other to gain more relevance. Then they go for drinks together. Is this the case here? No way to realistically know for sure.
Probably not from Gamers Nexus’ side of things. Their video is very professional, and focuses on the damage done to other companies featured on the channel, and challenges LTT and LMG to be more professional. They also said in their followup that they won’t be making any more videos on the topic, their goal was to raise awareness, and now it’s LTT’s responsibility to decide what to change, if anything. Is LTT playing it up as drama? Maybe, but I think it’s more likely that they want it treated as drama rather than legitimate criticism so that they can ignore it and move on, rather than to increase attention/ relevance.
I don’t think Gamers Nexus would do something like that, they have a good history of calling out companies for bullshit they try and pull. doing that would damage their reputation.
Calling out the integrity of a channel after that channels spent millions trying to shed the perception of them as just an entertainment channel as opposed to a trustworthy and reliable review channel by investing in the lab? Who comes off here thinking LTT is even more trustworthy when it comes to their reviews which weren’t trusted in the community to begin with.
If this were just some personality driven non tech recommending channel I could agree, but LTT is a channel reviewing hardware like Intel and amd to name a few alongside their wacky lets build a teleporting PC. There’s just some channels where hits to reputation would hurt them as opposed to help.
It feels like we need an extra level of aggregation for posts. It would be great if all posts for a certain topic could be grouped together. Maybe hashtags or something.
Yeah it’s honestly very strange that they don’t implement a proper tag system, i can’t imagine it would be difficult (like bro it’s an extra array for every post) and it would give a ton of flexibility to the ecosystem.
Kbin supports hashtags (and I included a few when I posted this), but there's no filtering option yet (that I'm aware of, at least), so it's still mostly just for discovery purposes.
People did move here from reddit after all. That’s why I recommend apps like lemmy connect on Android with keyword filtering. You can’t control what people post, but you can regain control by controlling what you see.
I did, and disagree with you completely. You don’t have to be so pesimistic about life and look for the worst things in it. They wanted to lighten a mood a bit, maybe it didn’t land well for you but It don’t see any ill intentions behind it.
Btw, how would dbrand know they’re making this video? I doubt LMG reached out to them and told them, wouldn’t make any sense.
Relax. So they made some mistakes. Cringe mistakes that could easily be avoidable (a lot like much of my life has been). Either they do better in the future or they die. People are getting so upset and enraged it looks like this is something that matters. They are still fun, I like them. Im rooting for them to improve!
Other than the Madison Reeves post I just read, I am completely out of the loop on the LTT controversy. That said, I made it about 1/3 of the way through the video before I had to stop it. I know very little about these guys but that video is infuriating.
Short and sweet summary as called out by Gamers Nexus:
Testing methodology sux and results are not sanity checked, thereby misleading consumers.
If errors are caught, they are corrected poorly and acknowledged with asterisks or in description, which does not put enough of a spotlight on it.
Trashing on a small company (billet labs) that makes dope coolers for performing poorly due to improper testing and not retesting because "I don’t wanna spend 500 bucks"
Not returning the prototype which was sent to them by billet labs for testing and AUCTIONING IT OFF (allegedly to a potential competitor) at LTX.
I don't know, Linus is still trying to excuse and justify. It would seem taking him out of the driver's seat was the right call. As for the rest, they are responding because their backs are against the wall. Time will tell if they will really make any changes.
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