[fartcannon]

Do you trust Linus, though? He often promotes himself as without bias, but he very clearly hates Apple (except the watch). He also loves things he already understands (anything Microsoft). He's got heavy duty fanboyitis. And he's clearly someone you can buy demonstrated by his flip flopping AMD/Intel/NVidia praise.

I don't think he outwardly lies (at least not in a way that matters), or anything, but he's got pretty good soft selling skills which he definitely uses for evil/to make money.

All LMG channels are great. But to me anyways, they're great because they're basically comedies.

[danudey]

As an Apple fanboy, I can easily say that Linus does not hate Apple.

Linus DOES hate a lot of what Apple does; cases where they make things more unrepairable for no real reason, or various socio-political causes (like opposing Right to Repair or unions or whatever).

Regardless of that though, I would trust a Linus review of a new iPhone or iPad a lot more than I would trust a lot of other sites, because I know he's not going in with Apple fanboyism (the way I would, for example), and he gives reasons for all his opinions.

Fundamentally, he always comes across as principled. If he has an opinion he'll tell you, and he'll give you a reason. He'll admit that he was wrong when he (believes he) was wrong. He'll contextualize his thoughts so you can decide if this or that opinion is really relevant to your situation.

As far as I've seen, his AMD/Intel/nvidia opinion changes follow along with the facts. He's pretty PO'ed at Intel for basically just sitting around with their fingers up their asses for however many years, and only actually trying to make good products at good prices (and largely failing) when AMD suddenly stepped everything up.

nvidia makes great video cards, the best on the market, but he's not going to avoid calling them out for shady or anti-consumer business practices. AMD makes great CPUs and good video cards, but if they have a disingenuous benchmark or claim he's going to say something about it.

I dunno, no one is entirely unbiased, but from what I've seen over the years, I can trust Linus more than most other people.

[simondotau]

As an Apple apologist, I also concur with most of the above.

Though I do find it amusing that Linus has often commented negatively on companies that don't want their employes to unionise, when Linus does much the same thing. In the case of LMG, Linus employs emotional threats, publicly warning his employees that forming a union would represent a declaration of "personal failure". Don't get me wrong, I agree 100% with Linus here. Unionising is what you do in response to exploitation, not as a default state of affairs. I just wish he could see the parallel when commenting on other companies which aren't currently unionised.

[Edit: just noticed that this exact point was already discussed to death elsewhere in this sub-thread.]

[usednet]

Unionisation as a default state of affairs is what prevents exploitation. Join a union.

[DubiousPusher]

Not to mention that if you wait to unionize until you are being exploited, you will have far less power to resist coercion. Striking when you have some money under the mattress is a lot easier than doing so after you've eaten the last of the shoe leather.

[simondotau]

Which is great in theory, until you realise that unions can and do exploit workers too. Collectives of people (whether corporations, unions, or entire countries) tend towards corruption as they scale. History has shown that large unions are similarly prone to exploitation and corruption.

[baq]

the choice is between having no negotiating power with HR or having some at the cost of being part of an organization.

[simondotau]

If you're part of a union, you don't gain negotiating power, you trade away individual negotiating power for collective negotiating power. Sometimes this is a good trade. It depends on the context, on the industry, on the sort of work you do.

[mschuster91]

> History has shown that large unions are similarly prone to exploitation and corruption.

Mostly in the US, it seems. Unions in Europe are healthy and effective. The key difference IMO is the interest people show in democracy and holding delegates accountable.

[aaa_aaa]

Here is my experience with "public" unions. When I was working at a public research institute, employees were kind of forced to enter a union. It seemed ok because union's cut was paid by government. Government just wants to look cute to public eye and EU. That union were more or less useless and just collecting huge sums of money. Where does that money goes nobody dares to check. My wife also had to enter a Teacher's union and that is a much larger scam. IMO, Most public unions are parasites living on free government money.

[DubiousPusher]

It's also somwehat moot. Unions in the U.S. get their workers better pay and better benefits pretty much regardless of corruption and did so even at the peak of their influence and corruption.

I think it's reasonable to argue against corruption but if you're argument against almost any human institution is just that it is corrupt, then you are arguing against the majority of human institutions ever. Which simply isn't practical.

[GekkePrutser]

In the Netherlands they've also become corrupted. The big union leaders have become so used to sitting at the executive table that they've lost track of the people they represent. Of course there's exceptions but I feel that they listen to corporate concerns way too much.

But unfortunately the Netherlands is the country with the most Anglo-Saxon model that is still in the EU. So it was bound to happen.

[bigDinosaur]

You also unionise to prevent exploitation, it's not just a reactionary option. Yes, it can get unnecessarily adversarial. We'd be better off if unions were the default but were only adversarial where necessary. I believe countries like Germany do a bit better at this?

[GekkePrutser]

> Unionising is what you do in response to exploitation, not as a default state of affairs.

You're not from France I can tell ;)

But yeah if people in such a small company start organising it means stuff is wrong

[fartcannon]

As someone who loathes Apple, I disagree. But I do agree that there's basically no place to get a trustworthy resource on Apple. Because, for the same reason I don't trust Linus, money is involved.

[simondotau]

It is unreasonable to expect any one source to be consistently reliable. The "trustworthy resource" is multiple sources with diverse views. Combine your LMG diet with some Rene Ritchie, Hoeg Law, etc.

[fartcannon]

Diversify your trust portfolio. I like it.

[AshWolfy]

I think the truth is you cant trust any one reviewer, you should always look at multiple reviewers.

[411111111111111]

Thats was true some time ago, but isn't anymore - for every authentic review you will find hundreds of fake SEO article/comments. This means that by simply increasing n you're basically guaranteed to be less informed.

Welcome to the age of misinformation.

[teh_klev]

> And he's clearly someone you can buy demonstrated by his flip flopping AMD/Intel/NVidia praise.

He gives praise where praise is due, that isn't bias. Many times on the WAN show he's reminded viewers and especially Red/Green/Blue fanboys that none of these companies are your friend. And big deal if he's more productive using Windows than Linux.

I'm in no way defending Linus, there's a bunch of stuff him and another staffer get up to that's utterly cringeworthy. But as to the rest of your comment I think it's your own biases that are playing in your head.

[coldtea]

I think that's a little naive. He's more of an entertainer making money with sponsorships than a reviewer telling hard truths.

Heck, even the Wirecutter, owned by the NYTs, is known to push products based on sponsorships...

[fartcannon]

Maybe, but those WAN show lectures are often starkly mirroerd by strongly worded submarine advertisement playing as segments on his various shows. He basically does a thing, then says that people shouldn't do that. To put it gently, it's exactly what someone with soft sales skills would do. He deflects like a politician. Even if he's wrong, and admitting it, he's very skilled at making it sound like its everyone who was wrong, or he's the hero for admitting it.

Narcissist is probably the word.

Again, I like the shows (well until his rabid fanboyism or petulance comes out). I mostly just don't trust him to review things.

[teh_klev]

> Maybe, but those WAN show lectures are often starkly mirroerd[sic] by strongly worded submarine advertisement playing as segments on his various shows.

Every one of their videos clearly mention who the sponsors are i.e. the "sponsored showcase" videos. And when they're not those types of videos, but just have regular advertising, they say out loud and clear "and this segway's to our sponsor...".

I'm not shilling for the fella but their content is some of the best when it comes to being transparent about who's paying for their videos. He can't risk getting that wrong.

> Narcissist is probably the word.

He's clearly offended you somehow and sometime in the past so why continue to watch their content? If a content creator offended me this much then I'd just walk away.

[hoseja]

The word is "segue", not "segway".

[teh_klev]

I know and realised after it was too late to edit. And I used work in radio and should know better. Sitting here with bright red shame-face :)

[fartcannon]

How do you know what he's saying isn't only half truths? You just trust him. I have seen enough of his behaviour over the years to prefer to see his videos as comedy. That's all.

[teh_klev]

You clearly have an axe to grind and there's no point in me wasting more time discussing this with you. Good night, and good luck.

[fartcannon]

It's just a conversation on the internet, my friend. I thank you for your contribution and apologise if I offended you.

Goodnight and good luck to you too.

[fnimick]

He's also vocally anti-union and actively tried to stop his employees from marketing themselves on personal social media (to stop them from building a following and then leaving, I'm guessing), so I refuse to watch any of his content or support his business in any way now.

[armadsen]

I know this is completely subjective, and his millions of subscribers tell me my opinion is far from ubiquitous, but he's also just straight up obnoxious to me. One of those people whose voice, demeanor, appearance, everything, just immediately turns me off.

[Dracophoenix]

Because he sounds like the stereotype of a Hot Topic-shopping turbonerd c.2002 ? Personally, I find it nostalgic, and even endearing.

[girvo]

I find his semi-rare discussions of 2000s tech nostalgic.

Yes sir, very Atomic. I miss that era.

[p1necone]

Yeah it's kinda awesome to me too. I want to travel back in time and go to a lan party with 16 year old Linus.

[fartcannon]

It seems like he creates a fun environment at the workplace too. I bet they have awesome work parties.

[bigDinosaur]

I think he, personally, is largely entertainment. His company does produce some genuinely useful (as in, not total SEO spam) reviews etc. though.

[teg4n_]

Agreed. I always think of his Amazon go video where thinks he “stole” tampons that were actually pads.

[rhyzomatic]

Do you mind sharing some links to back up these claims?

Just watched a video [0] where he clearly comes across as being pro workers rights, and against passing prop 22 in California. He seems to be generally pro-union while still trying to point out some general issues with them. He also says he would be "offended" if his employees unionized at LMG, which while maybe is a bit stupid to say, I don't think counts as anti-union.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpyiNOD-MOk

[bradlys]

People should also understand why he said he would be offended. He would be offended because it meant they didn’t talk to him and work with him - and that he did such a bad job as a manager that they decided to unionize.

He’s pro-union - he just hopes he is a good enough boss that his employees don’t feel like they need to unionize. He clarified his viewpoint in later videos. Offended was probably not the best choice of word - and he admits that too. I don’t recall the video but someone can find it. (I’m on mobile and on vacation - idk why I’m even here)

[9935c101ab17a66]

Anyone who is truly “pro-union” would recognize that seeing yourself as a good manager/boss doesn’t mean you don’t take advantage of your employees. Furthermore, there is ALWAYS a power dynamic at play that makes it difficult for individuals to speak up about their concerns or ideas for improving working conditions — even “nice” managers will disagree or see certain things as pointless / unnecessary / frivolous. Not to mention, Linus is both the owner AND the manager of LMG, making the relationship between employer / employee even more complex and unbalanced.

Unions are a tool to give individual workers more leverage in negotiations that almost always favour employers / managers.

A side note: Linus could be a great day-to-day manager, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t a bad “ceo” if that’s what he calls himself. He can be incredibly personable and kind and supportive, but also have unreasonable expectations about work hours, employee’s social media activities, compensation, etc.

[freemint]

Do you have a source for the work hours? I had the impression that he very much tries to not ask for more then he pays for. Do you have a source that the compensations at LTT are somehow unreasonable?

As for not having a YouTube channel, i find that a reasonable demand for employees of a company running YouTube channels. They are allowed to do game streaming stream on Twitch and stuff like that.

[fartcannon]

Pro-union but would be offended if his employees made a union?

That's the kinda double speak I'm talking about.

[bradlys]

It’s really not. People tend to only form unions when they feel that they’re being unjustly treated and this is one of their last resorts.

[fartcannon]

If you're pro-something, surly you'd want people to do it?

[framapotari]

This is an extremely American -- and misinformed -- view of unions. Where I'm from unions are the default, not formed as a last resort to unjust treatment but a natural counterbalance to corporate/institutional power.

Someone saying they'd rather not have their workers form a union is not pro-union. That's like saying you support workers sharing information but you would be offended if your workers talked about their salaries because that would infer that they don't trust you to be fair.

[junkieradio]

I watch one of his employees stream on twitch, I found out about his channel from a Linus tech tips video, I don't think your second claim is all that true.

[fartcannon]

I googled it and there's this. I'm not sure if it's what OP is talking about or not. Here you go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bTHSwBZVNI

[nighthawk454]

a lot of LMG employees have personal social media and either YouTube or Twitch streams, often getting viewers from fans of their persona on LMG videos. I think the issue is only with competing content and/or leveraging the LMG platform. For example, if an employee started a GPU review channel and called it out in an LMG video, like ok yeah probably not. More like non-compete than some draconian restrictions

[fartcannon]

Ah, that's pretty brutal. Thanks for the information I will keep that in mind. Seems less funny now. :/

[dx034]

Honestly, I would expect that from him as CEO. He only makes money off people watching the channel and subscription numbers are hugely important. Any efforts by employees to gain subscribers for their channels could dilute visitor numbers and subscribers to LMG. And obviously he doesn't want to create competition.

In the end he's still a CEO and the others are his employees, not his friends. For that, he doesn't appear to be a terrible boss.

[normaler]

Can you elaborate in the anti-union thing? I can't seem to find anyone discussing this.

[p1necone]

> flip flopping AMD/Intel/NVidia praise

This is a silly take. Tech evolves and companies release more than one product at a time. It would be weird if LTT /didn't/ have "flip-flopping" takes on various companies.

[fartcannon]

I disagree that it's silly. I think that's unfairly dismissive of a valid point when he is paid money to advertise for those companies and we are discussing the validity of his reviews of that equipment.

[dhzhzjsbevs]

It's silly because it isn't a valid point. Linus flip flopping on those brands is precisely why he isn't suffering from fanboyitis.

It's kind of rediculous to claim he's a fanboy in one sentence then claim he's just a shill in the next when the evidence contradicts your first statement.

[fartcannon]

Well, again, I disagree. It's ridiculous to see a behaviour with your own eyes and then choose to believe it's the opposite.

[dhzhzjsbevs]

What behavior exactly? Got receipts?

Because from what I see he's both called Intel on it's bullshit and still worked with them on a professional level.

Same for amd.

As for apple, they funded a whole new Apple channel without Linus precisely because he knows he couldn't be unbias.

[fartcannon]

Yes, and I agree that you can see those actions as being contrary to my proposed scenario. I sort of see them as evidence in the other direction, but it's good to hear it said out loud. Makes good food for thought.

[criley2]

LTT makes almost all of it's money from floatplane, youtube premium, and youtube advertisements. The "deals" they work with companies are almost entirely outside of the product space they review.

This mud-slinging idea you continue to push (with zero evidence) is contrary to their financials and directly contrary to their business model.

Why on earth would Linus leverage his entire business in debt to buy a huge facility to produce hardware reviews if that would mean "his sponsors" (your salacious claim) would abandon him or force him to change?

It literally doesn't make sense. If they were truly bought and paid for and producing faux-content that is actually advertising, they would have legitimately zero need to spend millions of dollars on hardware testing labs.

[hoseja]

>LTT makes almost all of it's money from floatplane, youtube premium, and youtube advertisements

In the recent video they did on their most profitable videos Linus explicitly said money from YouTube is only a small fraction of their revenue. I don't imagine Floatplane is much of a profit centre either...

[criley2]

Linus did a video on how much money they make from youtube premium/ads and the numbers can get as high as $50k-$100k/video for their most popular streams. It's not nothing. Floatplane is profitable because it's a subscription based system, and that's where the money always is. Hence patreon.

[hoseja]

For a company with 50 employees, that is really not all that much.

[freemint]

Oh LTT also sells a lot of expensive but high quality merch.

[fartcannon]

Salacious is a bit of a salicous word for doubting their reviewer credibility.

I get it. You disagree with me. I hope you are right because he's got quite a bit of power these days.

[teh_klev]

> I hope you are right because he's got quite a bit of power these days.

Oh c'mon. The guy is just a YouTube celeb like hundreds of others and easily disposable, what is this "power" he wields?

[fartcannon]

On the most recent wan show, his fans located and harassed an ex employee of the new facility he bought because he was mildly perturbed over the state of the building. That's some unchecked power.

[criley2]

Salacious is an eminently accurate word for your string of source-less comments describing your feelings about their advertisements under the guise of actual accusations of wrongdoing.

I don't "disagree with you", I dismiss you. I provided an accurate description of their financials and incentives and demonstrated that your salacious claims literally don't make sense.

This is good and normal! We should always dismiss peoples feelings especially when they directly contradict all available evidence. However, I happily await your evidence demonstrating that Linus has been corrupted by a hardware partner into producing devious advertising! We'd all love for you to back your claims up.

[fartcannon]

Now you're just being rude.

[p1necone]

LTT very clearly demarcates which videos are sponsored and which are not.

[fartcannon]

How do you know that that's everything? It's just taking their word.

[p1necone]

Do you have even an ounce of evidence? You're being ridiculous.

You can't just sling mud baselessly and expect people to take you seriously.

[DominoTree]

How do I know your comments aren't being sponsored by a rival YouTube channel?

[fartcannon]

You don't. But if I said, "I'm not being sponsored by a rival YouTube channel" would you just go ahead and believe me? What if I also linked to a bunch of videos from a rival YouTube channel while repeating that I'm not sponsored by them.

[p1necone]

Not having bias doesn't mean not having an opinion on things. It's a review channel, it doesn't work unless he "likes" some things and "hates" others, as long as he elaborates on the /reasons/ for those opinions.

[fartcannon]

Well, no, it would work way better if he had no bias. Otherwise you have to trust that he's aware of his bias and is somehow capable of separating his opinion from reality. Otherwise how does it help anyone make a financial choice?

I like the show(s). They're fun. But I don't use them to determine which CPU to buy or whatever. Their opinion changes depending on who is sponsoring them, no?

[kadoban]

> Their opinion changes depending on who is sponsoring them, no?

No, to the extent humanly possible. They have reviews, which are not sponsored by anyone having anything to do with the product being reviewed. Those are their actual opinions and evaluations of products.

Separately they have sponsored showcase videos, or whatever they call them, where they won't say anything untrue, but they're just showing off whatever it is, not really evaluating it deeply. These videos are _very_ obviously different, and very obviously labelled.

LTT has top tier policies and openness about these issues compared to really anyone on youtube or anywhere.

More anecdotally, I've seen them give takes on previous or current sponsors that were _very_ not in their financial best interests. If sponsors are paying for easy coverage, they're not getting their money's worth.

> Well, no, it would work way better if he had no bias.

That would just be lying. There are no humans without biases.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-zt57TWkTF4 is probably a good summary on Linus's thoughts on sponsors/funding. If you trust what he says or not is up to you. I do though.

[fartcannon]

Like, not to be dismissive, but how do you know? Talk is cheap.

Edit: thanks for the link to the video.

[kadoban]

Same way anyone knows anything, really. I look at what they've said, look at their actions and decided if they matched. You can tell that they genuinely want and try to do good.

Certainly feel free to evaluate differently for yourself.

I watch a lot of their content. Mostly it's just fun, but I do trust them to have pretty good takes on things when I'm considering buying something as well.

I do always check others though, mostly for the real gritty details that LTT doesn't usually focus on. I'm hoping that their Labs project starts providing a lot more of those too.

[fartcannon]

Thanks, I have and that is where my original position comes from. Got some good alternative perspectives today though. Interesting to hear the same thing as evidence of either position.

My fav part of the channel is the rest of the team. One thing you can't fault Linus for is his ability to hire entertaining characters and promote a fun environment. That is a great skill. There's at least 5 other people there who could be YouTube empires all on their own.

[crummy]

Are there reviewers you would recommend without any biases at all?

[jamiek88]

It’s pretty much impossible for humans to be unbiased. All we can do is work around it like with double blind experiments for example.

[fartcannon]

No. :(

[klausjensen]

As somebody who has followed Linus for the last couple of years, I have to say I deeply disagree with your conclusion about hating apple and being for sale.

He is not without flaws, but I think he is fair, balanced and very well-intentioned.