The Problem with Linus Tech Tips: Accuracy, Ethics, and Responsibility
I originally posted this on lemmy.world, but then the instance went down again so fuck it, moving my c/videos subscription to here and restarting this post
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Maybe just me but I've been really tired of Linus for like... years now. Typical youtuber clickbait thumbnail open mouth faced bullshit.
Jesus Christ
https://i.imgur.com/nKxiZh4.png
I need to gag.
No idea how they expect to be taken seriously with these thumbnails and titles.
He's said before that he hates it, but including one of those thumbnails boosts viewership by 30%. I certainly don't like it, but it would be really hard for me to resist that extra income too.
This is the issue this is all about. Linus doesn't care about quality. Just about extra income. Clickbait thumbnails, rushed content that comes in quantity rather than quality, refusal to even invest 500 Dollar into redoing a utterly mistake of the video, no care to auction of stuff that don't belong to them - this is all coming from the same place, and which is why the thumbnails and titles are so bad. They are an indicator of the rest.
Money at the cost of credibility though, not a good long-term strategy.
Steve at GN and also Level1Techs kind of do the same thing a little bit, but not enough to turn me off from their content. It also helps that their content is accurate.
It's been that way for years. I had to stop watching shortly after they moved out of that first house when they stopped putting product names into video titles.
Is this really any better? Or this? Or this?
Put face on thumbnail, big text to sell subject, have some goofy reaction shot. It's not really an exception here.
It's a bit better, but admittably not that much. We're not picking teams here, where you either pick Gamers Nexus or Linus as Gods.
I'd rather have a thumbnail without the face of the person (unless it really matters) and only the subject matter at hands.
Hello, can I talk to you about our lord and savior YouTube clickbait remover
Or DeArrow.
The title of the IPhone video just sounds very opinion based instead of a professional video talking about it. But maybe it still shows how limited the IPhone is and still talks about the technically aspect.
(While I mentioned "professional", they have a professional setup, but a hobby channel that has no money could be seen as professional while a professional cut video is not.)
I haven't watch the vid btw.
I don't really care about the thumbnails but the video titles are awful. I'm not going to click on a video if I don't actually know what it's about. What am I supposed to expect when I start watching just about any of these?
Every popular tech guru does this to be popular. Same with that Indian dude I forget the name.
It's hard to trust a face with a mouth agape.
While I agree he's just satisting the needs of the algorithm. You don't get millions of views otherwise. I don't see any of the people I sub on the main page because they don't use those tactics. Until parents keep their kids off the internet it will be shaped by their short attention span immature tastes
There are some fantastic gems of videos that still get released, but they're really hard to find amongst the YouTube crap videos.
Yeah I heard so many good things about Linus and it seems like everyone in the tech community loved him but I just couldn't get passed the thumbnails and clickbait. Really turns me off to a YouTuber when I see that
