The Thread of Internet Crash & Burns (Linus Tact Tips)

[Lebowski]

I though it might be nice to have a place to discuss the Ellon Musks of the world, those internet celebrity's who had it all and then flew to close to the sun who are just one cage fight away from losing it all.

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This weeks unlucky internet personality is screwdriver sales man Linus, from Linus Tech Tips, a channel that brings in millions from advertising revenue and sponsorship and focuses on building PC's, bench testing components, and unboxing of tech and gadgets. They built their reputation by being knowledgeable and entertaining, (if a bit smug) and had one of the largest audiences and subscriber levels for this type of content on YouTube.

So where did it go wrong for LTT, well its started when a Rival Tech channel did a piece on the levels of mistakes popping up in LTT videos, and how it handled these issues. It provided pretty compelling evidence that a lot of the time they didn't handle mistakes (A self imposed 20 video a week target came before accuracy). The YouTube piece also talked about how they treated suppliers, one start up had its one of a kind prototype product which it lent to LTT incorrectly used, trashed on the channel and then auctioned off at an event, despite them promising to send it back.

It kind of snowballed from there Linus put out the usual damage control stuff a post on his forum defending his channel first, this went down really badly, An apology followed via video "Monitised of course" but then things started coming out about sexual harassment of employees and poor working conditions at LTT. All this has forced LTT to stop production and put a freeze on its channel.

https://www.theverge.com/2023/8/16/23834190/linus-tech-tips-gamersnexus-madison-reeves-controversy

So do you think Linus deserved the smack down or has he been unfairly treated in all this?

[dataDave]

He'll most likely never need to work again so I couldn't give a ****, really.

[charlesr]

My son watched all his videos so he'll need to find another channel.

If I ever get famous and rich, I'm relying on you lot to remind me not to be a dick.

Being on YouTube, with so much visibility, you'd think they'd have to work harder on being above board, just to stay ahead of the opposition.

[Hirst]

I don't really know the guy, but the YouTube algorithm is absolutely obsessed with suggesting him pulling faces next to Ali Express mini-consoles or holding up a graphics card with a "how stupid!" face and I welcome any allegations or controversy just so I don't have to keep clicking "not interested" and "don't recommend channel" over and over again for it to ultimately ignore and re-suggest him in a month.

[Anpanman]

AdBlock for YouTube does wonders for Chrome.

[gunrock]

I do think he has got too big for his boots, somewhat. However, I'd hate to see him cancelled, he employs a lot of people and I think that he lost his way. The pressure to stay youtube algorithm relevant must be high when you have so many people relying on you for their income.

Given how quickly things have fallen apart, I think "flying too close to the sun" really nails it.

[Yakumo]

Use to watch Linus but he never sat well with me. Too much of a smug git for my liking.
Can't say I care about this drama.

[Asura]

It's the latest Channel Awesome, which went through a similar thing a few years ago and is now a shadow of its former self.

I'd say to be careful with threads like this, as sometimes they lead to dogpiling, and it's easy to forget these people are human beings.

But the problem is the same; these businesses made by YouTubers are typically hobby businesses that grow, usually in spurts (rather than gradually). When that happens, there comes a point for every business where you can't just have "Steve, the guy who deals with the email", but rather, you need a "HR and Legal Department".

The businesses that fail to navigate this usually do so because they wait to make that transition until the first time they really **** up, when in practice, if you "employ" staff, the best time to have a legal department was six months ago and the second-best time is today.

Tying into what [MENTION=1482]dataDave[/MENTION] said; if the business is kept relatively small, a channel like LTT is a bit different to most businesses because it might be an exercise in making money, doing so fast, fast enough that when you are inevitably usurped, replaced or screw up, you've made that much money that you don't really care all that much. You sell the business to some idiot terrestrial TV network who mistakenly believes the value is in the brand and you ride off into the sunset.

I think LTT will survive, because ChannelAwesome survived to a point. But It'll either be lower-key, or will take a while to get back to its old level of success. The main issue is that there are many people doing what LTT was doing, and stuff like this makes people check those channels out.

[Neon Ignition]

If you're a Youtuber and you have been fortunate to build a big success out of it, and someone offers to buy it from you for a large sum of money - take the deal.

The clocks ticking on the streamer scenario and the days of 'homegrown Youtube star's' will end with it, too many I think equate the success and skill of filming and editing and fronting a successful channel with being able to professionally run a large company and then face the slap in the face that the world of business, unlike their channel, isn't powered by their personality.

For Linus, he needs to step way back now and let others emerge to take his place. He won't, ego won't allow it, but his character is far too easy now to read and moving forward he's going to be baited left right and centre leading the wider channel to be at consistent risk of more damage down the line.

[Asura]

the days of 'homegrown Youtube star's' will end with it,

They already are. Nearly all big online successes these days are from nepotism. See a popular girl posting ukelele covers of songs in her bedroom? Her parents work for Sony Music. See a VTuber who is big? IRL they're probably mates with one of the Game Grumps. See a YouTuber doing a collab? They probably work for the same media company (which they will very rarely mention while they maintain an outward image of being an indie creator, working on a shoestring budget... While their min patreon tier is 2$, and they have 4,000 subscribers paying at least that every month - and that's just one of their revenue streams).

The fact that so many big streamers and YouTubers still maintain an "air" of being small, independent creators is this media generation's biggest lie. It's all a facade. True, some are genuine, but likely not the bigger ones.

That's not to say everyone on Youtube is "rolling in it", because that would be daft. I just mean that there's a definitely sense of disingenuousness at the top level, where those people were the disruptive, plucky self-made creators, and now, they've got the power, money and influence of a BBC TV presenter but they still pretend they're the outsider.

[Lebowski]

If you're a Youtuber and you have been fortunate to build a big success out of it, and someone offers to buy it from you for a large sum of money - take the deal.

The clocks ticking on the streamer scenario and the days of 'homegrown Youtube star's' will end with it, too many I think equate the success and skill of filming and editing and fronting a successful channel with being able to professionally run a large company and then face the slap in the face that the world of business, unlike their channel, isn't powered by their personality.

For Linus, he needs to step way back now and let others emerge to take his place. He won't, ego won't allow it, but his character is far too easy now to read and moving forward he's going to be baited left right and centre leading the wider channel to be at consistent risk of more damage down the line.

I'm not sure the clock is ticking for homegrown you-tube or streaming personality's, i see a lot of smaller youtubers growing their audiences naturally though just making decent content and being interesting. Id say broadcast TV is more at risk of loosing relevance, a lot of the younger generation just don't engage with Traditional TV and why would you its not made for them, it feels like the BBC has picked its audience and most of them are in their 60s, When its a choice between watching endless property and antique shows followed by a bit of poverty porn, you can see why broadcast tv is on its arse.

[MartyG]

It'll be forgotten about in a month (just as the uproar about the dislike button was), it'll only take that long because there'll be a few people who only go to their videos to troll. This is because the vast vast vast vast vast percentage of people who watch videos don't give a crap and just want to view content; 90-95% of channel views (even on big channels) don't come from subscribers, but randoms from the algorithm.

GN will get a boost of subscribers and engagement, boosting his algorithm score (and the main reason he does these hit pieces) because they do every time, just as it has this time.



The allegations from Suop are troubling, but she hasn't accused Linus himself of wrong-doing and it looks like they have that in hand by bringing on an external investigator.

Other than that it's drama over a few graphs caused by trying to produce too much content (given the Billet stuff wasn't the smoking gun it was presented as), from a beef from Burke he's had with LTT going back over 12 months now (he was invited to the recent LTX and didn't attend).

[charlesr]

What was Channel Awesome?

[MartyG]

What was Channel Awesome?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channel_Awesome

[Asura]

What was Channel Awesome?

The YouTube creator network founded by The Nostalgia Critic. This person:



You might not have heard of him, but he was pretty big on early YouTube. He also employed a number of other people who went on to become much more successful in the years since, like Lindsay Ellis, Dominic Noble (presents Lost in Adaptation) and the gaming content creator GuruLarry*.

They were on course to be one of the bigger networks on YouTube, but a bunch of their talent released a big document of grievances which really affected them. Similar to this LTT stuff happening now; just really unprofessional conduct which relates to how they started out as a bunch of kids making videos and somehow had to transform into an actual business, and they didn't do it very well.

This is all related to a weird era of YouTube around 10 years ago, when suddenly all the major talent set up their own websites, as there was this idea that YT could go under and take them with it. Channel Awesome got big because they did that part really well.

(*worth noting - Larry was largely unscathed from the whole affair because very few people knew he worked for them; all the rest were in the US but he was in the UK, and had never met them in person)