Linus Tech Tips is all-in on the clickbait-centric style of YouTube production that is the polar opposite of quality tech journalism. They emphasize exaggerated reactions and silly accidents over the thoughtful and well-prepared content that Ian’s writing is about. Some people love it (obvious from their numbers) but I always feel like it’s a waste of time to watch his videos because it’s 90% entertainment and maybe 10% useful info. Entirely different audiences.

So I hope he’s not joining them. It would be great if he formed his own venture instead.

I agree you about LTT to a certain point but I think you are dragging them too much. LTT has done some very good tech journalism in the past and brought some very important stories to light. While I do not prefer them for my hardware information for reasons you stated, I would not call them the polar opposite of quality.

That's the 10% good info that I referred to.

If I drop into a random page of a random Ian Cutress article, there's a high probability it will be interesting and well thought-out content.

If I drop into a random LTT video and scroll to a random timestamp, it's most likely going to be some minimal content arbitrarily stretched past the 10 minute threshold for YouTube monetization. I can usually find the answer to the clickbait headline with enough seeking around, but many of his videos contain so little actual content that it could probably be summarized in a couple of Tweets. His specialty is expanding it into 10+ minutes of overly enthusiastic, slow-paced talking about it.

The information density is at polar opposites of the spectrum, and that's by design. YouTube favors quantity and clickbait, and it's no secret that Linus is playing that game as aggressively as he can.

I mean very obviously you're comparing different media aimed at different audiences but even so you're wrong, there are plenty of LTT videos where they dive into their methodology and provide explanations that are fairly in depth. I think you should be blown away by the fact that LTT manages to retain it's broad audience going as deep as they do when it comes to stuff like testing thermals under various conditions. I came into LTT thinking it was clickbait trash but it's absolutely not, you have a long way to go before you get to the "polar opposite of the spectrum".

In any case people are suggesting Ian join LTT Labs, not LTT.

Wow, entertaining content is orders of magnitude more popular and profitable than in depth analysis.

Doesn’t mean that entertainment doesn’t benefit from rigorous science and methodology.

Which LTT has been shown to be interested in producing, buying cable testing equipment, using high speed cameras for monitor analysis, ... and with LTT Labs those efforts will likely increase.

> arbitrarily stretched past the 10 minute threshold for YouTube monetization.

So do you blame the creator or Google who makes these rules?

I don't know if this has changed but at some point I stopped watching LTT because my own knowledge of computing exceeded his (as far as I can tell) and I started noticing trivial technical errors in a lot of the content he made, delivered with unwarranted confidence. He's not an engineer, he got his start demoing products for tech retailers.

This is why I've long since preferred AnandTech to LTT. They employ people like Cuttress, who has a respect for scientific rigor and can go deep into the technological weeds and actually report usefully from them, whereas I feel LTT was limited mostly to surface-level observations when I watched regularly.

YouTube is HN taken to the extreme: nobody asks for credentials if you present content with infinite confidence.

This is what annoys me most about LTT: they have nuggets of value in most videos, but they're buried under a mountain of optimized dirt.

It's cool to see them try a different format and hope they succeed in bringing proper empirical-mindedness to the top of the presentation.

People shouldn't fool themselves, Linus is running a business, and the clickbait titles and thumbnails bring in viewers. Linus even stated this in a video.

I do think his heart is in the right place and his team is able to produce high quality, both in terms of the content and the production. If LTT is serious about LTT Labs, then they need someone like Ian Cutress, and LTT is one of the few place that would be able make him a genuine offer.

Agreed, I get annoyed with the over-the-top-ness of many of his videos, even the podcast, but overall they do a decent job of covering things. Clickbait titles/thumbnails are unfortunately table stakes on YT and while I hate it I can't bring myself to hate the player. LTT is far from perfect and I certainly don't agree with him on everything but I'd rank his content over quite a few other channels.

LTT Labs could end up being like BuzzFeed vs BuzzFeed News where a site famous for its clickbait, inane quizzes, and half-assed listicles started doing serious investigative journalism.

If you told me ten years ago that BuzzFeed's news site would end up winning many prestigious awards including a Pulitzer Prize I would have thought you were joking.

The interesting thing is that that was all planned from the start.

I think it's a TED talk but I'm not entirely sure. Buzzfeed was an MIT grad product to figure out how far they could go with virality and virality alone. If the project proved succesful, they'd invest in serious journalism.

It's all there in the video I don't have a link to!

What an insightful point. I was thinking the worst, but this gives me some hope.

Disagree. His videos definitely have the click-baity look and titles. But the content is usually pretty top notch even if you need to ignore some silly parts of certain videos. I think his channel pairs well with GamerNexus.

Had to chime in after seeing this comment. LTT is definitely a click-bait, simple and shallow channel but that's their strength.

LTT wouldn't be as big if they did highly technical "boring" analysis, they can be so big and influential because they are light, layman-friendly almost at a stupid level.

Youtube is about attracting the crowd and let me tell you something, the crowd isn't very smart for the most part.

On one hand I respect their success - what they do isn't easy and they run a successful business. On the other hand, I'm not at all impressed with their info-sparse, silly, light-hearted approach to their content. I understand there's demand for it in the market but it's a big turn-off for me...

You just described everything that is wrong and also most profitable about Youtube culture

Totally agreed. I've been following Anandtech since ~2008 along with other tech news but I've always had a very low opinion of LTT. I've watched a few videos but they feel so fake to the point of cringe. I'm definitely in their target demo but they're way too childish for me to take them seriously.

They do a lot of low effort clickbait stuff, but that pays the bills for them to do higher quality journalism. They have done plenty of high quality reviews of new tech.

Plus they have made a big investment into doing even more advanced testing and reviewing. So I don't really agree that they are "all-in". They do it because that's what makes money, but Linus also wants his channel to be a place for high quality journalism.

It is like you didn't watch the video link in the comment you replied to. Linus is trying to add to his entertainment empire with more scientific data based reviews. He seems to be perfectly aware of what he has to produce to keep his business solvent, while at the same time is using that success to add on the more detailed type of content he is interested in producing.

Honestly, I don't mind what current LTT videos do. I've spend enough time around tech and doing design work that a lot of the mistakes and situations are familiar. Sure the staff is aware they have to be entertaining and play it up, but a lot of the mistakes are genuine. Plus it makes videos quicker to shoot if you aren't trying to get a perfect take.

I think you're quite misinformed about the situation.

Linus has literally said that he doesn't like the clickbait himself but it's almost essential to get decent views thanks to YouTube's algorithms. It's true that a lot of their work is more surface-level compared to AnandTech but that's just partly because a. You need a lot of talent that they might not have had, and b. They actually ARE expanding in that direction.

Side note: Tom Scott/Rohin Francis/Veritasium have also started having more clickbaity video thumbnails. Do I blame them? No, I blame YouTube. Don't forget, Linux has a huge team he needs to pay and support.

Linus might be a showman, but I didn't see anything inaccurate or uselessly shallow in the videos I watched. It's not my style, but if the only complaint you have is stylistic, it's not enough to dismiss the whole thing.

He has an entire video about cleaning keyboards that consists of putting them in the dishwasher as a whole, PCB included. There’s no way that’s ever a good idea because of corrosion.

This seems to be in agreement with what I said, but you appear to have put it up as a counterexample. Showman means entertainment. He's an entertainer. He also seems to be one of the rare entertainers who doesn't fib for greater entertainment value. The LTT labs thing linked elsewhere suggests he cares about the technical side and, like BuzzFeed News, wants to use entertainment to fund more serious stuff.

I don't see a problem here. The keyboard thing sounds entertaining, so I'll go check it out.

Yet the video shower that wasn't an issue and he gave tips how to minimise corrosion anyway

They later on, as a side part of a last year or so video, discussed that all pf those keyboards failed a few months afterwards. The cause was not discussed but I would guess washing introduced either corrosion and/ or a lot of wear tp the keyboards. They mentioned that they would like to revisit the concept later but, iirc, it hasn't been done yet.

Some things LTT does are really good. But I see where you're coming from. I use SponsorBlock on YouTube and some thimes their entire video is full of "irrelevant content". SponsorBlock and the crowd that sources the info about this stuff is the best.

so was buzzfeed until they used that money to fund their actual journalism.

> Linus Tech Tips

The first thing I though before googling it up was that Linus Torvalds got into youtubing.

That was my first thought too. LTT has gotten really big and Linus now has the money to pay for top editors and he's been bantering with Dr. Cutress for a long time.

It's kinda sad to watch all the big name editorials I used to read as a teenager like Anandtech and Toms Hardware lost their spark and are withering away, and LTT is now becoming the tech review juggernaut.

The key question is the balance between advertising revenue and editorial independence. LTT seems to be walking that tightrope a lot more than some other outlets do, but IMO I'd rather see someone like GN take up the mantle from Anandtech... alas it seems like they often cater more towards gaming/enthusiast PCs in their work and aren't as broad as an LTT or Anandtech in their coverage.

I hope there will always be a place for Anandtech's and Tom's Hardwares in this world, though. Text content with decent illustrations can't be adequately replaced by video.

LTT just gets 1/3 of its revenue directly from sponsors because of the success of its merch store now so it is getting more editorial independence. Though you really can't alienate the tech companies if you want access to tech before news emargos etc.

From the tweet linked below [1], which sparked a lot of controversy about the definition of piracy (which I entirely disagree with Linus on), about 65% of their revenue comes directly from sponsors and 32% comes from merchandise.

[1] https://twitter.com/LinusTech/status/1486918784401088515

Just 35% comes from direct sponsors ie in-video sponsor and sponsored projects. Apart from these 2 none of the other categories would effect editorial independence.

> 65%

This just isn't what the tweet shows? Unless you are counting AdSense as sponsors? That doesn't seems to make sense.

You seem to be saying LTT is beholden to their sponsors? There is always an argument to be made there but misrepresenting: floatplane, AdSense and other sources that I don't see how you can call sponsors, which make up another 33% seems very disingenuous.

Unless I am misinformed about how AdSense works.

>Unless you are counting AdSense as sponsors.

Yes, I am going by Google's own definition of AdSense which describes them as "sponsored links". If revenue from sponsored links does not count as sponsorship revenue then to each their own.

>You seem to be saying LTT is beholden to their sponsors?

This is such a massive jump I have no idea if it's even worth responding to it. I have no idea how posting a link to a literal pie chart directly from a source can be construed as saying that said source is beholden to sponsors.

If there's anything disingenuous, it would be the idea that not mentioning floatplane which makes up a mere 4% of revenue is a form of misrepresentation. That said I will defer to Hanlon's razor on that one [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor

And really, they need that tech before the embargos lift because the first ones to get content out are the ones that get all the views. LMG might be making more from merch, but they need to keep those views up if they're going to keep selling it. I know Linus prides himself on the quality of the items he sells, but people aren't buying it for the quality alone. So if people stop caring about LTT, they'll stop caring about the merch.

>LTT seems to be walking that tightrope a lot more than some other outlets do

LTT's sponsored content is clearly marked and for videos with an ad read, the writing staff isn't informed what companies will get a spot in the video while writing. Seems like pretty solid editorial independence to me?

It's more about the long-term relationship.

If [sponsor X] has done five high-dollar 'product showcase' videos in the past year contributing [Y] in revenue, and a separate review of [sponsor X]'s product is coming up, does the writer and/or editorial staff have any possible filters (whether or not intended) to protect the revenue stream for future 'product showcase' videos from that sponsor?

I tend to give LTT the benefit of the doubt, but that's why I say it's a tightrope. Once you have paid content (in any form), and not just ad spots, it complicates the relationships you have with your audience, and with your sponsors/advertisers.

Which is also explains why the Segways are so off the cuff.

Segues? A segway is a branded mobility thing.

The problem is that GNs videos are often kinda long and boring. If i just want to know what's going on, I will watch an ltt video. I only watch GN videos when I'm making a purchasing decision.

I’ve said that repeatedly; the contents is good but it’s needlessly repeated throughout the videos. I feel most of Steves review could be presented in half the time without loosing much. And to be frank, most of the time there is just too much details.

There is a reason for time stamps

Yes. That was something I wanted to write in the 15 years of HN thread but then decided to left it out. I was thinking if there are any site that I have been visiting for more than 15 years. And Anantech is the only one. I stopped reading The Register and Tomshardware a long time ago.

I dont mind LTT, the problem is just it is way too dumbed down. It is part of the reason why Hardware discussions, even on HN is pretty average to say the least.

May be people just dont like reading long and detail review but instead only want short form video.

In a recent WAN show he was hinting at a known name that applied but didn't say much more than that. Definitely wouldn't be surprised if this was that.

Echoing others, I don't really respect LTT. They are more entertainment than information or any real attempt at tech journalism. On the other hand, Ian would be a great addition to a group like Gamer's Nexus, which is more focused on objectively testing technology products and diving into how they are engineered and what trade-offs are being made and why.

If he does I hope they also start a website for long form articles. Just watching short highlight clips of whats happening in the world of chips instead of reading his detailed, in-depth articles and interviews about these complex topics would be hell.

Heck, even if they where hours long, some stuff is just better suited to be read than watched.

That is the plan. They're launching "LTT Labs" which will focus on thoroughly testing products (I think they're aiming to do what Steve at GamersNexus does) and moving toward launching a written review and news site (I don't think he's mentioned that name yet).

Given the level of respect he's shown Cuttress in the past and the timing, combined with how excited he's been on WAN Show about the person he was finalizing a deal to hire to lead these efforts, there's probably a decent chance Cuttress is the hire. That's all speculation at this point, though.

Only just hearing about LTT Labs now, but it sounds like a great idea.

And i see no problem with LTT and their approach to hardware, it is entertaining but make no mistake, that they know what they are talking about.

But let's see what LTT is up to.

Lots of people replying to this comment without actually watching the video or understanding what LTT Labs is.

LTT Labs is their attempt at producing more investigative and informative content that is less rooted in entertainment like their main channels are.

He's been testing the waters with going independent for the last couple of years with his tech tech potato channel, and has collabed a lot with Wendell of Level1Techs which is a similarly sized channel, so I'd see it as more likely he's going to try go full time independent. Though it is always possible his experiences have convinced him the other way and he tries to join up with someone now.

That was my first thought. Linus has hinted heavily about industry veterans applying. I wonder if Ian is one of them.

Ugh I hope not. Linus is an annoying click bait uploader. Ian should go Indy.

Ian makes regular yt uploads on his channel: TechTechPotato.

Luke said this was happening on tonight's WAN Show.

It sure felt like a confirmation.

LTT is an entertainment channel. Completely different than Anandtech, by a long shot.

Their "LTT Labs" venture is supposed to be a mainly written research/testing articles

Not just that but they want to do independent validation work. They have dipped into it a little on the main channel already with cable and display testing but it seems they intend to go much further.

Oh man I wonder how long till we get companies paying for 'LTT Labs approved' on their products.

I wish Linus good luck, but I have a suspicion that it won't be like Anandtech. May be I am biased by the image of Linus and his crowd. I watched the Labs pitch, and it is very gamer oriented.

I've been reading Anandtech for ~20 years. It has stayed virtually the same [1]. Linus has turned his venture into a giant media and entertainment house. I hope LTT labs is completely different but it is hard to imagine it given Linus' vision and business interests.

[1] This aspect is basically unheard of these days. Hard to find anything that stayed the same ~20 years, they refined their vision instead of slowly destroying it.