CONCLUSION: I will stop watching them since all of these alligations and “false?” hardware testing makes me not wanna support them. Even if most of them aren’t true, i don’t want to risk it
ive heard some mixed things about ltt so i want to know if theyre actually bad or not
and im not watching them for linux help, i just like the content, but i also dont want to support a bad person
It used to be yes. No, not anymore really.
Its just tech entertainment with surface level knowledge at most nothing useful but the vids are fun to watch while I eat something
A lot of people interested in tech end up watching at least one of his channels due to internet searches confusing ‘best’ with ‘biggest’.
You will make your own mind up one way, or the other.
Linus is a trashtuber.
why is he bad? im not saying you’re wrong, i just want to know what hes done
Just search. It’s easy. There’s heaps of data on LTT being shit, but particularly in Linus being a greedy, grubby little man.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linus_Media_Group
Scroll down to ‘controversy’ and see if that’s someone you want to support.
My impression - not necessarily based on fact:
he used to do good, useful, interesting videos back in the day…
then he found he was getting a good income from yoochoob…
then he started chasing the click bait
If he’s doing anything useful now, I’d expect it’s because he’s lost a lot of viewers (income) … I don’t watch his new stuff, the thumbnails still look clickbaity to me, but maybe he’s going back to his original content…?
To answer your implied question, I don’t subscribe to anyone. I just search around for whoever’s talking about the thing I’m now interested in (usually Lemmy’s the source of the new thing)… I check in with Tom Lawrence (Lawrence Systems) often, but that’s about it.
he is kinda screamy like mrbreast sometimes and the titles can be misleading
Yeah, I’m not a subscriber - I don’t have a YT account - but if I did, I’d be down voting and writing comments like “so… where’s the content from your click bait thumbnail?” 😉
Edit: I’d also add something like “my subscription? You’ll never guess what I did next…” 😉
Well, he needs that comment so bad as it counts as “engagement” to boost his videos.
LTT is not a serious tech channel. Its a guy doing anything he can to get views with tech themed content.
This is such a tired take. He gets people enthusiastic about exciting or fun things in tech. Not every tech channel or influencer needs to deep dive analytics or details. Even so, they sometimes do exactly that.
Like him/them or not, they have advanced repairablity, spotlighted unethical behavior, and made useful guides for things like ad-blocking and piracy.
I think it depends a bit on what you’re looking for. If you want Linux content, LTT might not be your thing. Linus is a bit of a notorious Windows user. They did a few videos on Linux, but that’s not really what the channel is about. I don’t think they’re bad people, though. I’m not aware of any controversies.
It’s a bit below my paygrade, so I don’t watch them often. I’m not into gaming or optimizing my Windows file transfer speeds. And I don’t think I’m their target audience when it comes to explaining computers. I already know all the stuff they explain and some more. The episode featuring Linus Torvalds was great, though!
im not interested in just the linux things, but ive heard people say that they’re not so good people but i dont remember what the controversy was
Yeah, maybe I’m wrong and there is some drama. Googling for “Linus Tech Tips drama” yields many results. I must have missed it.
Some of that sounds like average stupid people behaviour, like not being able to wear seatbelts properly, or skewing benchmarks. I’ve seen all the Honey ads as well, I always thought that’s how YouTube is, and didn’t make up my mind about it. Having some sort of boy culture and being unable to learn sounds a bit more unfortunate and worrisome.
about the sponsors, basically every decent sized youtuber has had a bad sponsor
like look at drew gooden, his content is amazing but most of his sponsors are utter dogshit
My mom taught me, other people doing things is never an excuse for yourself… But yeah, maybe that’s how things are.
Tech channels get more scrutiny because their reputation lives and dies by how credible they are as opposed to being purely entertainment.
I trusted him less after he chose to stick with PIA after they got bought by Kape which is a company that had a history of distributing malware and adware
The issue is who he sold it to — the notorious creator of some pernicious data-huffing ad-ware, Crossrider. The UK-based company was cofounded by an ex-Israeli surveillance agent and a billionaire previously convicted of insider trading who was later named in the Panama Papers. It produced software which previously allowed third-party developers to hijack users’ browsers via malware injection, redirect traffic to advertisers and slurp up private data.
Why would I trust someone’s hardware and software opinions if that’s the sponsor they stuck with back then?
Never hears of Drew, but looks like he’s just a comedian? Not like his content is giving out product recommendations under the guise of being an expert who can be trusted.
LTT is an advertising channel to me. For their merch or sponsors. Modern day infomercials for people who are entertained by ads hosted by personalities.
I’d say there are better tech youtubers out there that you should watch instead, such as Jeff Geerling. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsd6hP-zzIkCpw8XGw7Osyw
In case you were not aware, I suggest reading through the comments of this post again and seeing the link to the comment about his opinions on some topics…
Linus Sex Tips
I have a relatively positive view on LTT compared to others here.
You can’t succeed on youtube without engaging in some of their clickbait bullshit thumbnails and titles. Although they’re relatively honest in actually covering what they say in the title… So over dramatic titles, but not quite click bait.
No content can be all things to all people. LTT is relatively “casual techy”. If you’re techy enough to be able to manage Linux yourself, then it’s probably not for you. You don’t need then to show you how to put a PC together, or to break the news to you that self hosting or home network storage is a thing.
The content also aimed at a certain audience. If you want more academic hardware testing and analysis, then there’s Gamers Nexus. If you want in depth gaming news/analysis then there are better channels for that too. These guys look at random tech at times too (car related or making craft art cushions or something). These guys are basically the “Top Gear with Jeremy Clarkson” of tech.
Things like the sexual harassment issue and things like that, I’m not as concerned about. If you work in big corporations then you know these problems exist everywhere, what matters is how you deal with them. The court of public opinion followed the drama and came to their own conclusions. This just plays out publically because they’re very public with their content.
As for Linux specifically, they did some noob videos where uninitiated staff tried to jump into Linux and hit a bunch of roadbumps (which happens often in Windows, fine to be open about that, but it also isn’t a big deal for the first adoption to need troubleshooting). They labelled Linux as no good for regular use at that point which angered the internet. Since then I think they’ve realised:
- They were unfair to Linux
- They’ve made no allies anywhere by hating on Linux
- It’s a free win for them if they say some good things about Linux.
So now they seem a lot more positive about Linux. But don’t go here looking for anything Linux related.
I think you should just watch some of their videos from main LTT, short circuit, etc and see if you find it entertaining for yourself.
Sexual assault allegations not being a big deal to you is already a huge yikes. But you’re also blatantly ignoring all of the other issues over the years:
- Stealing and auctioning prototype hardware from startups
- Underpaying employees and turning their termination details into content
- Making his employees renovate his mansion
- Buying a private jet for private family use (already bad) and then trying to pass it off as a business expense
- Repeatedly claiming Linux is garbage because he’s actually too dumb (or paid off) to follow basic instructions as a “tech expert” despite his basement gremlin assistant figuring it out fine
- Been shown with hard facts to regularly misrepresent products and their specs due to poor reviewing and testing standards by actual professionals in the space (and claims its too expensive to do so anyways. Remember that jet?)
- In response to all of this has acted like a whiny toddler caught at the cookie jar and cries that everyone else is worse (source needed). As far as I understand it, the podcast nowadays is essentially Linus claiming he’s a tech God among plebs while previously mentioned basement gremlin cackles and calls him a good master
holy cow
So now they seem a lot more positive about Linux. But don’t go here looking for anything Linux related.
They are so childish and ignorant in their approach to Linux, like claiming that the lack of Photoshop for Linux is a problem with Linux and not a problem with Photoshop.
The ignorance and lack of logical thinking is astounding.It’s OK to say you may have problems if you are depending on software that is only available on Windows or MAC, but that is not a fault of Linux. It’s the fault of those vendors that don’t support Linux. It’s like the blaming the victim logical fallacy.
If a user needs Photoshop in their workflow then Linux isn’t an option for them. That is a problem with Linux, from a user perspective.
Who’s at fault for that problem is a different question, and I’d be surprised if LTT ever say that Linux is to blame.
I’d be surprised if LTT ever say that Linux is to blame.
He did EXACTLY that, just not about Photoshop, but a similar proprietary piece of software he used for his video editing that is very expensive and targeted ONLY to professionals. Which is not at all relevant for 99.9% of the people that watch his channel. So he basically failed Linux on issues that are irrelevant to by far the most people, either because he is an idiot or he is paid to do so. Which of those it is doesn’t really matter. The point is he made a devastating conclusion for Linux based on a fringe use case that isn’t representative, and he blamed Linux for not supporting the proprietary software and hardware he wanted to use, instead of blaming the vendors that have the responsibility for it, and are the ones making money on it! Because that’s how stupid and misleading he is.
But this is no way near the only reason I have blocked his channel, it is also the blatant corrupt attitude when Ryzen was released, and his extreme favoritism of Intel, that then turned 180° shortly after Intel had announced they would decrease budgets for reviewers. We saw the same with GPU’s where he didn’t even review AMD cards, until suddenly he did, after AMD began paying for advertising on his channel.
The corruption is extreme, and it’s all about which vendors pay him money, and not at all about the products or interest of consumers. Except he is good at pretending it is.
LTT is an advertising company nothing more.
Presumably you can point me to a specific video, since you seem so completely sure of it. I’m not scrubbing through potentially hours of footage to try to find something that I don’t think exists.
As for your suggestion that he just reviews what he’s paid to do, sure, that seems plausible. I’m not trying to argue that it’s an impartial channel and people should be watching him. You certainly don’t need to defend a decision to not watch it.
Of course I can, because obviously I keep track of links to videos of channels I have blocked years ago.
Idiot!!!Use you own eyes from now on if you watch his crap. And maybe you will spot the problems yourself if you have a brain.
Falling back to insults when you can’t provide a source isn’t terribly convincing.
I can at least provide examples of them stating directly the opposite.
I use Adobe Premiere for editing, and one of the many fun ways that Adobe is kind of ass is that it just doesn’t work on Linux.
- Luke, “My Linux Curse is NOT Over… But It’s Getting BETTER - Pt.2 Linux 30 Day Challenge 2026”, emphasis mine
Adobe is very clearly the party being blamed here, not linux.
Also:
The Proton compatibility layer has made incredible progress. Even actually during our last couple of months, it’s improved a lot. But it can’t do anything about developers who block their games on Linux.
From “I Can’t Go Back To Windows”, again emphasis mine. Again very clearly laying the blame at the developers of the incompatible software.
Interesting that the video you reference, Linus actually admit that he made mistakes in the review 4 years back.
Also interesting how he has turned 180° on freaking almost every single issue on Linux vs. Windows.
The reason for that of course is that he was basically wrong about everything he thought he knew about Linux.
Also interesting that he now consider freedom a feature, something he completely failed to understand previously, for instance when Skyrim was supposed to have paid mods.
Where Linus completely failed to understand the criticism of that.IMO he is still a moron, but a slightly better informed moron.
The reason he was berated was because he was a moron, it is not our job of any community to embrace him and be nice to him when he is spreading basic falsehoods and misunderstandings.
“Quality clickbait” is the best description I have.
It’s an entertaining channel, prone to reviewing flashy stuff, rather than useful tips as the name might suggest. But not completely stupid, those guys have some knowledge and skills to back it up.
I can’t say how it changed over time, I’ve only watched them occasionally over the last 2-3 years.
That about sums then up. They have been on a streak promoting Linux, which is pretty great since they are a bigger channel. Are they perfect? No, but they are helping get new users into Linux.
I remember making the choice to just stop watching any Linux-focused videos from that channel. They always just tended to frustrate me. But, as I understand, the main host has started to really enjoy Linux lately due to the Steam Machine. Have their Linux videos improved at all due to that?
I can’t say that what your take on their Linux videos is wrong, but they had valid concerns and call outs. Their problems are reproducible and are things that would have kept me away from Linux before they were addressed. He genuinely wants Linux to succeed so by bringing attention to problems he had, it helped prioritize friction from switching. Now that he has had much fewer issues with daily driving Linux, he found himself wanting to actively avoid going back to windows. Who knows if that would have been the case if he didnt help spotlight Linux friction points.
i guess thats fine, i just dont wanna support bad peeps
They’re basically filling in that market for entry level tech knowledge and enthusiasts that used to be occupied by CNET and Tom’s Hardware when written articles were king.
They are run of the mill. Like other trash tech creators they removed out and actively avoid mentioning anything related to Israel.
If you want a good personality check out Eli The Computer Guy
It’s fine as entertainment, I just don’t take it too seriously
Imho they are first and foremost entertainment. If you take it as such, it’s fun. Although as others mentioned it has a bit downward tendency. I think Linus, Luke and others are intelligent, reasonable people and that makes it easier to stick to watching them. True that Linus is sometimes impatient, we all saw his Linux challenges 😅 but they are ok
yeah i mainly watch them for entertainment
90% light tech entertainment, 10% educational. Youtube tech review channels have limited usefulness outside those few moments you need to make a new purchase but sometimes you might discover or learn something new, but it’s mostly just constant roll of advertisements of new tech gadgets, basic tech advice for the uneducated masses, benchmarks and other such things that don’t really matter much and to be honest, most of the content comes out looking and sounding the same - and rather corporate.
But I guess that’s what happens to all big media outlets eventually.
The WAN show (current tech-afftairs podcast) is the only “half-serious” thing that’s worth a listen imho.
watch the video of linus buying a private jet and see if that’s the kind of guy you wanna support
It’s a jet for his company though, right?
And his upcoming “family vlog” he is about to launch. And no, it won’t be cringe, lol. shudders
doesn’t make it any less private
linus buying a private jet
Wow, thanks, I didn’t know that.
Before he was just mildly annoying and not something I wanted to watch.
Now he’s confirmed as an asshole, who must not be supported, from my perspective.
First trip was a family vacation to Mexico
