To say we've generated some complaints
with our recent change to the style of our video titles and thumbnails
would be a gross understatement,
and
I want to get right into a discussion about that;
after this ad.
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Honestly, it's kind of hard to know where to start with something like this.
Trolling you guys by playing up the
greedy, corporate shill perception that some of you have of me
probably wasn't the right approach, but
joking about things is usually how I break the ice when I'm about to have an awkward conversation and
this is going to be a little awkward.
I screwed up
the video title of our recent Ryzen 3
and Ryzen 5 performance preview.
Which was initially called AMD Ryzen 5 and 3 tested
and then AMD Ryzen 5 and 3 previewed.
We shouldn't have said we tested them because we were actually using a
different CPU to simulate their performance
And even preview upon further reflection wasn't quite right
since what we were previewing was the performance
that we expected from the chips, rather than the chips themselves
So I could spin that
as an experiment to see where the threshold was for audience
tolerance for our new thumbnails and titles
there would be some truth to that, we are constantly making small tweaks.
But this!
This is honest answers and these videos wouldn't have much value if I didn't shoot straight.
So here it is.
In this case,
I didn't think it was a big deal to draw viewers in with an admittedly misleading title
because I was so confident in our testing methodology
and I was so confident
that the viewers who I would draw in with such a title
would turn out to be amped
to see the benchmarks that we worked
so hard on.
To say that backfired would be putting it pretty mildly
and the damage is actually deeper than it appears on the outside.
One positive takeaway here is that I did get,
absolute confirmation of my theory that there's been a major shift
in the way that YouTube handles dislikes
or more accurately the way that YouTube handles the like to dislike ratio. So
my previous understanding was that both of them
were weighted about equally
and there are examples of
viral, hugely successful videos in the past
that seemed to have
backed up this belief
but we got to watch in this case
in real time
as YouTube
Buried this video
about 10 minutes after it went live
and the effect
of Youtube doing something like that
lasts for days on a channel.
So then I guess at this point some of you are expecting that
what comes next is, an on my knees apology and a,
a solemn promise to
never again make a silly face or press
the forbidden key.
Again, and to go back to the good old days of working out of the garage.
Luke: "Hey guys, can you tell me how the audio is?"
Linus: and thumbnails with white text on a screen capture of B-Roll from the video.
But, while there are aspects of that approach that I prefer both as a consumer and a creator of content
Its not going to happen and there are a lot of reasons why.
Some of it is that, nostalgia glasses don't actually work very well.
Blades of Steel is fun.
But is it really a good game by today's standards?
And our old unboxing videos are similarly fun,
but they contain very little actual information.
Change has been a very good thing
for the density of information that we are able to present.
I mean,
is it possible if you don't like it anymore that the tech industry changed or maybe?
You as an individual have changed in the last eight years just as much as we have?
But a much bigger factor is this.
Using so-called cancerous thumbnails
allows our videos to stand out better in a search result or suggested video pane.
Gaining us new viewers, which is very beneficial for obvious reasons.
The cold hard truth.
Is that if everyone is doing this there's probably a reason.
It works.
And while I've seen every argument under the sun I read almost all the comments on our videos
for why it's bad,
the cold hard truth is that none of them really hold any water?
Number one,
you're big enough.
You don't need more views.
What!?
Think about what it would mean
if we stopped growing!
YouTube as a platform is growing.
PC gaming in particular
is growing,
us being happy with stagnant viewership in a growing world would be
kind of like your grandpa being happy with the same three dollars an hour he made back in 1950.
Unacceptable.
Number two, people hate it
You'll drive away your core audience.
Well there is no doubt that some people hate it but
most of the empirical evidence. We've seen suggests that this is a
very vocal minority
To be clear,
unsubscribes do happen,
they're common.
We've lost
more subscribers on LTT than most YouTube channels will ever
have!
But this is a natural thing people's interest change, maybe they even die!
But the massive waves of unsubscribes as a reaction to a particular piece of content
are much rarer than the comment section would have you believe
Three.
You're pandering to kids by making these faces.
Okay, there are two fundamental problems with this one.
Number one,
who cares!?
Adult enthusiasts!
You know grown-ups.
Should be able to see a silly face without it ruining their day
and should be pleased as punch
that someone is out there creating content that gets younger people excited
and passionate about technology
and two
it's nonsense.
Our demographics skew you older today
than they ever have
so consider that one
debunked.
And honestly, I could go on and on
but the bottom line is this.
Video production is really expensive
When you believe that your staff should be comfortable,
happy and well compensated,
then you put that money where your mouth is.
So with the significant investment
already made into making every piece of content we do.
Another 20 minutes on a thumbnail
that can boost viewership, by no kidding
up to 20%,
is a no-brainer.
And, in response to what I'm sure is coming next, you! yes you!
The one writing an essay
about how being a youtuber isn't a real job.
We shouldn't have all this overhead
we should just do it out of passion like we used to.
One.
A job is anything you can get paid to do
and we're doing okay.
Some of us even wear decent clothes
Two.
To jog your memory.
I used to work at a computer store.
In fact
every single person in this video
has been paid
to make Linus Tech Tips videos since the moment they started making Linus Tech Tips videos.
So that hasn't changed.
Leading us to number three, of course!
We're passionate!
Are you kidding!?
There are a lot of things
that I would rather not stress about.
Like,
commercial property leases,
insurance
equipment breakage,
taxes
scheduling,
dealing with staff vacation times.
But I do all of this crap
that I don't enjoy
because I am passionate about
making the best videos we can
and about running a real business
that has allowed us to make
7 gamers or
ultimate desk PC,
Scrapyard Wars.
Projects that wouldn't have been possible
if I was still hand camming unboxings in a parking lot with Luke.
You can criticize me for plenty of stuff
but slam me for lacking passion?
I mean you're probably the same people asking
why I built my own server room instead of hiring someone to do it properly
Because I love playing with this stuff. What do you think I do it?
I wasn't personally passionate about making tech videos
there would be no reason for me to make an embarrassing face in a thumbnail
to try and grow this company you think I wanna
explain to my kids
why I'm always looking like this?
Honestly! Do I really even seem
like the kind of person who needs a lot of material things to be happy
Do you think this is about the money?
I live in the same house.
I drive the same car
and I wear the same abominable cheap footwear that I always did.
The only fancy stuff in my life, is my tech gadget
Just like before I ever set foot
in front of a camera.
Do you know what a lack of passion would actually look like
Plotting away,
day after day
at the same kinds of videos
in the same format
with the same presentation.
Do you have any idea how easily
I can rattle off a power supply unboxing?
Do you have any idea how much faster it is
to generate our old thumbnails?
Which coming back then to the beginning of our little chat?
Doesn't mean, that we haven't ever taken it too far.
So here is my proposal
to help us communicate with each other better
Unfortunately, I need to keep going like this
and titling our videos in a way that allows us to adapt to how viewers are discovering new conten.
But,
I won't mislead you
if I say
"you won't believe this bizarre keyboard",
you won't believe it.
And what I'm asking for in return is this.
One.
Try to understand our position.
We can't ignore the changes in the way that viewers are browsing content on YouTube.
If the title is representative,
of the content
world's ugliest keyboard.
It Isn't,
even if it shares some stylistic aspects with clickbait.
It isn't by the very definition, click bait.
It's awful,
and I'd appreciate if you could look past a little bit of edginess
and avoid painting us with the same brush as
folks putting boobs in their thumbnails of videos about cars
and not cars with boobs, just regular cars.
And number two.
If you want to communicate with us,
do it in a way, that's meaningful
Honestly, I couldn't tell
if this thumbnail thing was a serious problem
or just more
background noise from haters.
Like, whatever the hell prompted 500 people to dislike this.
This really cool piece of content where we took the time
to benchmark 10 years of video cards
there was a lot of time.
Or the look like this truckload of poorly researched comments
informing me that my server room is flammable
Try this.
If there's something that you liked about the video
Help us then,
help us drown out the peanut gallery with a like and an on topic comment.
We really do read those and these things boost search rankings and suggested video places
Behavioral conditioning, 101, guys.
Positive feedback is more powerful than negative
and negative loses its impact if you aren't also remembering
to let us know when we've done something right
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We've actually contracted a few individuals to create some clickbait thumbnails for us.
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So thanks for watching guys if you just like this video
as always hit the dislike button but,
please make sure there's a reason for it.
If you liked it, hit the like button though, get subscribe
maybe consider checking out where to buy the stuff we featured which I guess wasn't really anything
at the link in the video description and also check out our merch store
which has cool shirts like this one and our community forum which you should totally join.