NVIDIA Influencing YouTube Tech Journalists' Product-Placements, Alleges Whistleblower

[GlacierNine]

Just to point out BTW, this isn't the first time btarunr has caused a fracas with a weird article. There's also this - https://www.techpowerup.com/247870/...ocial-justice-warfare-a-great-purge-is-coming

 

[RH92]

I'm not sure I understand your question. It's meant in the context of reviews/content etc. Obviously before a launch there is an NDA that says I can not post benchmarks until time x

Hello W1zzard , im not sure to understand your answer neither. My question was adressed to some other forum member not TPU staff !

 

[cucker tarlson]

If I didn't know better I'd say we're being attacked from some outside forum or link.

All these new accounts jumping out of nowhere to demand BTR's resignation is... amusing. Sure he messed up and he should've pulled the article earlier IMO. But pulling it now would look like he was hiding something. He's handling it as best he can, and frankly, he's damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. These guys just came to flame him for something that is now way outside his control. That's about all they were ever going to do anyways, it's not like they ever had a serious passion for this site by virtue of the obviously new accounts.

I'm so glad I left this profession, frankly. BTA, you have my sympathy. There is no mercy.

he's the victim.
but of his own stupidity.

me personally,I wanted him gone before that,for the sensationalistic approach to news that has little to do with what I always got on TPU.

let's hope he's not too harsh on himself but learn his lesson too.

 

[freeagent]

I think people should put the torches and pitchforks away. Lots of comments here from people who must never make a mistake.. Shit happens. Lessons were learned I’m sure.. I’m sure the guy feels like shit, and many of the comments probably don’t help.

 

[cucker tarlson]

I think people should put the torches and pitchforks away. Lots of comments here from people who must never make a mistake.. Shit happens. Lessons were learned I’m sure.. I’m sure the guy feels like shit, and many of the comments probably don’t help.

frankly if w1zzard wanted him gone he could have done it already,he's,like xkm said,the drama queen of news.
firing him now would be odd cause he did what he always does,let's just hope things will change from now on.

 

[buggalugs]

Just to point out BTW, this isn't the first time btarunr has caused a fracas with a weird article. There's also this - https://www.techpowerup.com/247870/...ocial-justice-warfare-a-great-purge-is-coming

He didnt cause it, he reported on an issue that was already being discussed across the internet.

@FlyingFish

TPU responded quickly and bta apologized, He sounds very apologetic to me. I dont know what more he can do.

I think these corporations are big enough and ugly enough to defend themselves, they have legal depts and plenty of money to take action. I really dont think they need your help

I'm more suspicious about the backlash, than the original article. Its almost like bullying.

People need to relax.

 

[cucker tarlson]

He didnt cause it, he reported on an issue that was already being discussed across the internet.

@FlyingFish

TPU responded quickly and bta apologized, He sounds very apologetic to me. I dont know what more he can do.

I think these corporations are big enough and ugly enough to defend themselves, they have legal depts and plenty of money to take action. I really dont think they need your help

I'm more suspicious about the backlash, than the original article. Its almost like bullying.

People need to relax.

this is expected,and frankly quite restrained.
if he did the same against amd and channels like adoredtv it'd be a thousand times worse.

 

[GlacierNine]

He didnt cause it, he reported on an issue that was already being discussed across the internet.

The issue wasn't that he reported it, its that he wrote a incredibly right-wing, conspiratorial, aggressive editorial about it instead of *just* reporting it. Read the comments in the thread.

 

[cucker tarlson]

The issue wasn't that he reported it, its that he wrote a incredibly right-wing, conspiratorial, aggressive editorial about it instead of *just* reporting it. Read the comments in the thread.

100% on this.
people act like he's getting skinned for mistakenly using a gn photo.
the truth is the original article had nothing to do with reporting.

 

[rtwjunkie]

its that he wrote a incredibly right-wing

Please share the way in which it was “right wing.”

 

[owen10578]

Wow using GN as the example, even if it was just a coincidence what are you doing turning techpowerup into a shitty tech drama reddit conspiracy site? Wtf? I thought techpowerup used to be a legit news site? Your news are getting more garbage as well mixing in lots of PR releases of useless things no one cares about. Its all a shit show now.

 

[cucker tarlson]

Wow using GN as the example, even if it was just a coincidence what are you doing turning techpowerup into a shitty tech drama reddit conspiracy site? Wtf? I thought techpowerup used to be a legit news site? Your news are getting more garbage as well mixing in lots of PR releases of useless things no one cares about. Its all a shit show now.

let's not go too far.
he's probably the only one who does things this way.

 

[Flying Fish]

@FlyingFish

TPU responded quickly and bta apologized, He sounds very apologetic to me. I dont know what more he can do.

I think these corporations are big enough and ugly enough to defend themselves, they have legal depts and plenty of money to take action. I really dont think they need your help

I'm more suspicious about the backlash, than the original article. Its almost like bullying.

People need to relax.

The contents are the entire article are founded in a fantasy on one anonymous post on reddit, the fact the article is still there in its entirity with no retraction of the allegations. And sure, corps are big enough to defend themselves. Ugly enough? That's the same rhetoric that I have issue with in these articles.

And sure they have legal departments but if users don't challenge clearly false reporting with absolutely no evidence (even the original reddit post is deleted) then who will in the end? If users don't challenge then you get a circle jerk of people in the same mind reinforcing their own, often incorrect, beliefs.

Sure, a lot of comments on this subject are toxic but you're also targetting people who are approaching and commenting on the issue calmly and rationally. If you're calm and rational about things, don't resort to flaming etc, how is it "bullying"?

 

[moproblems99]

If I didn't know better I'd say we're being attacked from some outside forum or link.

All these new accounts jumping out of nowhere to demand BTR's resignation is... amusing. Sure he messed up and he should've pulled the article earlier IMO. But pulling it now would look like he was hiding something. He's handling it as best he can, and frankly, he's damned if he does and damned if he doesn't. These guys just came to flame him for something that is now way outside his control. That's about all they were ever going to do anyways, it's not like they ever had a serious passion for this site by virtue of the obviously new accounts.

I'm so glad I left this profession, frankly. BTA, you have my sympathy. There is no mercy.

You know what they say: Hell hath no fury like a nerd scorned...

I never realized that nerds and youtubers were a collection of teenage girls.

 

[MrMilli]

11 pages ... jesus. Millennials and gen-z on full force. Probably half of the comments are from GN fans and god knows how many nVidia shills. You all need to take a shill pill. This isn't Twitter where you do the same until someone is fired. No one is going to get fired, sued or whatever gives you guys satisfaction. TPU is giving first-rate reviews for 15 years now, which means some of you back then were still in kindergarden.
TPU does reviews and editorials. End of story. Editorials are subjective and you can chose to read them or not. They are not meant to lose your mind over it. There's such a thing as ignore too.
That put aside, one thing that younger people don't understand, is how dirty nVidia actually is! I'm following the tech industry very closely for the past 25 years and I put nVidia on equal footing with Intel. Both make fantastic products but will use dirty tactics beyond your imagination to gain market share. Pinching reviewers is like a sport to them and is an ongoing tactic.
I understand why btarunr though that this story must be true because of nVidia's history and it's this history that caused the lack of research.
I can't provide you with a full list of nVidia's dirty history but it all can be found on the net. Though they've perfected their tactics.
I remember fondly two things, them cheating on 3DMark03 and the solder bump issue around 2009. Both of which were denied until definitive proof was shown and in the solder bump case, a class action lawsuit was lost.
Their Gameworks game library in its first two years (2014-2016) purposefully killing performance on AMD hardware is a more recent thing.

PS: i'm not going to be reading any replies, so don't expect any either

 

[Fragment]

I have seen Youtubers display AMD products on Nvidia and Intel reviews. Where's the outrage in that?

Don't be naïve.
Obviously the problem is not the displaying of the products itself. Rather than the implication/ramification if NVIDIA approaches content creators and coerces them to do so purposefully (market manipulation).
That is the whole pivot point of the discussion. And all of it stands or falls with wether this is true or not. While it will be hard to convince someone who is financially dependent on review samples from a vendor to admit to this, of course.

On another note... subconscious/subliminal advertising was already big since the 80s - they did it a lot in cinema ad-blocks. I think there was a very famous Coca Cola example somewhere on YT, but a quick search got me this example:

The effect of this type of product placement is undoubted.

So if reviewers get some kind of incentive by putting certain boxes in their AMD/Intel/NV reviews then they would need be legally inclined to indicate that... Example: "Navi 5700XT review [Sponsored by NVidia]" ... and now how bizarre would that look.

 

[cucker tarlson]

I understand why btarunr though that this story must be true because of nVidia's history and it's this history that caused the lack of research.

that's a shit excuse for laziness,really,can't think of a worse one.

Probably half of the comments are from GN fans and god knows how many nVidia shills. You all need to take a shill pill.

(....)

i'm not going to be reading any replies, so don't expect any either

nice
reported for trolling

 

[john_]

I think I don't have the best of opinion for @btarunr for a couple of editorials that where targeting specifically AMD and where made to look like real news. But that's years ago in a "before Ryzen" era, where all the tech press was targeting AMD. AMD was the easy target and a way for tech sites to "prove" to their readers that they are independent and not favoring big corporations.

That being said, is anyone here that posts news almost every day on a tech site for 5-6-8-10 years? Just to see how "easy" it is to spend hours looking at stuff that probably doesn't interest you, but might interest the readers of the site. To have this in your mind for every f day? I did it for 5 years in a Greek forum (I had the extra effort of translating from English). It's not easy. It's hard and adds extra anxiety in your daily program. And really, who can say that he can post thousands of articles and make NO mistake?

So, I think people should stop attacking @btarunr and find another way to pass their day. He apologized, fixed the original article, the end.

 

[FYFI13]

Can we get this "article" removed altogether please? I'm absolutely ashamed to be part of TPU because of this.

 

[Romulus2K4]

Someone pointed this out. Sounds like what was in the Reddit thread

Oh yes, this crew, The Good Old Gamer, Not an Apple Fan, Coreteks (who recommends buying reference 5700 XTs) and at times, Jim from AdoredTV, even though I have immense respect for Jim, but sometimes he'll give complete garbage like this Reddit whistleblower credibility. I blame this particular crew for causing this dumpster fire.

 

[ty_ger]

garbage

 

[techguymaxc]

I would like to make a suggestion to all tech journalists, and if we're being honest, journalists in general.

Leave social media on social media.

Your job is to dig up information that isn't available in public, do some independent research, verify the facts, then report.

If you want to say that is what you were attempting to accomplish here, I have a simple question: where are your sources? If all you can point to is a reddit thread, you're just amplifying conspiracy theories. We already have (insert most-hated media outlet here) for that.

 

[Kajuvra]

This is an independent technology website, its not the Washington Post, but even professional news entities like the Washington Post, report on stories from whistleblowers, and anonymous sources.
Many big news stories come from anonymous sources, theres nothing wrong with that.

These sources are vetted before hand, News Agencies don't like to back peddle. Your Right they do report on Whistleblowers and Anonymous but Again they do there research. Something that wasn't done here. The fact that there's ONE SOURCE with no way to back it up or verify the information. There was No other sources or proof even the source was created and brought to the public without any source to proof of said practices. you know what if they had any proof, Invoice, Witness, Spreadsheet data something that showed this was a practice we wouldn't have been so hard on the author. Then to attach a picture of a well renowned member of the tech community known for being open and honest, he kicked the bees nest. As i stated in another post. We come to TPU for honest reviews, news and information on some of our biggest decision and purchases someone we have grown to trust just to have them show us Lazy reporting from an Editor no less. This is why alot of us are so angry.

 

[R-T-B]

Just to point out BTW, this isn't the first time btarunr has caused a fracas with a weird article. There's also this - https://www.techpowerup.com/247870/...ocial-justice-warfare-a-great-purge-is-coming

Fun fact, I am reply banned from that thread. Only one in my history.

EDIT: Wish you'd never brought that one up to be frank. I still have all kinds of bad feels from that.

 

[Xzibit]

Oh yes, this crew, The Good Old Gamer, Not an Apple Fan, Coreteks (who recommends buying reference 5700 XTs) and at times, Jim from AdoredTV, even though I have immense respect for Jim, but sometimes he'll give complete garbage like this Reddit whistleblower credibility. I blame this particular crew for causing this dumpster fire.

It probably gave them flashbacks of Nvidia and AEG marketing. Its common practice. All big companies have dedicated departments and hire outside firms.