I had three YouTube titles, this one got about 2x the watch time as the other two, so I let YT pick it.
For technical readers, I write my blog posts. I don't have to (I lose money hosting that thing and all it's mostly just free training data for Anthropic, OpenAI, et all), but I enjoy writing, so I do it anyway. If you don't like the YT game, please subscribe to the blog's RSS feed. I much prefer text over video.
Just because this title did the best doesn't make it not misleading. If you are a serious reviewer, it wouldn't have been an option in the first place.
You can make an even more outlandish title and get even more views. Doesn't make it right.
- Humane AI Pin Review: The Worst Product I've Ever Reviewed
- I Tested the World's Craziest Smartphone
- Do NOT Buy These Fake Tech Products!
- This Is Not a Normal Laptop...
- Unboxing the $10,000 Mystery Tech Box
- Don't Make This PC Building Mistake
- This Desk Accessory Changes Everything
- I Didn't Expect This Phone to Be This Good
- I Bought a Mystery Tech Box from Amazon
- Testing the Craziest Cheap Tech on Temu
Jeff Geerling's videos have fine titles.
Declaring that Jeff can't be a serious reviewer because he uses clickbait is kinda silly. Have you seen the state of journalism? Somehow the tabloids are frequently less clickbaity.
It also seems that YouTube is steering the ship: they could simply push content that’s straightforward and non-clickbait (and in fact: downgrade clickbait), but as Geoff says the clickbait got 2x the traffic.
That’s not “the same amount of people were shown the video and 2x the people clicked in”. The algo is always skewing.
It's a hook. That's been a standard part of writing for like at least a hundred years.
It's not kicking dogs. Or, if it is kicking dogs, society has been doing it for at least as long as publishable media has been a thing, probably longer with the likes of bards.
> I had three YouTube titles, this one got about 2x the watch time as the other two, so I let YT pick it.
I think you’re being mid leading here Jeff. You almost make it sound like YT actually came up with the title.
For anyone that is not a YouTuber, Jeff wrote three different titles himself, then YouTube ran an A/B test and just kept the one that resulted in the most watch time.
Jeff consciously chose to write a click bait title, he could equally have chosen not to.
You are trying to launder responsibility for a clickbait title to a computer program. Then you try to shift the topic to the public good you are providing.
I don’t think it’s wrong to use clickbait, but come on, own up to it. You consciously chose to “let [YouTube] pick it.”
If you don't like it, either install DeArrow or subscribe to my blog, where I tone it down for the more technical audience. (Or block/ignore my content, no skin off my back!)
That's why you're not a serious reviewer. If you're serious, you wouldn't mislead people.
Even your blog post does not tell the truth nor does it have highlights of benchmarks that represent how people will actually use a $600 laptop.
The people who are buying these laptops are likely not very technical and it's your job to guide them. They wouldn't know that an FP64 test on the $600 laptop is near useless - yet you base the entire conclusion on it.
Jeff has a day job. He is not a professional reviewer. He shows cool products and showcases what he’s passionate about. YouTube as a medium requires clickbait - that’s the belly of the beast.
Jeff, you may want to think about your credibility going forward. Please avoid becoming one of the "influencers" who collect pennies via clicks.
You have an opportunity to be continue to be taken seriously like you have been so far.
Surely there must be some way to avoid mis-leading clickbait titles.
Separately, asking your fellow community-members to not bother, and that too with an unaffected shrug, just kills the conversation we would want to have with you.
It sounds like you agree with the criticism that your title is a bunch of baloney, but somehow think that's not your fault? You wrote the lies in that title, not an algorithm.
> and the only reason for being notable is that it is a lying piece of crap
That's your takeaway from the outrage in this thread, but now you should actually watch a few videos to understand why this is a silly accusation.
Jeff Geerling is not Digital Foundry. He's not Louis Rossmann. We do not rely on him or trust him to release Chips and Cheese-tier flawless benchmarks and datasets. He's not writing the Beej's Guide to Computer Architectures, he's an enthusiast that likes to ask basic questions like "how does a GPU perform on a Raspberry Pi?" and then answer it for his followers. If that constitutes "a lying piece of crap" to you, then I don't know what to tell you. "Clickbait" has always been a component of his content and it just seems like people are upset when it's clickbait that offends their own identity.
I think the lite tip of: “take your credibility seriously” stands, however you are getting attacked by pretty much one (ab-)user. (Those type of users are normally not even in your market.)
I think it’s pretty normal that you are incentivized by YT. Too bad the internet favors screaming and yelling. Pretty clear line you draw between writing and video.
No, I disagree with you here - it isn't one user and certainly not an abuser. This is reputationally damaging, and doubling down is not helping. Arguably, the doubling down is the most damaging part.
An absence of open expression of disapproval is not the same as approval - people may just be avoiding dogpiling a member of our community.
I would add that people have a right to express disagreement or disappointment in a respectful manner in accordance with the rules of this moderated private space, and we have not had moderation/interventions suggesting otherwise. The criticisms are reasonable, to my mind at least, and probably ought to be taken as a massive hint that something is wrong. We are less than a day in, and it's not too late to fix things.
I am trying not to be too critical, as I have enjoyed previous content from this channel and I wish the poster well for the future.
I’ll just go and pick out those sentences I find not of curious good will for this forum:
“Did Jeff […] get paid to post misleading headlines”
“I can't believe this crap is getting upvoted. Hopefully this guy loses all his credibility going forward. This kind of post is seriously misleading and smells like like an undisclosed sponsor review.”
Ad hominem, cursing, opinion as fact with a barrage of replies.
That could have gone three steps up in politeness without losing any of the criticism.
Yep, there is just one account going ballistic in this HN thread, Jeff would be well within his right to ignore that kind of ragebait.
All of us have watched enough Jeff Geerling videos to know that he's not a secret spy for Intel or the Manchurian Candidate for Apple haters. He just wants to try out new technology with the curiosity that most people have, and apparently that's enough to outrage some people. Accusing him of avoiding disclosure is against HN's guidelines and generally an absentminded accusation to level. Methinks somebody doth protest too much...
For technical readers, I write my blog posts. I don't have to (I lose money hosting that thing and all it's mostly just free training data for Anthropic, OpenAI, et all), but I enjoy writing, so I do it anyway. If you don't like the YT game, please subscribe to the blog's RSS feed. I much prefer text over video.