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Marques Brownlee (a.k.a. MKBHD).
A few weeks ago he posted a new episode of his podcast with him and a few others. They talked about Nothing Chats and Sunbird, the iPhone getting RCS and the usual OpenAI drama. At some point Marques mentions the fact that iMessage with RCS will still be "unencrypted". Following that they ponder over why RCS wouldn't have this fabled encryption, such a weird thing that RCS doesn't support encryption from the get-go, and after brainstorming for a bit someone adds the information that it indeed will be encrypted in-transit, but not end-to-end encrypted. And what comes next boggled my mind: Silence ensues. No-one says anything. You only see the faces of four grown-ass tech influencers that are stunlocked and completely unable to process what this neverheard difference between encryption methods might mean. It all just ends with "I've been trying so hard to figure out what that means. I can't." And then.......then they simply move on, not even addressing for a second this knowledge gap and solving it right there on the spot. You can watch it if you want. What hurts the most is that Marques' co-star, David, the guy that looks the most confused, made a 1+ hour history-lesson type video a few months ago about the history of the internet and the importance of HTTPS encryption.
Now, if we're talking about visual quality and overall visual production quality, his videos were insanely enjoyable to watch. I also don't want to shame anyone for not knowing something and I understand that this is in part the consequence of an ever growing company at this point. The channel is still growing and has reached 18 millions subs. Him (and his team) also cover a constantly growing tech sphere, from phones to laptops, from e-vehicles to supercars, from tech politics to tech blunders. But coming from a guy that has been a "tech influencer" on YouTube for 14 years, a guy that over the years had the chance to interview Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Sundar Pichai and surely had the chance to surround himself with experts on all sorts of topics, a guy that dedicated entire videos to Nothing Chats, the role of Quantum Computing in encryption or the dangers and potentials of the Metaverse, this kind of shocked me. I just couldn't take him seriously anymore and I hate myself for it. But it's like my grandma not knowing the difference between a normal call and a WhatsApp call, expect that he's been talking about tech for more than a decade.
Tbf Mkbhd has never been smart or technical. He has good video editing that's it. His phone reviews have always been pretty trash too. He kept asking for bigger batteries and now he whines that the phones are too big and heavy.
It really triggers me that he has become the face of "black tech Youtubers" when there's people like Jeremy Fielding out there
I know very little about electronics and really like Jeremy Fieldings videos. A very good channel.
As for mkbhd. I don't like his content on Elon musk products. He bought a Tesla and was in a bunch of their beta/early adopter stuff and makes videos with heavy praise. It gives me a bad taste about his ethics on these topics which extends to the rest of the channel.
Well, he's played a role in getting me and I'm sure many others interested in tech in the first place (remember the OnePlus One days?). So I'd say he has a bit more going for him than just video editing, he summarizes tech really well and he just....sparks that tech passion in his viewers! But I simply can't believe that in all these years he never stopped and pondered what in-transit encryption vs. end-to-end encryption might mean!
To hammer my point home: This means he doesn't understand why people would use Signal instead of sending a DM on Facebook or Instagram. Why any sane mind would pick Proton Mail over something like standard Gmail. He's absolutely clueless as to what a data breach into popular password managers like Bitwarden or LastPass might mean. When Apple says things like (and imagining this in Tim Cook's voice makes it a hundred times better) "What stays on your iPhone, stays on your iPhone." or "end-to-end encrypted, meaning that not even Apple can access it", he doesn't understand any of it and just moves on. And mind you, these are Apple presentations we're talking about, catered to the simple understanding of an average consumer.
Yes, naturally everyone has to start somewhere, but I wish him and his team (c'mon guys, I KNOW you'll read this!) would put a bit more effort into fillling knowledge gaps as soon as they come up, instead of just relying on their selective research each time a new video gets made and arrogantly thinking that in all other aspects they must still be ahead of 99% of all other people. Don't take my word for it, see for yourself: After one of his co-hosts asks people watching the podcast to tweet at him to explain it, Marques replies: "Good luck getting a tweet."
But hey, I hope these are only the first of many steps they'll take in the big world of data protection, transparency, open-source, privacy and, of course, encryption ;)
P.s. sorry for the wall of.....text.
Edit: clarification at the beginning.
FlossyCarter is my go to for phone reviews. He does a lot of stuff I don't care about, but he does the "release review" that all tech youtubers do when they get sent a device, but then he follows up with a "real review" later and his likes/dislikes are often fair critiques.
I know I'm going to get downvoted to absolute hell for this but I kinda don't like anybody who is an Apple fanboy. I used to be one like 5 years ago, however, I know have a pixel+graphene phone, arch linux laptop and desktop, selfhosted storage and media server, basically the tech nerd setup. I hate for the top YouTubers to be not a tech nerd but someone who promotes Apple fanboys who will just roll with the punches even if the company does something stupid.
Anyways, thanks for the channel recommendation. If you haven't watched Colin Furze yet, his shit is wild as well.
I know of those who understand tech very well and still own Apple products. I don't know who to hate more. I just don't like the fanboys in general. Either they know of the shitty practices or not and still got the whole apple watch, iphone, ipad, macbook, imac setup. They're just so stuck in the ecosystem that they'll never come out.
I don't like anyone who is a fan of anything, I have used iphone (iphone 3G) and been using android ever since because I like to tweak my phones (roots and flashing custom roms), but I would definitely jump to another system if a better one comes around.
Saying he isn't smart is ridiculous and rude. He very clearly is smart within his particular skillsets and in business, or else we wouldn't be here talking about him. He's also subjectively entertaining and relatable, which is why he gets more views than many other tech YouTubers, black or otherwise.
Also, you do realize that "bigger" battery doesn't necessarily mean physically bigger right? People wanting bigger batteries are usually referring to battery capacity, aka higher charge density.
It's so weird that you're triggered by a YouTubers popularity; I wasn't aware that such homerism existed in that space. Stay triggered though I guess 😂😂🤦🏾♂️
I dont know about his knowledge, really, but I watched a few videos when shopping for my most recent phone and found his reviews to be a bit shallow and personal, not particularly objective and somewhat biased.
But i would like to say, the number of views a youtuber gets is not directly related to the quality of the entertainment other than it has to appeal to the most people in order to make it. That often leaves a bland taste to the videos. Its true of youtube, of music, of film... or any form of media really. You dont get popular by being extremely talented and nishe.
It is also not directly related to being smart. You only have to look at someone like elon musk to see that. Hes, frankly, an idiot. But he has done very well for himself to a point. Obviously, he's fallen off now,
Fact is, not agreeing that Marquis is a good youtuber is not equal to being triggered, and its kind of ironic coming from the white knighr who cam running to his defence on a fairly obscure message board. :)
He never struck me as being actually knowledgable about tech. He knows the consumer level stuff, just enough to review things. But anything deeper than that he never touches.
He seems most knowledgeable about cameras and filming but he uses mostly Macs so I wouldn't expect much computer wise.
Feeling I got too, just consumer level stuff and pretty videos.
I stopped watching him about 7 years back.
Production quality wise, the videos are always exceptionally well done for a Youtube channel. I just really cannot stand his content.
He markets himself as an unbiased first look channel, but for example, any time a new phone comes out, he'd praise an iPhone for all the same reasons he absolutely fucking decimated an Android phone for. It's very similar to other products he takes a look at. The podcast is also filled to the brim with similar conversations, and it's just unpleasant tech-bro culture
he's a apple shill mkbhd
He's really not.
He's not an organic tech reviewer. All of his devices are sponsored. He exists in a completely different world than the vast majority of his audience. Money is not an object for him and he promotes always having day 1 tech. He essentially shills for whomever is giving him today's device to review and he's been very pro-Apple in his editorializing.
That's true to some extent, I guess.
I've always thought his approach has remained broadly consistent to his roots (I've been subbed to him since he was much, much smaller) but yes, the products he reviews now are almost always provided to him rather than being bought by him personally. This becomes true of any channel of his size, but I've not seen his opinion change as a result.
He addresses the topic about bias in this short , but we can look to his phone of the year awards to assess his biases objectively. For every year since the awards began in 2014, an Android device has always won Phone of the Year. An iPhone has never won an award for Best design, Best Value or Best Big Phone since records began either.
iPhones have won best camera system since 2018, but he maintains that this is due to the superior video capabilities of iPhones, but still prefers the 'look' of a Pixel photo, or the hardware of a Samsung (20x zoom etc). Androids dominate every single category simply because there are so many companies developing and competing against each other to make better and better Android devices.
Marques is personally almost always rocking a Pixel or Samsung Galaxy device as his main daily driver (because he loves the customisation and the freedom that android devices give him), and has an iPhone in his other pocket for apple things. He calls out bad Android and Apple devices in equal measure, and he actively advised against buying a newer Mac because the M2 and M3 products just don't give you enough of an upgrade over M1 to make it worthwhile.
I watch every single video he puts out and just don't see the Apple shill thing. He has always come across as an Android fan to me, but I hear the Apple shill thing all the time.