LTT'S Linus Sebastian stepping down as CEO

Modred189 said:
LTT has outgrown his skillset.
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Full disclosure, I haven't watched it yet (this is why I hate video content, I can't listen right now)

That said, his skillset is that he is a charismatic personality who presents videos well.

He was never good at the tech side of things, getting things wrong just about as often as he gets them right. His content has improved ever since he hired people to do the tech work for him, and he just kind of presented it, and that's not a mad model, but he was essentially setting up a full scale test lab, and yeah, those are really not his strengths.

Recent videos in the LTT warehouse has made this excruciatingly clear. They have been like "hey look at this expensive thing we bought for testing which I don't understand at all, hey you, explain it to us"

He was always a sales guy. That's where he got his start at NCIX, and how he got into making videos. And everyone knows sales guys don't know shit other than schmoozing.

I'd argue this decision is WAY overdue.

That said, one thing I DID like about Linus was that he never struck me as a sellout. He wasn't going to just read the review guide. He was going to tell it like it was. A little bit like Kyle, but with a sense of canadian non-confrontational politeness :p

I hope whoever he selects to succeed him has the balls and the integrity to stand up against the constant corrupting pressures in this industry.
 
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Zarathustra[H] said:
Recent videos in the LTT warehouse has made this excruciatingly clear. They have been like "hey look at this expensive thing we bought for testing which I don't understand at all, hey you, explain it to us"
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And I cannot judge at all, but often it felt a lot like the people in charge over bought for overkill always dreamed to play with toys because it was not managed that well, versus a for 20% of the cost we will have 80% of the capacity and more than enough for mass consumer review.

Could have been persona and all faking to learn about it and the cost on camera, obviously, but it gave that feeling.

I think the LTT has outgrown his skillset was well put and it could be a bit awkward to have to keep nice on camera relationship and be the day-to-day boss at the same time once it reached being an very official big business affair.
 
horrorshow said:
.... He turned down a 100 million dollar buyout???

Yeahhhhhhh ok sir.
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Sounds to me like him and his family already live very comfortably, like he loves what he does and has a desire to positively impact the industry and be a force that rests the modern shady business that all the major brands pull, trying to pressure reviewers into depicting them in a positive light, no matter how shitty they really are.

I'd like to think that if I were in a similar position, I'd have the fortitude to resist the $100M payout and sell out as well.
 
So, having watched it:
- Linus and his family remain the sole owners of the company, so they are the board.
- The new CEO is Linus old boss from NCIX.
- Linus isn't going anywhere. He is still going to be the face of the company, and feature in most of the videos.
- He is just letting someone else do the shitty day to day management work.

It really sounds like the best world for everyone. He still has oversight as the board/owner, but can let go of the day to day management and instead focus on what he loves to do, the creative video personality stuff.

While I am not the biggest Linus fan ever, I do admit he does good for the community, and I'd argue this is good news and probably the best possible outcome for the community.
 
60 millions cash, 40% equity and maybe the kind of deal you need to saty with the channels for say 5-7 years and show up in X video a month, not "free" money.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
It really sounds like the best world for everyone. He still has oversight as the board/owner, but can let go of the day to day management and instead focus on what he loves to do, the creative video personality stuff.
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Right?

Most people will never know how gut-wrenching it is to have to fire somebody or (even worse) lay them off.
 
Twisted Kidney said:
Most people will never know how gut-wrenching it is to have to fire somebody or (even worse) lay them off.
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As someone who does "know", thankfully I've never been in a position where I had to lay someone off.

But, firing someone after they've been given far too many chances/warnings?.... I had no trouble sleeping afterwards, lemme tell ya.
 
horrorshow said:
.... He turned down a 100 million dollar buyout???

Yeahhhhhhh ok sir.
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His videos move millions of views. He has 10 million subs, has a burgeoning video platform of his own, pushes like 25 videos a week, each with at least one big name sponsor. And his merch business is no joke. The guy prints money for a living.

Bag on his last video discussing financials, $100k is low. Probably by half.
 
Mega6 said:
Linus Sebastian has a net worth of approximately $85 million.
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If that from some website that give celebrity approximate net worth.... it is to be taken with a lot of grain of salt (and they could have included his wife in that, if they did anything).

I am sure we could find 200-400m net worth for Johnny Depp online on that type of website when he was in reality big financial trouble.

I could easily believe the 60m cash + 40% equity proposal, Sous Ecoute a much smaller (by 20 times say) Canadian podcast got a 7.5 millions offer, the owner had to continue to do video and star in it for 5 years I think on that deal.
 
horrorshow said:
That's about double what I expected....

Under that particular set of circumstances, I wouldn't "sell-out" either I suppose.
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You also have to remember that, net worth aside, it isn't all about money for everyone. Some people really love what they do and will do it even if they don't need the money. You see that with entertainers, where they have "fuck you" amounts of money but keep working, sometimes for less than they used to, because they enjoy doing it.

As a practical matter though if you aren't super-greedy and don't get in to silly showy shit like having a yacht, there is only so much money you usefully need.
 
I don't see the new CEO lasting long, Linus can not help himself. The reason why he is tired is because he micro manages everything. He has to make himself STOP and delegate authority to the right people. He also needs a toxic masculinity class.
 
mullet said:
I don't see the new CEO lasting long, Linus can not help himself. The reason why he is tired is because he micro manages everything. He has to make himself STOP and delegate authority to the right people. He also needs a toxic masculinity class.
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I'd bet good money, he let "wolves into the henhouse".

They'll squeeze him out, Steve Jobs style.
 
horrorshow said:
I'd bet good money, he let "wolves into the henhouse".

They'll squeeze him out, Steve Jobs style.
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That's not actually possible in this case. Since he and his wife have an equal share, and since there are no other investors, there's no ability to squeeze. If you have a company where the head owns a good chunk, but not the majority, of the stock the other investors can squeeze them out. However when there's a sole ownership you can't do shit.
 
Sycraft said:
That's not actually possible in this case. Since he and his wife have an equal share, and since there are no other investors, there's no ability to squeeze. If you have a company where the head owns a good chunk, but not the majority, of the stock the other investors can squeeze them out. However when there's a sole ownership you can't do shit.
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And, with snakes already in the grass?

I give him 5 years tops, before corporate takes his lunch-money..
 
seems like a well played out publicity stunt

he's freaked out and said he can't be "the guy" multiple times now and each time his subs and views exploded according to Social Blade

here's one from a few years ago, and i remember one with him and Luke on the WAN Show. he freaked pretty hard there, few literal cracks in his voice

 
horrorshow said:
And, with snakes already in the grass?

I give him 5 years tops, before corporate takes his lunch-money..
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What snakes, unless you mean his wife? I don't think you understand how corporate ownership works:

For public companies, like Apple, it is something that is literally bought and sold on the open market as shares. When you buy stock, you buy a small share of ownership in a company. For big companies this is generally very spread out and usually owned by investment funds. For example big holders of Apple stock are Vanguard, Blackrock, and Berkshire. What that means is that if someone want to try and force change in the company, they can do it by getting enough of these holders to vote on it. So if they want Tim Cook out, they go and get enough investors to pressure the board to either replace him, or they replace the board with members that will. Tim can't stop it, as he only owns about 0.02% of Apple.

For private companies, like LMG, they are owned one or more individuals and are not traded on the market. In the case of LMG Linus and his wife own it, with each owning half. Nobody else has ANY ownership in it, which also means that they have complete control. They can do whatever they want. The only way you could force him out is by getting his wife to sell her share, or to cooperate and even then it is really hard when it is close to a 50-50 split. A company can't buy their way in, because there are only two people to buy from and they are married. Realistically the only way to get it is what a company tried: Make a large buyout offer to buy the whole thing from both of them.

At some point he may decide to sell it and leave, but it won't be something a company can force.
 
Sycraft said:
I don't think you understand how corporate ownership works

At some point he may decide to sell it and leave
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Unfortunately, I understand all too well sir.

And yes, he will sell.. (within 5 years)
 
erek said:
seems like a well played out publicity stunt

he's freaked out and said he can't be "the guy" multiple times now and each time his subs and views exploded according to Social Blade

here's one from a few years ago, and i remember one with him and Luke on the WAN Show. he freaked pretty hard there, few literal cracks in his voice

Click to expand...

Seems like you're not actually watching these videos or listening to what he's saying. He even referenced this old video in today's video that you posted in OP. It's not a publicity stunt, it's just him being very transparent with changes in his company.

I listen to his WAN show podcast most weeks and it's pretty crazy how much he really discloses about how he runs the company and how unafraid he is to admit how he feels about most situations even if it makes him seem incompetent and ill-prepared (which he's fully aware of too). Given what I've observed from him the past several months, he's been alluding to this step down for a long time.
 
yeah I am not sure how much publicity you get for announcing a CEO as a youtube channel and if it would be worth the cost.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
Sounds to me like him and his family already live very comfortably, like he loves what he does and has a desire to positively impact the industry and be a force that rests the modern shady business that all the major brands pull, trying to pressure reviewers into depicting them in a positive light, no matter how shitty they really are.

I'd like to think that if I were in a similar position, I'd have the fortitude to resist the $100M payout and sell out as well.
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If this guy is worth $40-60 million I would probably turn it down if I was in his shoes. There are some things money can't buy. For everything else, well he has plenty of money already.
 
Twisted Kidney said:
Right?

Most people will never know how gut-wrenching it is to have to fire somebody or (even worse) lay them off.
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i don't know, i'm sure a lot of them don't care. they're only worried about themselves. and especially if the person deserves it, because sometimes they do.
 
T4rd said:
Seems like you're not actually watching these videos or listening to what he's saying. He even referenced this old video in today's video that you posted in OP. It's not a publicity stunt, it's just him being very transparent with changes in his company.

I listen to his WAN show podcast most weeks and it's pretty crazy how much he really discloses about how he runs the company and how unafraid he is to admit how he feels about most situations even if it makes him seem incompetent and ill-prepared (which he's fully aware of too). Given what I've observed from him the past several months, he's been alluding to this step down for a long time.
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There a bit of reality show over it at times.
 
Zarathustra[H] said:
Full disclosure, I haven't watched it yet (this is why I hate video content, I can't listen right now)

That said, his skillset is that he is a charismatic personality who presents videos well.

He was never good at the tech side of things, getting things wrong just about as often as he gets them right. His content has improved ever since he hired people to do the tech work for him, and he just kind of presented it, and that's not a mad model, but he was essentially setting up a full scale test lab, and yeah, those are really not his strengths.

Recent videos in the LTT warehouse has made this excruciatingly clear. They have been like "hey look at this expensive thing we bought for testing which I don't understand at all, hey you, explain it to us"

He was always a sales guy. That's where he got his start at NCIX, and how he got into making videos. And everyone knows sales guys don't know shit other than schmoozing.

I'd argue this decision is WAY overdue.

That said, one thing I DID like about Linus was that he never struck me as a sellout. He wasn't going to just read the review guide. He was going to tell it like it was. A little bit like Kyle, but with a sense of canadian non-confrontational politeness :p

I hope whoever he selects to succeed him has the balls and the integrity to stand up against the constant corrupting pressures in this industry.
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It's kind of funny, I remember him well on the old NCIX forums. At their height, NCIX was a blessing for us Canucks. Newegg wasn't really an option then since they had yet to set up their Canadian site, and the other sites had very low selection and were overpriced. Canada computers was always good in Ontario but they didn't have the selection or prices NCIX did back then. Plus since they were in BC and I was ordering in Ontario, i didn't pay the provincial sales tax. Kind of a loophole that saves me 8%.

Linus was awesome on their forums. Had enough knowledge to be extremely helpful and was very likeable. I never got past seeing him as the ultimate computer store clerk.
 
I've always like Linus and enjoyed his channel for the most part. I know he gets a lot of hate from the "hardcore" types cause the top guy usually gets all the hate but I think the guy should be admired. Kinda started the tech YouTube scene and built it up from a little hobby to like 100 employees and a 100+ million dollar company. That ain't easy to do.

I think this is a good idea for him. Let somebody who knows how to be a CEO be the CEO so he can focus on just doing the stuff that's made his channel so successful.
 
MacLeod said:
I've always like Linus and enjoyed his channel for the most part. I know he gets a lot of hate from the "hardcore" types cause the top guy usually gets all the hate but I think the guy should be admired. Kinda started the tech YouTube scene and built it up from a little hobby to like 100 employees and a 100+ million dollar company. That ain't easy to do.

I think this is a good idea for him. Let somebody who knows how to be a CEO be the CEO so he can focus on just doing the stuff that's made his channel so successful.
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Yes, this happens to almost every successful startup. VERY RARELY is a startup entrepreneur also a good CEO. That type does not like HR, finances, regulation compliance, legal issues, etc. They're creators. This way, he gets to focus on what he is best at
 
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