MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed" • Hacker News Board

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#61

Post by SideburnsOfDoom » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 11:09 AM UTC

KennyBlanken wrote: post #60

throwaway4good wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great link. But what is described here is how common reviewers and influencers are treated. However a superstar like Top Gear or MKBHD won't be impressed by a night at a London airport hotel. They require much more resources otherwise the company risks the hammer coming down like it was case here. People really shouldn't be surprised by this stuff - this phenomenon is as old as mass media itself.

Top Gear is a household name around the world, even with people who aren't car enthusiasts. Nobody knows who Marcus Brownlee is unless they're into tech and under 30.

> Nobody knows who Marcus Brownlee is unless they're into tech and under 30.

Disagree. I started looking at EV reviews on Youtube, and soon noticed him in that context. Yes, including the Fisker review. I don't fit your filter. You don't need to be under 30 or into computer hardware to have that experience.

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#62

Post by xethos » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 12:35 PM UTC

znpy wrote: post #52

unsupp0rted wrote: post #34

> More people subscribe to Brownlee's YouTube channel than to the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today combined. In the recorded call with the senior engineer, he called Brownlee "this kid". Should have taken "this kid" seriously earlier.

This most likely means that this youtuber is doing a better job at delivering information than all those institutions combined

Or that the Youtube subscription is free and none of the newspapers mentioned are

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#63

Post by znpy » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 1:26 PM UTC

xethos wrote: post #62

znpy wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This most likely means that this youtuber is doing a better job at delivering information than all those institutions combined

Or that the Youtube subscription is free and none of the newspapers mentioned are

Or that none of the subscription fees are worth paying

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#64

Post by reaperman » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 1:39 PM UTC

KennyBlanken wrote: post #60

throwaway4good wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great link. But what is described here is how common reviewers and influencers are treated. However a superstar like Top Gear or MKBHD won't be impressed by a night at a London airport hotel. They require much more resources otherwise the company risks the hammer coming down like it was case here. People really shouldn't be surprised by this stuff - this phenomenon is as old as mass media itself.

Top Gear is a household name around the world, even with people who aren't car enthusiasts. Nobody knows who Marcus Brownlee is unless they're into tech and under 30.

*Marques. And most of my 35-40 year old friends know him, including most of the ones in medical/education/service industry. And we're not anywhere near a tech hub.

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#65

Post by thih9 » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 2:41 PM UTC

k8sToGo wrote: post #22

thih9 wrote: post #18

Why is that car so bad? The software seems at fault, but I’d like to know more - what exactly happens?

An unfinished mess that was rushed to release due to money issues.

I wanted a more detailed description. I watched the video, these software related issues were mentioned:

- driving modes seem impractical and half-baked

- no hill hold; expected in upcoming software update

- UI gets slow and unresponsive when switching screen orientation

- there is a burst mode with a hard limit of 500 activations (!)

- general unreliability; affects bluetooth pairing, key fob operation, cameras (!)

- color backgrounds behind the meters can sometimes blink in a distracting way

These are the ones I remembered.

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#66

Post by SllX » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 5:52 PM UTC

KennyBlanken wrote: post #49

SllX wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not by the people making the products they’re reviewing. Marques Brownlee runs an extremely popular YouTube channel; his money comes from YouTube ads and subscriptions and his reputation is everything just like any other product reviewer.

You seem unaware of the term "press junket" - events where car companies invite press to fancy locations and wine/dine them. The top tier press are invited to that, and they're expected to have nice things to say or they aren't invited back unless they have such a large audience nobody can say no to them. Just getting access to the press car fleet alone is worth something to a reviewer; if they can't get access to ca…

I know there are crap reviewers that are basically shills, and I also know that if you’re going to accuse a specific person or organization of shilling, you had best bring receipts.

You’ll also note the guy I was originally responding to didn’t, and instead throughout this thread has made vague and uncritical commentary about social media influencers and how they need to be “managed” disregarding what Marques’s channel actually does. Don’t give a guy like that an out.

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#67

Post by mingus88 » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 6:44 PM UTC

znpy wrote: post #63

xethos wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or that the Youtube subscription is free and none of the newspapers mentioned are

Or that none of the subscription fees are worth paying

Strongly disagree. I pay $2/mo for an all digital NYT subscription and it’s worth it alone for 10 minutes of Wordle every day

$2/mo is a rounding error for most people’s commute costs, even mine and I am fully remote.

The fact of traditional web content is that companies who led with free content gave away too much for too long to build their footprint and the result is that people are trained to refuse even the smallest charge to read articles, even things they seek out daily

I also feel that literacy in general has declined. Long form written content just doesn’t garner attention in a world where influencers are posting videos and images. The dopamine hit from social is something a well researched and written article can’t compete with today.

Tying all of this back to your comment, Netflix subscription costs have balloned and their subscriber counts have picked up 30 million in 2023 according to statista.

Netflix costs 10x what I pay for NYT. Journalism is far more valuable than the type of true crime docudramas cranked out on Netflix but it’s too late now

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#68

Post by whatindaheck » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 8:35 PM UTC

KennyBlanken wrote: post #54

adrusi wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

42 videos on his car review channel plus 13 videos on his main channel (a few might be crossposted) plus a couple tesla reviews from several years earlier than the others. So 50+.

Which does not mean he's qualified to review cars. There's been a huge trend in the last 5 or so years for corporations to go to "influencers" like Brownlee because they're ignorant and uninformed to the depth the industry press are. This has been going on for a decade with shitty kickstarters for bicycle accessories which had to be kickstarted because the designers couldn't sell the idea to any existing companies, g…

> Which does not mean he's qualified to review cars.

At the age of six I knew my mom’s meatloaf sucked. For some things in life, you don’t need to be “qualified”.

You don’t need to be a Certified Gearhead to know that a backup cam that doesn’t work half the time contributes towards making a car experience crappy.

In fact it can be good to have “normie” opinions and reviews. Some things are meant to be refined tools used by the general populace.

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#69

Post by unsupp0rted » Sat, Mar 09, 2024, 10:08 PM UTC

mingus88 wrote: post #67

znpy wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or that none of the subscription fees are worth paying

Strongly disagree. I pay $2/mo for an all digital NYT subscription and it’s worth it alone for 10 minutes of Wordle every day $2/mo is a rounding error for most people’s commute costs, even mine and I am fully remote. The fact of traditional web content is that companies who led with free content gave away too much for too long to build their footprint and the result is that people are trained to refuse even the smal…

I would pay a multiple of $2/mo for a subscription to the journalism of record that the NYT used to be.

In 2024, a subscription to NYT would be too expensive even if it were free.

Re: MKBHD, Fisker, and "the worst car ever reviewed"

#70

Post by GrumpySloth » Sun, Mar 10, 2024, 1:15 AM UTC

adrianmsmith wrote: post #45

> Unaware that they were being recorded, the rep let some things slip How is it OK to record a private phone conversation and publish it publicly without consent?

It’s called one-party consent, which is standard in Europe and most states of US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_call_recording_laws#...>