This is NOT how you treat your community...

[@razter6678]

I would like to mention that not only did Jay build her a new PC, but EVGA pretty much supplied most (if not all) the components for free. Kudos to EVGA too

[@dreadswizzard9142]

This is why EVGA has such a good reputation.

[@volkswagenginetta]

ya know im trying to think of evga being involved in any scandles and i cant really think of any. its easy with gigabyte or msi, but evga has been pretty good. The have quietly just been a good company. evga deserves the clout it gets

[@volkswagenginetta]

@@dreadswizzard9142 im not sure if it is, they just avoid doing shitty things, this just reinforces they dont do shitty things

[@devilsancientminions]

This is why I buy EVGA when I can. Such a great company.

[@stevesamuel263]

Meh, its good marketing by them, not really something praiseworthy

[@computer1up]

Ironic, isn’t it? Noah mentioned that he started the company to be like LTT. He mentioned something like “we’d be the LTT of PC building companies”. Not only does the actual Linus of the Tech Tips not even recognize him, he does the opposite of what Linus’d do.

[@paulmusselman]

95% of the time when someone says that they mean the money aspect of it.

[@namonaite]

I don't think he understood Linus cares about his promises, and probably wouldn't go back on them even if it costs him substantially.

[@necros748]

@@paulmusselman nah I've been around a lot of small business startups, if they're the type, they always start out looking up to a business idol and then end up trying to eclipse their idol's accomplishments in their own mind when the power goes to their head. "Yeah this is what bezos was doing when he was like me if he owned a mcdonald's, good job Brendan" its actually really sad. Power hits people's mind like a drug they can't get off of until it runs out

[@chucklesdeclown8819]

It was at this moment that(hope fully) he new, he fucked up

[@SeraphX2]

@@necros748 But I think that has to do with a core part of your being that is immutable. Linus has power and he seems to be an altruistic person who truly wants to help others. Power didn't get to his head. If power gets to your head, it always was and probably is indicative of someone that's not all that great to be around socially. if you are willing to publicly make fun of someone and not feel the smallest amount of shame while doing it (that shame should have cropped up as soon as you thought about it) then you do that all the time to people.

[@Frost640]

Artesian builds is now defunct, someone did some digging and found that they were committing tax fraud/evasion and the State of California revoked their business license.

[@bobberry1463]

Imagine thst you trying to save a few bucks so you fuck over a small streamer and your company get shut down and you might get arrested

[@lexecomplexe4083]

Lmao that makes this even more hilarious

[@AnonEyeMouse]

@@lexecomplexe4083 sorry to be a buzzkill, because I want to laugh at a arsehole tanking his business like that, but they axed 50 staff members because of it. Not sure if that was their entire staff or if more layoffs will follow, but that's lot of people who just got shafted because of one idiot CEO. Steve at Gamers' Nexus did a video on it.

[@altruisticlemur]

@@AnonEyeMousethat fuckin sucks. wonder if someone could set something up so the PC community can rally behind all the fired employees the same way we did with the streamer

[@liltimmyotoole]

@@altruisticlemur Steve (GN) was reaching out to as many of them as he could, to help them find jobs through some of his contacts.

[@JasonZakrajsek]

Fun Fact: If you give a free PC to a smaller streamer, it makes both of you look good.

[@FizzyCape]

For real. Other small streamers see that a small streamer won the pc, and they’re more likely to work with artesian in the future

[@oz_jones]

@@FizzyCape and it doesnt make you look like an absolute mong

[@lyianx]

Fun Opinion: I think small streamers deserve to win a PC WAY more than big streamers. Because Big steamers very likely are earning enough to just BUY one on their own. ITs the smaller ones that could use the assistance. So their sudden magic requirement that they be "big enough" makes even less sense.

[@adverbs626]

Fun Fact: If you act like a human and treat others with respect you wont seem like a giant douchebag.

[@zimmerman1031]

Unless you can't afford it, then it makes you look and feel broke.

[@treescompany3462]

The first 10 seconds make me feel great: this boutique PC builder who acts like he's a big shot who's above smaller streamers gets a "who? Never heard of em" from someone who actually matters in the industry

[@4450krank]

And that they look up to linus just makes it so much better.

[@loowick4074]

@@4450krank they don't look up to Linus they feel like they are on par. The CEO is an absolute egoistic tool.

[@GamerThatSucks13]

@@loowick4074 He doesn't think he's on par, he actually think he's better than Linus. Which makes this even better

[@carlosbenitez6148]

The sip tastes better when you know that this CEO was using Linus as a role model 💀💀😭😭😭😭💀

[@carlosbenitez6148]

@@loowick4074 he uses Linus as role model 😭😭💀 Imagine getting dragged by your role model 😂😂😂😂😂

[@sohamray2266]

So basically he destroyed his company & boosted a small creator by roasting her .... PEAK IRONY right there.

[@xiao7372]

Indeed

[@empath69]

was letting the company fall apart for not paying the bills ("BO-RING!") while chasing Internet Fame... ...well, at least he got *infamous* - does that count? XD

[@FlabbyTabby]

What if.......that was his plan all along?!

[@AbirZenith]

Congratz Artesian Builds, you finally got recognized by LTT, not the way you wanted though

[@extreme123dz]

A bad publicity is stilla publicity

[@AbirZenith]

@@extreme123dz not in this case

[@giantskeleton420]

@@extreme123dz the effects thanks to bad publicity say otherwise

[@ilenastarbreeze4978]

@@extreme123dz itnis, but id never touch this guy ever because od this

[@Mr.Genesis]

@@extreme123dz Not if it means your entire company is basically forfeit. No they can't do business anymore. So this publicity is not at all good for anyone in that company

[@Bigred10101]

Hats off to Linus for not wanting to let people go around Christmas, I worked for a bike shop for just under a year and they fired me three days before Christmas which caused me to go broke twice trying to get though that period. The way I found out was my employee log in was cancelled, and it took me a couple of days of calling before they told me, I found out later the reason they did that was because I could ask for a full time contract after 1 year of casual work

[@cocoahere]

So basically they let you go right before they would have to let you work more hours/get paid more?

[@Bigred10101]

@@cocoahere yeah pretty much, to my understanding they realised that I was a couple of days away and just fired me there and then as they didn't want to risk me having solid grounds for worksafe to get involved

[@qq13563817153]

@@Bigred10101 that's extremely shitty, are there no repercussions that can come from that? Also I hope you're doing much better now

[@da_pawz]

@@Bigred10101 wow that's really a bad company...

[@MediocreTCG]

Yeah, bike shops are mostly run by shit bags. Former tech for Impact Bikes/a few others. Would still be a bike tech if Impact didn't make me sign a non-compete and fire me random, thus forcing me entirely out of the job market and into something different.

[@Spiderpichi2099]

I love Jay’s response. He responded so fast and postponed his plans to help a streamer who was treated poorly by people she probably looked up to.

[@maxzett]

The kinda thingy I dislike about Jay's actions is that he does it for clicks and attention. He could've literally done it without any public attention and just give it to her in private. Edit: (not gonna argue about this anymore. I prefer people to do good without needing to "cannabalize" it. You guys are okay with it. That's it and I won't change my opinion about this, so don't try to make me do it).

[@seanvermilion7256]

@@maxzett I can see your point about Jay benefitting from all of this, but he also publicly criticized the wrong doing and demonstrated how to treat someone the right way. It's kind of unavoidable to get PR clout out of it. The most good was done this way so that's what he decided to do

[@MrBizteck]

We live in a ln social world .... Jay runs a business to do it privately would be stupid business. Anyway he wasnt the only one to offer her equipment. Ya it is a bit crass but its no different to corperations sponcering schools or Amazon building wind farms.

[@SolaireFlair]

@@maxzett because it's so much different than something like Rig Reboot? You think LTT doesn't benefit from the positive press of sponsors sending them stuff to build lucky PC gamers whole new PCs? Come on, if you're gonna dislike one creator for getting good PR for a nice gesture, then you have to dislike everyone who does the same thing.

[@maxzett]

@@SolaireFlair sure they do. But monetizing and "promoting" the shit out of a nice gesture has a bad taste coming with it. He could've done it privately. It's not like he'd need the few clicks from it. Also rig reboot is a totally different thing

[@rsin314159]

Imagine getting roasted by your idol.... just days after burying your own company. Just desserts are the sweetest.

[@FuburLuck]

He doesn't care. He's a sociopath. Oh, and the company folded today. 50 people out of work. See the Gamers Nexus video from today about it.

[@atimholt]

Just a correction because I think it’s a cool quirk of English: it’s actually “just deserts”, with an obscure “single s desert” pronounced the same as “dessert”. It’s related to the word “deserve”.

[@ifiwantyoutofeel]

@@atimholt 🤓

[@lahar2412]

@@ifiwantyoutofeel “sir those are the display toilets”

[@jimthegentleman2446]

@@lahar2412 "why are you in my house?"

[@hnt6885]

I mean this can actually get a lot worse for them what they did was actually illegal in the US

[@tsalVlog]

yup. this has been quietly ignored. giving away something expensive like this that has rules - breaking your own rules is fraud.

[@michaelcorcoran8768]

Right, linus is keeps mentioning it as a moral situation, but it's actually also a legal one. Even using the term giveaway comes with quite a lot of legal requirements.

[@alexdavis9324]

@@michaelcorcoran8768 it's only a legal situation if someone actually pursues it. Nobody has

[@no_nameyouknow]

@@alexdavis9324 Not true. A crime is a crime whether you get away with it or not. I hear what you are saying, but I want to clarify, it's not like a civil case, crimes are crimes.

[@crisnmaryfam7344]

Oh and it did lol.

[@Dusty_Daddy]

As a former ambassador for their company, this stuff has been crazy to watch and unfold. Don’t shame small creators, especially those who work and do free advertisements for you. Noah sucks, no matter what he thinks he’ll never be as cool as Linus.

[@azntactical4884]

All they had to do was give her the pc and tell the followers to go help bump her numbers up.

[@alextaylor4973]

I trust you're being genuine but the vast majority of Artesian Buillds chat were chanting reroll so they were just as bad as the company

[@Dusty_Daddy]

@@alextaylor4973 the ambassadors weren’t the ones doing that, the majority of the mod team and employees in chat were shouting reroll, discussions between ambassadors was already happening in the twitter and discord chats that we were confused as to why he was refilling and then it only got worse

[@FierceElements]

The company had an option to take a different spin on this and be the actual good guy. "Kia has no click-throughs but is a longtime ambassador! Congratulations Kia, and a massive thank you to all our ambassadors! We appreciate our entire community; we wouldn't be where we are without your trust and support in our brand!"

[@aegis_knight]

the good ending

[@drebk]

To become a CEO and not know that this is the right response...

[@LavenderSunrise]

Evil Noah be like

[@nunyabusiness271]

What a yikes to act like that on stream from a CEO. Makes you wonder how he acts in private if this is how he presents himself publicly.

[@dkrampage2933]

From the information coming through about him... Not very well.

[@sopcannon]

@@dkrampage2933 according to Kris ex employees say he is bad.

[@fruitbouquet5479]

Not that I condemn fraternity, but he sounds and acts like a hazing frat boy.

[@FakeJeep]

Probably like some Activision people we know.

[@digizilla164]

He just has a face that screams Im a frat boy douchebag please punch me.

[@ImJapanda]

My friend hired them to build him a PC (before this incident) he paid for it, they built it on stream, now they're not shipping it, unbelievable.

[@Cooe.]

Tell him to contact his bank for a chargeback ASAP! The company's bankrupt and all stuff they have like those PC's & parts will be sold to pay creditors. He's not getting a PC or his money back from them, and if he doesn't contact his bank like RIGHT NOW he's going to end up with absolutely nothing. 🤷‍♂️

[@ImJapanda]

@@Cooe. He ended up getting his money back 🤙🏻 Now hes looking at other options.

[@mcsnuggie]

@@ImJapanda tell him to build it himself he'll get more bang for the buck and he could always get a local pc shop to build it for him

[@ImJapanda]

@@mcsnuggie He ended up getting his money back thanks to his CC company and got a superior PC for cheaper

[@jeremydale4548]

Honestly the PCs that AREW ALREADY OWNED SHOULD NOT BE SOLD OFF! Whoever decided THAT was OK should be arrested for depriving people of property.@@Cooe.

[@techpappee]

Jay mailed her the PC. He even made a video on 'how to properly pack and ship a PC' with it. Big thumbs up to the community for standing up for her. That was wrong on sooo many levels what he did.

[@armchairgeneralissimo]

Jay wasn't messing around either 5950x and an RTX 3080ti! The system he made is no doubt better than what the 'give away' PC would have been.

[@stanguay169]

Many thanks to Jayz for helping Kiapiaa.

[@Ghost011]

What a man of the pc community, the build was really cool too 👀

[@rhiley36]

Man can’t believe hov helped out her.

[@KevKlopper]

99 problems but a PC ain't one

[@prisonerofthehighway1059]

Jay didn’t just build her a computer, he drove to EVGA headquarters and raided their warehouse to build her a computer lol.

[@TipOfTheSauce]

Was Jay supposed to manufacture the parts on his own?

[@JbHomestead]

He made a few calls, and Evga agreed. He did something, not like me, or you just sit here a comment.

[@epico5805]

Oh cool so now every tech youtuber has to manufacture every component by hand from the stone age

[@Psyopcyclops]

@@epico5805 Primitive Technology Episode 10,000 Manufacturing GPU From Beach Sand

[@tonicipirani7659]

What a simp, lol

[@Decadentotter]

I really appreciate you not wanting to fire someone around Christmas. I was once told I'd be losing my job 3 weeks before Christmas and that absolutely destroyed me. Especially since I was told on my birthday. I couldn't even enjoy the holidays with family because I had to keep telling people I no longer had a job and no one was scheduling interviews right before Christmas.

[@gregorymirabella1423]

are you doing better now?

[@Decadentotter]

@gregorymirabella1423 I'm doing a lot better thank you. That Christmas layoff happened almost 8 years ago. I have recovered from it, but I still think about it from time to time

[@benjaminoechsli1941]

"I consider [keeping my word] to be basic." We need more of that in this day and age.

[@r.daneel.90]

Respect and empathy? Yeah, unfortunately its very common that people who demand that, rarely practice it.

[@cIappo896]

gotta say, huge respect for actually keeping that employee. My 1st company kept telling a single mom in her early 20s that she's getting a new contract. On the day her contract expired, she was told no contract. Still makes me vomit.

[@gregorymirabella1423]

how is she now?

[@cIappo896]

@@gregorymirabella1423 that was years ago, i was her manager so i've pretty much lost contact with a huge majority of the people i worked with, which was like 250-300 at some point.

[@Stew91]

The immediate internet justice that followed such an awful situation, was so satisfying to see. The audacity of that man to talk down to others like that.

[@JohnKerbaugh]

Most giveaways like this are designed to get people to sign up, and stay signed. Also giveaways can have legal issues when you require certain prior actions. Which is why many contests you'll hear no purchase necessary and you can write to them and requesting entries

[@bobberry1463]

The reason they say no purchase necessary is because if you required people to buy something to win a prize it consider gambling which have allot of strict rules.

[@empath69]

@@bobberry1463 yeah California defines "any draw where *consideration is given by the player to enter the draw* a 'Lottery'" - and unless you've already gotten a license from the government to run a CHARITABLE lottery draw (i.e. 13% or less go to administration and 87% or more go to the registered charity/nonprofit), you're committing a misdemeanor offense and can end up in criminal court, iirc punishment is like up to $2500 and even incarceration! California is STRICT on this - not a state you wanna 'fuck around and find out' :D

[@marhawkman303]

@@empath69 yeah, Just guessing, but could be why the business license got suspended. The tax thing is... kinda weak sauce. Illegal publicly displayed contests? He wasn't even sneaky about it. He yelled it. He was right that he was allowed to change the rules.... but... he had to PUBLISH the revised rules, which he never did.

[@empath69]

@@marhawkman303 exactly; the government (in the US, the State level) regulates giveaways, sweepstakes, etc. to combat fraud of ppl getting just outright robbed; one of the consistent things internationally is: any changes you make to the rules of a giveaway MUST be before the 'draw' happens so that entrants have time to see the revisions and decide whether or not to enter. Them wanting to revise the program (which is part Sweepstakes and part sponsorship/endorsement in an unsettling blend of 'not a lottery' and 'maybe a lottery' that would make a lawyer nervous) to be more effective for the company's benefit is not wrong....but doing in MID-DRAW, live-streamed and recorded for posterity...well, like I said: **Attorney-General of California has entered the chat** ;)

[@GlarialsTombMossGiant]

Well, the CEO just straight up laid off the entire staff via Slack so your comparison to not wanting to let the employee go right before Christmas is even more apt

[@peope1976]

I don't think he had a choice. It was probably in bankruptcy and at that time any spending you do makes you personally liable. You have to take assets in a waterfall priority way.

[@empath69]

@@peope1976 the COO got fed up and quit back in November - seems like HE was doing all the 'boring grown-up' paperwork that was keeping the company RUNNING and after five months of neglect, the whole mess comes crashing to a halt over unpaid bills, state corporate taxes, etc. The fact that everything falls apart JUST as Katz acts like the Douchebag of the Hour is just evidence of some sort of higher power out there with a deliciously evil sense of timing. Lunkhead narcissist wanted to be 'internet famous'...say, dude - will you take *infamy*? XD

[@helios566]

@@peope1976 He had a choice about how much notice to give. He chose a week, doesn't matter how you slice that, it's a disgusting thing to do to your employees.

[@andromydous]

The top thing to realize is that, as Jay has said, I'm quite certain that what that company did was commit fraud. Even if they can't be brought up on criminal charges, some lawyer could potentially have one hell of a lawsuit case against said company. I'd almost wager that it could be considered "bait and switch". I'm not a lawyer, however, my wife used to be a paralegal and she's pretty sure that there's legal and civil ramifications.

[@FarikoUnited1]

They also committed tax fraud so yeah they could be in some serious legal mess.

[@fightingfalconfan]

Tax fraud sure, but if you have no legal binding contract; you really can't be touched. Each state has different laws about giveaways. I don't know where the computer company is based but according to Jay she's in Texas. Have to look up Texas law on giveaways. But again; it would be hard to do anything to them if she and the company never had a written contract.

[@andromydous]

@@fightingfalconfan I don't know about that. There was a lady who entered into a giveaway for a Toyota, but got a toy Yoda instead. She was able to sue whichever comapny she worked for. There may not be any criminal actions that can be taken, but I can't see how there's no civil action. Anyways, the company is getting hid pretty hard by "ambassadors" disengaging and by social media such as LTT and JayzTwoCents.

[@mystikarain]

@@fightingfalconfan Over state lines giveaways are a Federal issue. Local and state laws are not even on the table when these giveaways are interstate. (I think it is also just you need to know the streamer had a contract, a legally binding contract with Artisan Builds. I was tempted with a sign on deal as not just a creator but also as a "partner" but I refused because they would have taken my design and licensed it under their name not mine.)

[@chubbynubs2208]

the youtube lawyer strikes again lmfao

[@TheUnknownaccent]

I like how floored Linus was when he heard they were throttling the graphics cards. That needs to be made into a sound bite

[@Teth47]

If a member of the community is being a jackass, you are allowed to talk about them being a jackass, that isn't being shitty to your audience, that's being a good human. We all need to speak up around bad behavior more.

[@EmpressEmbeth]

Yup! There's a big difference between being mean to your community, and calling someone on BS behavior. And this commentary is firmly in the latter category.

[@AnimeSunglasses]

Agreed. It's not even a roast or anything like that -- you can't build a good community if you're not willing to call out bad behavior by anyone in your community.

[@brootalbap]

This aged so well.

[@unclehowdy409]

Man linus should take some advice from this guy

[@the_undead]

Why should Linus insult smaller content creators? Cuz as far as I can tell that's what you are suggesting

[@boytype]

I was fr 1 week away from ordering a build from Artesian before this happened, and I hear that they have not only halted refunds, but basically stopped buying parts and are only completing orders that they can complete with hardward already in their warehouse. They fired their entire team over slack with no notice, and are basically grabbing all the money they can and running for the hills.

[@elcoronacartel]

When Luke mentions they wanted to be the PC company Linus would have created, and he looks at the camera and says "NOPE!" I nearly lost it. XD

[@empath69]

Yeah, and you know what I would have loved to see? Katz's reaction to what Linus - his idol - thinks of Noah trying to be like him...

[@Kitsune-Chaos]

PC hardware community came together hard for this one and QUICK. Certainly feels good.

[@empath69]

Amid so much shitty behavior, we have awesome people step up and make things right.

[@tabeseb]

Thank you youtube algo

[@nemanjaradisavljevic9983]

It's there's to decide the requirements for that draw. And so they can determine if someone meets those requirements and if not, draw again until all requirements are met. But to set requirements and then afterwards change them "on the fly" plus roast the winner of that draw like they did is just uncalled for.

[@japanadian879]

changing the req in the middle for shits in giggles is fraud lol

[@24680kong]

Kinda like when the definition of "astronaut" was changed retrospectively just to snub people.

[@fist003]

it's illegal. here's a video that best breaks it down by Hoeg Law kzbin.info/www/bejne/ooO4aJlno5inb9E

[@mikeymaiku]

@@fist003 hoeg law, one of EZA's first long term advertisement supporter!

[@SomeQuackingDuck]

Seems even the algo has turned, I am now convinced it is both sentient and enjoys some good drama.

[@melbelts4357]

I love how much Linus loves his company, his employees, and his audience.

[@SkylerLinux]

The funny bit about the ROI is that by picking a small struggling streamer, you can get a huge ROI just by making their streams better. For even more/better ROI just push them afterwords so that they pop up more and you're niceness comes up more.

[@deViant14]

Twitter / Artesian Builds: March 1: We're LIVE for our giveaway March 5: We're examining an employee buyout of the company Feds: March ?: Tax evasion / giveaway fraud / FTC/SEC charges World record company destroying speedrun

[@nathangoddard8115]

My photography company used to photograph students at lower income schools for free and provided a free sheet of pictures to each student, again for free. It cost me money but it did not go unnoticed by other schools, it was appreciated by the families and it was the right thing to do. You do not need to 'win' every transaction to be successful in business or life.

[@GabbieTheFox]

Update to this story... Artesian Builds is, as of 8 hours ago, effectively closed down. The company accounts have been frozen and all 50 of their staff have been laid off. Up until the day before this, staff were instructed via the company's slack channel to stop providing refunds to customers (ex-employees have been leaking screenshots to youtubers like The Quartering and Gamer's Nexus). EDIT (Extra Info) : Builds that were in progress as of the time this news broke are in limbo and will almost certainly NOT be delivered. (If you have a pending order with Artesian, get a charge-back now. Artesian will not provide a refund as all the company accounts are frozen due to suspected tax fraud.) Additionally, Artesian is suspected of committing tax fraud in California. As a result they have had their California business license revoked and have lost the rights to operate under the name Artesian. That's right. Anyone in the US can start a business now and take their name if they wanted and Artesian would be forced to change their name and they would not be allowed to reclaim their name after the investigation. Also while the investigation is ongoing, Artesian has lost the right to file legal action or defend themselves in a court of law. And to add insult to injury, any contracts Artesian Builds had can now be broken freely by the other party or can be cancelled immediately without consequence. To put that in plain English, from what I am aware... All their suppliers now have grounds to drop Artesian at any time and Artesian can't do anything about it. All their ambassadors are also immediately freed from any exclusivity deals they had with Artesian too and NDAs can be freely ignored. And due to the investigation, I believe that all their assets are frozen and they cannot legally close the business, they HAVE to remain open.

[@kryptic7598]

Linus apologies can go into that Smithsonian Museum for terrible apologies now too

[@the_undead]

I would say that apology video that line is made was probably about as good as it could have been. Linus is easily could have roasted Steve for practices that are arguably worse than anything Linus has done over the past 10 years, but he didn't. Because when that apology video was made, he sat down and thought about the situation rationally, instead of in the emotionally charged state he had been in for the past couple days like happens every single time there is a controversy around Linus

[@t1mmy13]

Heh thanks. This makes me feel better, I have always felt 'wronged' by a company I left at the end of a year that witheld a bonus (half a month pay, not even that big) because I was leaving. My last day was 31st of january even, those were some fun weeks.

[@TrynityMirell]

Man wish Linus would listen to this guy

[@the_undead]

So you want Linus to screw over people?

[@seepeoplenotme]

“Is it like a Christian group?” Made my day

[@aodhanmorrissey]

Crazy that the algorithm recommended this today LMAO

[@zaneplatt3533]

This comment still makes no sense, and LTT is still going strong so...

[@adamhunt5291]

I've always thought about any corporate give-aways as a kind of investment, you may give a number small creators an olive branch, if one of them small creators becomes famous and spreads your name then it's an investment worth while.

[@PhilBoswell]

Yep, and you could say similarly about the Christmas giveaway that Linus described if you wanted to put it into cold business terms: that's one extra person out there who is likely to be willing to praise LTT to the skies for being generous, as opposed to someone who would take any opportunity to get back at them.

[@pointblank2890]

Exactly! Even the scummiest and most grimy corporations understand that give aways build good rapport and is an investment that (most of the time) costs them very little. You'd be nuts as a company not to do a giveaway even if it only had a small chance of an return in investment further down the line. But the CEO guy of Artesian Builds is obviously NOT a businessman or someone who likes computers at all, unlike Linus who is both, and it shows Overall it makes zero sense from any angle you look at it from

[@nixsquish]

to be an ambassador, you have to apply for the program but i was approached (by approached, they messaged me via twitter dms) that they were interested in me and my content as an ambassador for them. there was nothing about numbers (my twitch numbers were just roughly around 600 at the time or so), and it was a month before the giveaways for ambassadors started. the only requirement to enter was to have your panel up on your about page with your code, and that the more tenured you are as an ambassador, the more chances you get for winning. there was no email about guidelines, it was all mostly just in discord. i think the first giveaway was announced there too.

[@jaysunbrady]

Oooo, how the tables turn.

[@LOLHICRONO]

this is gonna age nicely

[@jinxedpenguin]

I know this is yet another old video but you not firing/laying people off around Christmas is honestly amazing. I worked at a start up that treated their employees really well and was one of the highest ranked places to work in my area. They are profitable as well. They laid off 10% of us in early December with pretty poor severance. This was about 3 weeks after our CEO said that we were "strong going into potential recessions and didn't foresee any layoffs". The only positive is, apparently workplace culture has drastically changed after they laid off 10% of their staff, so I'm honestly kinda glad I got laid off early on and at least got some severance versus them trying to find reasons to terminate employees for "lackluster performance" (fwiw I'm pretty sure I got the ax because I was the highest paid midlevel employee on my team.) So, genuinely, thanks. I hope someone at LMG sees this because getting laid off right before Christmas was honestly pretty shitty. At least I don't have a family to really buy gifts for, or kids, but man. I'm sure some of my colleagues did and imagining them getting axed sucks even more.

[@SuperDanielHUN]

The problem isn't that this guy wants to give it away to a "positive ROI" streamer, the problem is changing rules on the fly and cancelling prizes. If you want ROI streamers, make only streamers with 20k+ combined followers elligable, then make sure your back end verifies the right ppl. If you can't do that, it's your fault, and I'm absolutely certain what this guy did violates some laws of what constitutes a fair promotional giveaway.

[@martenkahr3365]

It absolutely does. Which is why they didn't openly have those "requirements" listed as a condition. Because at that point it's no longer a promotional giveaway, it's using a lottery to randomly pay some, but not all, of the people who have produced a ROI for your company. Especially since most of the components were actually provided for free by Intel, and that deal probably had strings attached as well.

[@Henners]

The problem Is him changing it yes, but the reason WHY he changed it was the positive ROI

[@empath69]

@@Henners Dude, the State of California doesn't give a flying fig WHY you changed the rules of the draw DURING the draw, they just focus on THAT you changed it mid-draw while Operating An Illegal Lottery and throw you in a county jail...

[@mkdator3019]

That's not the first time they refused to accept the winner, CEO does it all the time, I've watched 20 minutes of their stream and I've seen it twice, because the "winner" didn't have satysfying amount of folowers. And when community was upset he said "My company, my rules"

[@VeraTheTabbynx]

US law says "lol no that's illegal"

[@empath69]

@@VeraTheTabbynx **State Of California Lottery Commission has entered the chat** ^_^

[@papasauce234]

From what I've heard, the west coast branch of Artesian was run by the CEO and generally made the streamer PCs and other high profile PCs, and had a much higher % of rmas and complaints than the east coast branch which was responsible for normal customer builds which seemed to be of much higher build quality

[@essvd2524]

Linus saying he’s never heard of this guy is going to kill his ego. And trust me he has a HUGE ego

[@Anon1370]

Tbh I never heard of the guy either so many won't have

[@crowdemon_archives]

I wonder if it went as well as the "little sun" comment in a specific part of Final Fantasy 14... 😂

[@apanda0077]

I never heard of this guy or artesian before all this, but now I'm convinced Noah Katz only started a company to say he's the ceo of a tech company super ambiguously to people.

[@Goretantath]

"oh god he's part of our community" Then disown him? You don't need to let bad people be a part of your community.

[@crowdemon_archives]

They kinda disowned themselves from the whole legal fuckery lol

[@danielcintz8880]

7:25 lol

[@roflmfao4life]

Omg lolololololololollolololololololol

[@SurgStriker]

damn sounds like LMG parties are off the hook. Last company i worked at that had any sort of christmas giveaways would have a couple 'high end' gifts (more than $100) for probably around 200 employees in the office, with most of the rest being modest to lame gifts (ex. one year i along with a few other people got a pinata... no real reason as it had nothing to do with our company. Other stuff would be like mugs). So hearing about a party where people are walking away with multiple thousands of dollars in gifts, that alone could get a company lots of applicants lol

[@reaganharder1480]

I've been to one company Christmas party in my life, and the giveaways were stuff like mugs, jackets, probably a google home mini or two, and no one got more than one thing. That company also did a monthly draw for one person who had a birthday that month of $50 free gas (it was a car dealership, so they just wrote up a gas slip that would be used at one of the gas stations they had an account with. Probably the only free gas giveaway that asked you to bring back your receipts).

[@shawnburton1687]

Thank you for being an upstanding man Linus. My wife was fired three weeks before Christmas, while being 5 months pregnant, and we struggled mightily to provide a good Christmas for our son because of it. Shows your character that you wouldn't do that.

[@babsguette0919]

well this aged liked milk

[@davidalbrec]

Wow…. Watched you here and there for several years, as someone who isn’t really tied to the “PC” community, but was in the past. You are a great example of what we need more of in business, period. Someone with good ideas, is able to execute on them, but not at the expense of the people around them.

[@tsalVlog]

at 7:50 I'm super happy to see we agree here. it seems like today, many people have the belief that you don't *have* to keep your word as long as you're popular / get likes. just.. oof.

[@Epicghost18]

The irony in all of this now that all these things at LMG are coming to light

[@Henrik0x7F]

What things?

[@ericpisch2732]

Noah’s ego has grown with his stream, it was a terrible cringe moment, glad your covering this

[@bypassmobilehelp9571]

Yvonne was the employee in question; she's very forgiving.

[@saulgoodman2018]

It's funny how KZbin recommended this video to me?

[@roty9509]

Apparently the company also owes the IRS a not insignificant amount in back taxes and is potentially facing losing their business license and rights to the business name if they aren’t paid soon.

[@lexecomplexe4083]

California revoked their business license lmao

[@lexecomplexe4083]

And if you get it revoked in one state good luck getting another in any other state haha

[@TheBigExclusive]

Noah Katz: I wanted to be everything you are Linus! Linus: I don't even know who you are.

[@RandomVenezuelan]

Aged like milk and the algorithm knows it

[@the_undead]

Would you mind actually telling me how? Or for that matter, how the particular controversy you speak of is any different from any of Linus's previous controversies?

[@BarbazuX]

Jay seems like such a standup dude. Him and Linus both have earned to be where they are through work and determination. A good sense of fun and respect for the audience helps ten-fold. This guy Noah seems like the kind of guy who would not wear a mask on an airplane, and then look surprised when exhausted travelers who just want to get home don't back up his bullshit.

[@drizzle8309]

Couple things to learn from this I think. First one's for companies: don't let your CEO do publicity stuff unsupervised. I think it was proven CEOs are more likely to be sociopaths. Not saying Noah is, but it seems like that's a risk you don't want to take. Second one's for us, and it's nothing new: companies are not your friends. You are their target.

[@BackwardsCombatable]

Imagine thinking the takeaway is that the CEO shouldn’t talk publicly, rather than the CEO shouldn’t be an asshole.

[@drizzle8309]

@@BackwardsCombatable people will be assholes and assholes do well in positions like that. and people don't change. so, in our non-fairytale world, keeping him in check and offline is the most realistic solution we'll get to this problem

[@muninrob]

@@BackwardsCombatable Most good CEOs ARE assholes - most of them are also smart enough to hire a PR department that keeps them out of the public eye. Something about being a sociopathic asshole seems to give you a leg up in upper level business & politics.

[@empath69]

well, its oddly coincident that the COO who was apparently doing all the boring grown-up stuff like paying the bills etc to keep the company running QUIT in November 2021, and only AFTER that time does CEO Katz go off the rails in such an disgraceful manner. Forget having to be The Ant to Noah's 'Grasshopper'; how much struggle and effort did that poor COO have to put in to keep Katz from embarrassing the company up to this point?

[@drizzle8309]

​@@empath69 Good point. Though it has to be said that even before this Artesian has apparently done shady stuff, like throttling PCs etc. This fiasco has been pretty public, but for everything before, it's going to be pretty difficult to apportion blame. I hope GamersNexus gets somewhere with interviews so we can get some inside info. Who I feel for most though, are the employees. Having read some of the internal messages, this whole thing had to have been awful for all of them. I love seeing people like Noah get what they deserve, but there are too many people involved and affected to get any sort of satisfaction, no matter what happens to him. edit: I might have to change my first 'thing to learn' though. Maybe to 'dont hire a CEO', since it's pretty debated whether they actually affect anything and they are almost always grossly overpaid. Or maybe 'get a cheap CEO', cause I can't for the life of me remember if not having one is worse than having a bad one...

[@imushavem7504]

Watched Jays2Cents build video on this. Much respect to that man!!!

[@scotty82]

I wonder if Linus watches this video and thinks, maybe he made a few too many mistakes..... Throwing stones in glass houses. Well Done Linus

[@valascasunbelter4966]

The best way to fix LTT now, is to trash Linus!!

[@Henrik0x7F]

What did Linus do?

[@kinggalactix]

Jay did a good thing building that PC for her, and EVGA for helping out as well. As well as Linus, JTC and other computer building youtubers talking about this bad issue. Glad there's a good ending. I saw the video myself, and I was surprised!

[@MarieAxelsson]

As someone who was let go from their dream job at the beginning of December (years ago), I appreciate this from Linus.

[@MrBasicHelixLoop]

Back to art school darling.

[@DarkTrapStudio]

Linus should be at the minister of empathy and respect

[@Corristo89]

Well this aged poorly. People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones, eh Linus? Now that LMG is facing a massive PR scandal caused by managing oversight or indifference and a destructive, self-imposed crunch on the backs of its employees, everybody at LMG should get ready to eat a boatload of humble pie.

[@Lb8068]

Couldn’t have put it better myself!

[@jeremydale4548]

Oh for pete's sake! Will everyone STOP overblowing this?! It's pure ridiculousness how this got blown WAY out of proportion! Yes. LMG made a mistake. IT HAPPENS! GET THE FUCK OVER IT!

[@publiusii4246]

I know im late to the controversy but i don't think you could have twisted this any harder to call him a hypocrite if you were a contortionist. You took a guy renegging on a contest as opportunity to say something about glass houses about workplace conditions those things don't line up.

[@hiredgunsg6178]

The expressions of Linus had me crackin up. The facial expressions in the video are pretty funny especially when it was said that Artesian Builds wanted to work with LTT. lol

[@FarikoUnited1]

If they had set the requirements of numbers prior to doing the giveaway or prior to joining the ambassador program thats fine but the fact they had no numbers requirements means they should have just sucked it up for that prize and given it to the rightful winner without comment. If they wanted to change it for future giveaways and put a number requirement before a future giveaway thats fine IMO but you cant change that ongoing one in the middle or after having drawn a winner just because they dont meet some unstated terms. You dont go out and refuse a legitimate winner and certainly dont be bashing their numbers in public and put out an absolutely horrible apology video.

[@tjl9458]

If you actually look at the laws related to giveaways in California (where they are), it's against the law to change the rules after the winner has been drawn. It's also quite likely that it's against the law in Texas where the streamer is. But, given that they already have tax issues, that's probably the least of their worries.

[@empath69]

@@tjl9458 I dunno, Cali's REALLY draconian about "illegal lotteries" - I think even a short stay in a county jail is gonna rankle Noah's Katz's fur...

[@AtotehZ]

0:05 Ironically this might be the thing Noah would take the most offense with in the entire video.

[@TheFinagle]

"Pass the savings into my pocked while you pay full price" That honesty level right there.

[@crowdemon_archives]

Need profits in order to stay open lol

[@reaganharder1480]

I mean, it's a good business model though. You get compensated for your work putting the computer together, and your customer pays the same as they would had they done everything themselves.

[@kenzieduckmoo]

Noah's hero is Linus, and here's Linus roasting him :P he deserves way more even

[@banhammer7243]

Considering this month so far, this video being offered up is ironic!

[@Aka.Aka.]

There's a company composed of former artesian builds employees called Phynix PC's. Everyone, please support their passion if you could!

[@Xmetalfanx]

there were many issues with the company ... but the people who worked there who had nothing to do with the CEO and disagreed with different things he did .... has nothing to do with him .... it was a "dream job" for many of them and they deserve to not get hate IF someone hates him

[@Bamfhammer]

Wait, someone who is fired but has thousands of dollars of LTT stuff. Colton Guy is owed so much from that one party he is still collecting a paycheck. It all makes sense now!!

[@carbuster4392]

On the bright side the man finally manage to make a collab with linus

[@trstmeimadctr]

They got their state business license revoked the same day this happened- for tax evasion

[@empath69]

well, more likely 5 months of non-payment of taxes; the business license was SUSPENDED. Of course, that means NONE of the other 'boring grown-up' stuff was getting done since the COO quit in November. The fact that the company is running out of steam and falling apart JUST as good ol' Noah acts like the King of Douchebags live on the internet is just evidence of some higher power out there having a delicious sense of timing.

[@koimaxx]

5:20 Was this one of the times Colton got fired? XD Seriously though, I feel that Artesian Builds could've approached this in so many other better ways. The fact they went with throwing salt on the wound AND then gloating about it would make anyone lose any little remaining sympathy for what they're going through now. Just absolutely appalling the lack of professionalism and integrity CEO displayed publicly and on record. Can't help but just shake my head.

[@haniffaris8917]

Can you give me direction on where he gloated about it?

[@koimaxx]

@@haniffaris8917 gloat may have been a poor choice of words on my part -- maybe more like belittling, or being condescending. Still doesn't change what they did was unacceptable from an ethical and professional standpoint.

[@crowdemon_archives]

@@koimaxx gloating is fine (the definition, lol)

[@MakeItWithCalvin]

I love how the guy tries to pull the "I am very professional, do I look like I would do something like this" in his apology video instead of just admitting he made a mistake and leaving it there. I thought that tech bro mentality died off years ago, but I guess it did not 🙄.

[@lexecomplexe4083]

Its alive and well and infesting my city (Seattle)

[@MakeItWithCalvin]

@@chrishoppner7875 It is a line from a TV show. Go look up "Jaswinder Cheema TCAP" he drops that line and has that exact same tech bro "who what me" mentality. I had some experiences with those kinds of people on commuter rail in the past and their level of entitlement was nuts.

[@PedroLauridsenRibeiro]

13:10 Dear Linus, that's a EVGA Dark mobo - the CPU socket and RAM slots are rotated 90 degrees compared to normal mobos. Jay explained in his video that he had to mount the AIO pump like that because of this.

[@xtrct7303]

Canadians be like : saying sorry before the “who?” memes

[@markusgeimer3099]

I JUST started watching OTK like 2 weeks ago and I saw the "Artesian Build" logo on their streams, and was like "hmmm something about that seems sketchy. And sure enough I was right and it's filling me with joy for spotting something like that out of the blue

[@TheBebe666]

This aged quite nicely 😆😆

[@kwisin1337]

Luke's " NOPE!!!!" Just Gold...........

[@RoughNek72]

Hahaha!! I laughed my ass off when he said that!

[@Snacksu]

My favorite part of being in the PC community is to help my content creator friends make the right decisions on their PCs and fix their issues so that they can in turn create great content for me to enjoy hahaa

[@jonathanpeden9930]

8 years ago a friend encouraged me to build my own PC, he offered advice out the wazoo but left me to do the actual build. Still using it right now and it has never let me down.

[@johnmoore1495]

I agree that other KZbin communities do not have each other’s backs usually. I feel the PC hardware community (in terms of creators) is so nice and has each others backs is because of the type of people they are. They’re nerds, nerds who were probably treated differently when they were younger, who just wanted to be treated nicely and shown some respect. Hence adult versions of them are so nice and caring. (The nerd thing isn’t supposed to be an insult, I would define myself as one.)

[@namonaite]

Dude honored his promises as well as CCP honored the hong kong handover agreement.

[@casualgamer5273]

Man..I feel so sorry for all the employers lost their job because of Noah. Twitch viewers know some of those nice workers, ( Elliot, Blake, Ariel, Tung, Adrian, Wells, Alan and sorry some other employers i remember only their faces but not their names) . I hope they will find a new job fast in what they like. I will miss them

[@ericconnor8419]

The CEO definitely has rich parents. I was a poor kid who got a scholarship to a private school. I had to deal with a lot of people like him. They are dangerous. He will not pay a price for this he will have a new business next year.

[@local631]

I am happy to see that their are others out there that still believe that a person or company as this is... still keep with my old values of the belief that you are only as good as your word.. Say What You Mean, Mean What You Say, And Do What You Say You Will... That is My #1 hands down greatest pet peeve and it seems as more and more younger people are oh so entitled, that less and less actually care... well unless it affects them.. then they cry till someone caters to them....Thank You LTT and also JTC for doing the right thing..

[@shwolverine2300]

this didn't age well :)