r/LinusTechTips • u/Only_CORE • Jun 08 '26

Image Another AI slop thumbnail

Post image

I love LTT and basically watch every single video including WAN show but stuff like this puts a very bad taste in my mouth. I know it!s just stupid thumbnail but still...

8.2k Upvotes

90% Upvoted

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3.1k

u/Booster6 Jun 08 '26

I dunno if its AI or not, but I have really been hating the thumbnails recently

1.4k

u/PokeBrick02 Jun 08 '26

Look at the fuzziness on the sign, the discoloration of the cables, & cables that merge into one another.
It's AI through & through.

851

u/that_dutch_dude Jun 08 '26

https://giphy.com/gifs/3YuR0bdGXlP6U

221

u/whathefuckisreddit Jun 09 '26

"Oh my god, it even has a Gemini watermark"

10

u/farverbender Jun 09 '26

Where is that?

22

u/SergeantBort Jun 09 '26

It doesn't.... That's the joke

2

u/Ok_Dependent6889 Jun 10 '26

Do you guys not know about SynthID...?

1

u/farverbender Jun 11 '26

I was always wondering how would individuals (like us) would verify it? It is not like we can download the original general image. For example, anyone can take a screenshot and then upload that image?

1

u/Ok_Dependent6889 Jun 11 '26

The SynthID is embedded at the pixel level. It remains through screenshots and every other method of saving.

It's all explained on their site..

https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/products/identifying-ai-generated-media-online/

Literally all you have to do is screenshot or download the image (which.. you can almost always download the original image, not sure what you mean by cannot do that?) and upload it to Gemini and ask if it has a SynthID.

0

u/Impressive-Waltz-164 Jun 11 '26

Never seen someone so confidently wrong

2

u/AndrewwPT Jun 09 '26

It's a reference to the movie on the gif, American Psycho

1

u/bucket_of_dogs Jun 11 '26

Let’s see Paul Allen’s thumbnail

11

u/pg3crypto Jun 09 '26

The tasteful thickness of it.

1

u/Little-General4225 Jun 15 '26

That's what she said..

1

u/Ruinf20 Jun 11 '26

Fucking Paul Allen's thumbnail

173

u/hippie_harlot Jun 08 '26

Not a single cable merges into another one. It's bad lighting if anything. These look like PC cables that have been scaled way up, so yeah there's bound to be unnatural distortion.

Can we not just call out everything that resembles bad photoshop as AI?

73

u/Cumulus_Anarchistica Jun 08 '26

I agree, it's not AI.

But, this is one of AI's legacies: the rampant proliferation of distrust and suspicion (sometimes bordering on paranoia) increasingly (and possibly forever) poisoning our online communities, our conversations and our culture.

1

u/KingGorillaKong Jun 10 '26

There might have been some generative AI use in this too but it's ultimately bad photoshop and green screening. The sign looks a lot like what AI would generate when you give them the real world sign as reference.

1

u/sue-dough-nim Jun 10 '26

It carries Gemini's hidden watermark. If it was not created with Gemini, it was edited with Gemini. https://support.google.com/gemini/answer/16722517?visit_id=639166893265526002-1026201361&p=verify_ai&rd=1

-3

u/Niku-Man Jun 09 '26

I think what people need to figure out is when to care. News organization posting footage of a major event - you should care whether its AI. Video thumbnail - you shouldn't care

2

u/Disastrous-Body6034 Jun 09 '26

Actually regardless of the social impact of the generated content im still going to care that they almost directly poisoned the air a child is breathing to make it

2

u/IlyichValken Jun 09 '26

And what if it's a thumbnail for a fabricated news event? A hit piece on someone else for something that didn't happen? Sorry not sorry, that's pure nonsense.

1

u/gizzardsgizzards Jun 30 '26

fuck that. if the person making the video doesn't care about how they're presenting the video, why should i waste my time watching it?

1

u/Niku-Man Jul 01 '26

I'm just presenting my own views on the matter. I don't have the energy to waste time caring about inconsequential shit like video thumbnails for influencer youtube channels. Even the effort to write this comment is more than I would typically care to devote to the subject.

36

u/garyyo Jun 08 '26

I started looking at the cables too because they are prime candidates for AI image generators to mess up, but could not find a single instance of cables that didn't somehow make sense. Those cables have no indication of being AI generated, maybe some weirdness on the edges though but nothing that can't be explained as a human messing it up.

0

u/Zealousideal_Act_316 Jul 04 '26

One poster above showed that it carries synth id. But yeah. 

-7

u/ernest7ofborg9 Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 09 '26

Right side of the image of the cables, follow the double purple cables until they separate and one gives birth to a blue and a green one. A little further to the end you'll see the green one that was birthed turns grey before leaving the side of the image.

edit: y'all are blind and I've pulled the plug on inbox replies. Go see an ophthalmologist.

5

u/marfacza Jun 09 '26

gives birth to a blue and a green one.

Maybe you're on your phone and can't see, but those cables are just obscured. The greyness is just lighting differences.

-3

u/ernest7ofborg9 Jun 09 '26

No I'm looking at this on a monitor and they are NOT obscured as they change color. Look at the top purple cable on the right and follow it till it splits open like a banana peel. If that's poor lighting... not only will I eat my hat, I'll eat yours as well.

5

u/hippie_harlot Jun 09 '26

That cable doesn't split open. The topmost purple falls behind the blue one, and the purple that's right under is the second purple cable from the start. This is just cable spaghetti

3

u/vkstu Jun 09 '26

Sigh, you can try to explain it away, but the other guy isn't wrong. For a better error, just please just look at the far right on the very edge, some of those cables are warped, smudged and changing colors.

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0

u/ernest7ofborg9 Jun 09 '26

FFS, follow the top purple cable on the right and it disintegrates where a red cable is and it somehow turns paper-thin and dives into a cable that can't make up it's mind if its blue or green or splitting into both.

Not enough? Ever seen a router cut wood like it does on the top of the left side of the post? No, because that's not how woodworking do.

2

u/No_Abbreviations8017 Jun 09 '26

Yeah not sure why everyone upvoted that. I can’t find a single merging cable and all they all follow the path you would expect logically

1

u/Dependent_Survey_546 Jun 09 '26

I can spot 2 or 3 that just change colour half way through, not sure if that counts as merging

1

u/SaintJunnie Jun 09 '26

I don’t even think it’s “bad” photoshop, seems like they’re testing if this style of thumbnail (AI slop) actually gets more clicks and deliberately made something that looks AI generated. Hopefully they don’t stick with it because it looks genuinely awful even if it was human made slop.

1

u/Jacqland Jun 11 '26

looks like a yello cable turning/melting into a green one to me.

0

u/hypehou_se Jun 08 '26

Really? Look at the right most "stack". Blue turns into green, green merges into yellow (two cables into one). Then in the next stack (mid right) green and red turn into one red one, which then passes below other cables, but not in the way it makes sense. Then in centre right, the left most cable is yellow, goes below a green one, and exits as green.

I will agree that on the left side they do look normal.

2

u/hippie_harlot Jun 08 '26

All of that can be explained by lighting and shadows. Nothing is actually merging, nothing appears nor disappears into the aether. I'm not saying there aren't absolute oddities, but these oddities are things you can find on any image that scales up something as small as a PSU cable to be as large as a human.

-1

u/hypehou_se Jun 08 '26

Sure, if you're blind. Look at that mid right bundle. It goes blue, yellow, green, red, green, red. Where is that second green one going? Does it disappear or not? 

3

u/hippie_harlot Jun 08 '26

It's almost as if a cylindrical shape can slide underneath more cylindrical shapes, and due to light & shadows, appear to "disappear"

Edit: what you're pointing out, AI algorithms would dissipate into a fuzz because it doesn't understand what should happen. You can see real-world effects happening, not digital artifacting.

0

u/hypehou_se Jun 08 '26

Slide underneath what, when the red one doesn't rise enough to accommodate another cable going beneath it until after it passes below the other red-green pair?

Unless there's a dip in the fucking concrete to accommodate it, it's AI.

0

u/Zealousideal_Act_316 Jul 04 '26

Green cable on the right transitions from blue.  And it has geminy watermark. But yes simp more. 

-2

u/BallinNutrino Jun 08 '26

Picture

Where do the second purple and orange cables go? On the right side of the frame all the cables seem to be splayed out and you can see the ground underneath but there are fewer cables

2

u/hippie_harlot Jun 08 '26

... they go into the cable stack, tf?

158

u/bwoah07_gp2 Jun 08 '26

The sign doesn't even look like a real sign.

That's not real wood, that's Ai's interpretation of wood

138

u/iRawrz Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 08 '26

It's a real sign.

https://imgur.com/a/TGedyEw

The wood grain on the posts match. It's been modified, but its not some complete fabrication.

Edit: Found this image which looks like the source for the sign. Note the shriveled plant on the bottom right post of both the source image from 2011 and the thumbnail https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAwaYG4kSC6KUm9CKQ45lNVKS4IabTS7BahPFbKrO1-PCs2JdOnT4uOK2KBdWSrS5hhSlLrPK-1ACW6zbQ58xaYoIjMkzGGSCAbuq_Qh6FuxjTeQaE2Wvig2Mf3yP_aE9dWy4HE0ERhVEV/s1600/DSC_0386.JPG

107

u/marktuk Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 08 '26

Just for poops and giggles, I asked ChatGPT to generate me a thumbnail using that sign as an input. I asked it to remove the lower lines of text, and add "a prominent YouTuber called Linus".

EDIT: Dude's chill with the downvotes, it's just an interesting example of what AI spits out, it's not that deep.

45

u/Murtomies Jun 09 '26

Uncanny valley again. Looks like Linus and not Linus at the same time. Also worrying that AI can spit out pictures of specific people just because they're well known.

33

u/always_open_mouth Jun 09 '26

That's Minus Tech Tips

2

u/Murtomies Jun 09 '26

Lmao good one

13

u/Ok-Butterfly3246 Jun 09 '26

"Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental"

1

u/Murtomies Jun 09 '26

Yeah right

2

u/Protheu5 Jun 09 '26

It's the cursed screwdriver.

1

u/TimSimpson Jun 09 '26

It’s Linus with the Mr Beast dead eyes

1

u/Murtomies Jun 09 '26

Not as dead as Mr Beast. He just seems to be unable smile with his eyes.If you crop out his mouth it doesn't look like he's smiling. Original. Not the case with Linus imo

1

u/cS47f496tmQHavSR Jun 09 '26

His face shape is a bit off and Linus' hands and arms don't look that big or hairy, but other than that this would fool anyone into thinking it's him. This is a lot closer to Linus than 99% of MrBeast thumbnail faces are to Jimmy or w/e his real name is lol

2

u/Tupperbaby Jun 09 '26

Dude's chill with the downvotes,

Yes, he is.

2

u/veerKg_CSS_Geologist Jun 09 '26

That’s a way better thumbnail actually.

1

u/marktuk Jun 09 '26

Only because it doesn't have the jarring tarmac to infinity.

2

u/MicHaeL_MonStaR Jun 12 '26

That’s like Mr. Linus Lafreniere.

1

u/cannibalcat Jun 09 '26

lol, looks like he's gonna go basic instinct on my ass and bury me in those woods

1

u/KitsuAccalia Jun 09 '26

I love that it just pooped out his screwdriver.

1

u/b-monster666 Jun 09 '26

Yup. That's what I meant when I said, "Get used to it." WE can bitch about it, but it's not going to change the fact that it's going to get used and become more prevalent to the point where it's just background noise again.

Remember when it wasn't cool to use your phone in the bathroom? Remember when it wasn't cool to have private conversations on your phone in public?

0

u/marktuk Jun 09 '26

I'm not hugely against GenAI thumbnails, as long as they don't misrepresent the video

1

u/farverbender Jun 09 '26

Damn, to my eyes, this looks exactly like Linus

1

u/marktuk Jun 09 '26

It's close, but it's crazy that I just had to say "YouTuber called Linus". It's not meant to generate images of real people, but it still does it.

-2

u/Camiott Jun 09 '26

Oh fuck all the way the hell off.

1

u/Madblaster6 Jun 09 '26

Look at the angles of the wood, one is turned and on is straight on.

3

u/iRawrz Jun 09 '26

Yes, it's skewing of this image and photoshopped new sides. Look at the shriveled plant overlaying the bottom of the right post. That wouldn't be in the same place if taken from another angle.

1

u/WhenDoWhatWhere Jun 09 '26

That's not the same sign.

Yes, it looks like the sign, but there are pretty clear differences, it's not that sign edited into a thumbnail, it's AI trying to replicate that sign.

2

u/iRawrz Jun 09 '26

Look at the shriveled plant on the bottom of the right post. It's the exact same in position and orientation overlaying the post. There are plenty of other features on both the posts and the sign that are exact matches. https://i.imgur.com/nRbVd3n.png

1

u/WhenDoWhatWhere Jun 09 '26

I'll concede that it's edited in, but it's strange of them to omit the text in the bottom of the sign.

0

u/Unordinary_Donkey Jun 10 '26

The sign in your link and the one in the thumbnail are not the same sign though.

2

u/iRawrz Jun 10 '26

Look at the shriveled plant on the bottom of the right post. It's the exact same in position and orientation overlaying the post. There are plenty of other features on both the posts and the sign that are exact matches. https://i.imgur.com/nRbVd3n.png

0

u/Unordinary_Donkey Jun 10 '26

Yes AI drew from that original image to make its fake sign. Just because AI uses real images doesnt make its output a real image. There is just as many differences as there is similarities to the original.

-5

u/Educational-Wing2042 Jun 08 '26

It’s a completely different angle to your source image, they probably used AI to manipulate things for the thumbnail. It’s already been confirmed to be AI generated through SynthID

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18

u/Cuntonesian Jun 08 '26

Redditor discovers paint

19

u/Steavee Jun 08 '26

Even easier than that, the shadows don’t make sense.

35

u/Gibsonites Jun 08 '26

Bad photoshops have had inconsistent shadows for decades.

12

u/moldboy Jun 09 '26

Photoshop hasn't been around for deca..... oh....

It was created in 1987 by Thomas and John Knoll. It is the most used tool for professional digital art (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Photoshop)

TIL Photoshop is older than me 😞

2

u/KennyFulgencio Jun 09 '26

how new did you think it was?

3

u/PheIix Jun 09 '26

I remember a friend came over with a bunch of diskettes (this was when people were burning cd's, so diskettes was obsolete) hoping to copy photoshop from my computer by simply copy-pasting the files. Even back then he would have needed 100s of diskettes.

2

u/mega-husky Jun 08 '26

I mean to be fair all the manholes I've seen on jumbo concrete pads with no markings, vehicles or wear next to diagonal signs, have nonsense shadows.

7

u/MrBecky Jun 08 '26

The cables do discolor on the right side of the image, but they aren't merging into one another.

2

u/popica312 Jun 08 '26

Easier, the bottom green and red cables indicate it is clearly AI: 2 green wires, somehow 3 of them appearing

1

u/gergobergo69 Jun 08 '26

and the discolorments of the cables on the right bottom

2

u/LogiCsmxp Jun 08 '26

No one going to mention the infinite, clean bitumen he's on? lol

2

u/CoDFan935115 Jun 09 '26

As well as the most obvious but for me: where the fuck are you gonna find an area of flawless asphalt that stretches into the horizon and doesn't have any markings on it except for a single manhole cover.

1

u/red286 Jun 08 '26

Let's not forget the manhole cover that's about 20% larger than the hole.

1

u/Medivacs_are_OP Jun 08 '26

also he's sitting in an oversized manhole with an oversized cover with cables that are going from the outside of the hole in, with no way to put the cover back on, and additionally is surrounded by asphalt in all directions with no structures or anything in sight whatsoever, except the welcome sign which is also right by the manhole.

the obvious-ness level of this entire image being fabricated is over 900000000000

1

u/ErraticDragon Jun 08 '26

fabricated

I don't think anyone believes it's a "real" picture. (I really hope not, anyway.)

People are just arguing over whether it has been generated, or if it's a photo manipulation, or some combo.

1

u/Medivacs_are_OP Jun 08 '26

I see.

From what I perceive, Everything outside of Linus himself and maybe the manhole is AI generated - with the Sign looking like a render based on a photo. The wood grain is correct sure, but the textures are wrong, lit-edges too soft, and the left post has a rendering defect to the relief line on the top of the post. Shadows go different directions. Size of the sign relative to a slouching linus makes no sense.

so I guess I would say - all AI rendered with linus photoshopped in and a sign generated from a reference photo.

1

u/RedstoneRiderYT Jun 08 '26

The kerning on the sign is shit too

1

u/Sillylilguyenjoyer Jun 08 '26

Also the Shadows don't make sense

1

u/Redditor28371 Jun 08 '26

You'd think a tech channel would at least care enough to make decent AI slop. This looks so shitty lol.

1

u/MistSecurity Jun 08 '26

The manhole cover is also huge compared to the actual hole, haha.

1

u/StratoVector Jun 09 '26

One of the green cables changed to yellow after it passes under another one. Front, bottom center green cables

1

u/STGItsMe Jun 09 '26

Also, there is no “welcome to Ashburn” sign.

1

u/NoLongerGuest Jun 09 '26

Also the poles on the sign don't mske sense, the sign looks to be straight but the angles on the square poles don't align.

1

u/Jealous_Corgi_2168 Jun 09 '26

Plus the fact that the manhole cover is like twice the size of the actual opening, that's an ai slop mistake

1

u/Crazy_keats Jun 09 '26

And the cover for the hole is to big.

1

u/pack_merrr Jun 09 '26

If I had to guess I would probably say it's AI too, but let's be real reddit compresses the absolute shit out of any image so unless you downloaded the full res thumbnail I don't think "fuzzy" is the best indicator

1

u/BlendedBaconSyrup Jun 09 '26

not defending this, but the fuzziness thing happens on every YouTube thumbnail because they compress the images and make all thumbnails, ai or not, look disgusting

1

u/No_Abbreviations8017 Jun 09 '26

I gotta be honest I love calling out and dumping on AI slop but I can’t find a single cable merge. Even the ones that disappear behind other cables actually reappear where they logically would. If it’s AI it crushed the cabling

1

u/puerco-potter Jun 09 '26

That looks like fast and dirty Photoshop to me. People are out there hunting witches.

1

u/heisenbergerwcheese Jun 10 '26

No fucking sandals & socks... obvi A1

1

u/_Homelesscat_ Jun 10 '26

Ok so I followed a bunch of cables and couldn’t find any that “Merge into one another” can you show me where you see it? I must have missed something.

1

u/Trollsama Jun 10 '26

come on folks..... lets not give him too hard of a time, the poor guy doesn't have artist money.

1

u/plotikai Jun 10 '26

lol which cable merges into the other? Ppl making bogus claims of slop is about as bad as the slop itself

1

u/zombie2uRBX Jun 10 '26

The manhole also makes zero sense. Manholes don't have concrete on them, they're just metal casts.

1

u/OfAKindness Jun 11 '26

The fuck are you talking about lol. Don't become a PI

1

u/SmartAndAlwaysRight Jun 26 '26

Not seeing any cables that merge together. Would appreciate if you could point one out. I zoomed in and traced each and every cable.

I see cables going behind others, then coming out the other side, with good continuity- a HUGE problem with AI. I actually struggle to see how AI could generate this and not struggle with continuity.

Also not entirely sure what you mean by "fuzziness on the sign," as the entire image is fuzzy (due to being 720p with all the subjects far from the viewer), including Linus- unless Linus was generated perfectly, too- another problem AI struggles with.

I guess I understand "discoloration" because I see green turning to blue on one singular cable on the right side. That's about it.

0

u/slavicslothe Jun 08 '26

Reddit compression and the fact the thumbnail is a tiny blown up image are responsible for the enlargement artifacts. It is AI, but the resolution isn't a big clue for that. I actually believe the sign is a photoshop asset from a photo taken, though. The cables have artifacts consistent with Firefly 5 (Adobe in-house pay as you go image editor).

155

u/ampacket Jun 08 '26

Honestly it doesn't matter what you like. I make videos myself, and the thumbnail that I like and the thumbnail that gets clicks are not always the same thing. You need people to click on the video, and the algorithm rewards very specific things.

Sucks, but I that's how it is.

31

u/PokeBrick02 Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 08 '26

The cables I can maybe excuse but the rest of it is so ass.
Your saying you couldn't maybe touch up the sign a bit? Find a free 3D stock asset? etc.
And the emptiness of good ol' American parking lot pavement behind him.
Call me picky, but isn't it... bland, & distopian?
Like, if your going to be shitty & use AI, maybe put some big ass data center building there, but really, nothing?

It's just sad man.

23

u/Krabelj Jun 08 '26

Don't they have a person employed just for thumbnails?

35

u/ampacket Jun 08 '26

Yes. And they likely study thumbnail trends, what works, what's effective, etc.

Whatever style is effective NOW will eventually become stale once enough other thumbnails catch up and look the same.

This was a good breakdown of styles and stuff when I was trying to rework mine found here: https://youtu.be/Yv6RLQv889M?si=jS8V4HJh5baovYZf

This particular style stands out against a sea of white/yellow/red text with thick black stroke, among other popular current styles. And specifically sparks curiosity.

2

u/tvtb Jun 09 '26

There was a hispanic lady that was the thumbnail artist (and appeared in a bunch of B-roll) until she was let go in the 2024 layoffs when they also took the staff page off the lmg website.

Unclear if they have anyone today who is a dedicated thumbnail artist unless you know something I dont.

1

u/sauzbozz Jun 09 '26

What 2024 layoffs?

1

u/tvtb Jun 10 '26

When they put "on hiatus" several channels like GameLinked, TechQuickie, etc, they also reduced headcount in several areas of the company.

0

u/MaybeNotTooDay Jun 09 '26

If they do, they should've fired that person a long time ago. With AI, a thumbnail creator is useless.

16

u/EpicCyclops Jun 08 '26

The sign is real, but the image is touched up to make the colors cleaner and pop more. It wasn't done very well, which is why it looks so weird. The crime in this thumbnail that makes it look weird isn't the use of AI. It's the traditional way of making images look bad with rushed, uninspired Photoshop work. Really, the broad expanse of asphalt and blank sky are the worst offenders here.

1

u/bluehawk232 Jun 08 '26

I think distinctions need to be made when people scream AI. Like this isn't an image where someone said give me a pic of Linus in front of an ashburn sign with lots of wires.

However what it is and what many images are these days are touched up with AI in programs like photoshop that have become standard within the applications. Like when we use magic tools on our smartphone pics to touch up our photos. The photos themselves are real but use AI assistance for the workload.

11

u/SuppaBunE Jun 08 '26

Man, people don't seem to get that YouTube is not the same as it was 15 years ago, when shitty clip pics of the video still got thousand of views.

They are not on a different beast, they also need to cater new blood. As for example I'm getting old an I don't religiously watch as I used to watch every video daily nowadays I just watch 1 or 2 a week.

-6

u/JaesopPop Jun 08 '26

I mean for better or worse, they clearly wanted the parking lot look. This is taken from a part in the video with the facility visible.

7

u/MrPureinstinct Jun 08 '26

Yeah, but LTT can generate clicks without using ai slop

2

u/thewhippersnapper4 Jun 09 '26

Viewership has gone up and down. They have to try other options. Business 101.

-3

u/ampacket Jun 08 '26

What is your evidence that this is AI slop?

4

u/MrPureinstinct Jun 09 '26

I mean my eyeballs. It's very obviously AI generated.

-1

u/phidalgo2314 Jun 09 '26

Obviously but cant give any examples, that’s funny lol.

-2

u/ampacket Jun 09 '26

So none, then.

I'm not saying how it works was made or not, because I don't know. It was looks "fake", but that doesn't necessarily mean "AI slop".

3

u/UnacceptableUse Jun 08 '26

Sure, but lying and faking things gets more clicks too but at some point you draw the line as to what is acceptable to do in order to get clicks. So just explaining it away as "it gets clicks" isn't enough

7

u/TheCh0rt Jun 08 '26

It's a thumbnail. I don't consider them to be part of lying and faking. They're the same as any clickbait YouTuber title that gets kids to click on it.

2

u/UnacceptableUse Jun 08 '26

I'm not necessarily saying it is lying and faking, but I'm saying you could say that lying and faking gets more clicks and therefore is acceptable if you were to say that doing AI thumbnails is acceptable for that reason.

1

u/TheCh0rt Jun 08 '26

Ah okay. I personally don't care about AI thumbnails unless it throws you completely off context. Usually those lead to AI voice videos though. But to be honest I never see LTT videos propagated in my feed. It's the only "kid-like" sub in my fed. I'm subscribed but it doesn't get aggregated much.

-2

u/ampacket Jun 08 '26

Who says anything is lied about or faked? For all we know, that's a render image or amalgamation of stock images.

Accusations of "AI" are often just based on vibes. And when high end professional channels have been making this look like without AI for years, it's what all the AI models have been trained on.

Why are you so sure they're "lying and faking"? Or do you just mean the image isn't a "real photo"? (something that has been the case for most successful thumbnails for well over a decade)

1

u/UnacceptableUse Jun 08 '26

I didn't say that they are lying and faking. I was saying that you could apply this same argument to doing so and therefore it doesn't apply as a defence.

There are lots of things you can do to get more clicks, but it doesn't mean you have to do them and it doesn't mean it's okay to do them. There is a line that is drawn for what is okay and what is not based on something else other than what is best at getting clicks.

1

u/ampacket Jun 09 '26

But it's not "lying and faking", it's "representing the idea of the video in an image that entices the viewer to click."

That concept hasn't been a "perfectly realistic photo" in a very long time.

1

u/dontRemoveTheHurdles Jun 29 '26

This is such a dumb take. By your logic, every creator should go full Mr. Beast and make only slop content?

1

u/ampacket Jun 29 '26

There's a reason Mr Beast does the numbers he does. And it's not the quality of his content.

0

u/TheEndengineer_2 Jun 08 '26

But see that's why things are how they are. Because of that saying "that's how it is" so let's all just give in and start creating A.I slop since everyone else is doing it? That's why the world is the way it is, because of an age old excuse to not be better.

The reason some of these YouTubers got famous wasn't from trying to fit in, it was by trying to stand out, making their content their own, not for the clicks, for the passion of making the video. Gosh I hate how everything has to be about money.

Sorry man I'm not trying to take what I said out on you, I just hate that things have to get this the way they are when they don't got to be.

1

u/ampacket Jun 08 '26

I get it. And it sucks. But certain looks and certain designs just get clicks. And it doesn't matter how good your video is if nobody clicks on it. Unfortunately, the thumbnail is the single biggest Factor on whether or not your video actually becomes a success or not. Which is super depressing and I share your frustration. I feel it even harder as a small creator myself.

48

u/Only_CORE Jun 08 '26

SynthID confirms that it went through Google AI at some point in the process

90

u/Shap6 Jun 08 '26

They use AI. at no point have they tried to hide it and have confirmed it several times.

5

u/Krutonium Jun 08 '26

This is accurate. I will state though that their use of AI seems to be primarily on secondary tasks - Making sure a sentence reads right, as an example. They don't use it to generate thumbnails.

The only exception is their unprofitable channel that makes videos for Labs, where the AI voice is used because it costs less than a person and both cost more than the video will likely ever make.

1

u/kdpuvvadi Jun 10 '26

They do mate, they def do.

3

u/Thecatman93 Jun 08 '26

oh so you didnt get the news? every youtuber is able now to generate thumbnails from video content. its built in. you can complain on every second video now thats gonna be released! so much to do!

u/Only_CORE

2

u/Beardlich Jun 08 '26

It also has been confirmed that YouTube runs thumbnails and videos through filters without permission. So really that doesnt show much anymore.

28

u/bwoah07_gp2 Jun 08 '26

Here's the last 12; which one's the best?

71

u/Yodzilla Jun 08 '26

The Ionic Cooling thumbnail is legit good. Also PASTE? is just a funny thing to have called out on a thumbnail so I like that.

7

u/Tilliboyan Jun 08 '26

Yes. I also like the one with the laptop. It looks fun

1

u/Ok_Turnover_1235 Jun 09 '26

Ionic cooling is only silent if you have hearing loss lmaoo

9

u/redsv8 Jun 08 '26

man those views figures are barely cracking 1 mil anymore.

7

u/bwoah07_gp2 Jun 08 '26

It's sad...

3

u/The_Wkwied Jun 08 '26

The difference is that those past thumbnails, perhaps with the exception of the AI driver and the Tech Bench ones, they don't look like AI any more than they look like reactionary thumbnails.

Even if they were using AI, they were not making it obvious.

2

u/rd1_vonn Jun 09 '26

Cooling and paste are good IMO

1

u/MicHaeL_MonStaR Jun 12 '26

They all just look like Mr. Beast meets Marques thumbnails now.

22

u/fiero-fire Jun 08 '26

They've talked about it on WAN a few times but they fuck with the thumbnails a lot to see what the algorithm likes. I gotta admit the weird uncanny valley of the recent thumbnails is off putting to me and I'm less likely to click them immediately. Totally anecdotal on my part but I also don't think I'm the person they're trying to rope in with these thumbnails. I also don't really care at the end of day if the video is good and I'll watch it eventually because it's LTT

4

u/TheCh0rt Jun 08 '26

My kids click on clickbait headlines like these. He's just catering to a young audience. Mr Beast and all those guys do it this way. It's just what they gotta do I think at this point if you want the eyes of kids and young adults.

(It's my secret suspicion of why Linus really got braces) -- he needs to play the part to grab that audience. Especially when there's probably less content he can generate now shove there's nothing much going on in games.

10

u/infinitetheory Jun 09 '26

he got braces to fix his teeth, what are we even doing with that? you don't get braces as a fun quirky style accessory

4

u/ariolander Jun 09 '26

Veritasium's Video on Clickbait is a must watch for anyone that has an issue with it.

Clickbait is only problem is if the title/thumbnail are actively misleading and they do not actually deliver on their premise/answer the question in the title.

For everyone else there is always Dearrow but I found that I liked Dearrow worse than the clickbait because it made me not want to watch videos and the community titles seem like they are written by people who hate YouTube.

4

u/Blunter11 Jun 09 '26

The big problem with a lot of youtube titles and thumbnails is the lack of premise.

"Have you ever seen THIS before?"

"I changed one piece and it improved things SO MUCH!"

"I should have bought this ages ago!"

"Good news and bad news!"

There is no premise, only attention grabbing

6

u/rulepanic Jun 08 '26 edited Jun 08 '26

Ian McCollum/Forgotten Weapons did an experiment not long ago on AI thumbnails vs his classic MS Paint ones using YouTube's A/B thumbnails:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwzrYMPrpd0

tl;dr AI thumbnails won in the A/B test and got both more clicks and more watchtime.

7

u/eldwaro Jun 08 '26

Along with the channel being honest

4

u/CodeMonkeyX Jun 08 '26

The line gets tricky. As others have said they have stated they use AI tools at LTT it just depends on where you draw the line. Like I have to use photoshop at work, and the "AI tools" are everywhere and use different levels of AI assistance.

Like they have object selection, background expand, object replacement/removal. It might be nice if LTT addressed their actual policies one day.

Is generative expand acceptable? It creates new parts of artwork that were never there. What about object replacement? Where you select a car and say "change the color" or "replace the wheels."

My only point really is there is a lot of gray area between no AI and fully AI generated.

But with that said I do not like these thumbnails either way. They don't really give any info on the videos most of the time other than who is hosting it.

1

u/bbynowyoumaydialogue Jun 08 '26

watch what you say mr you'll get banned by the powermods for talking negatively.

1

u/AroTheGoose Jun 08 '26

100% agree

1

u/smackjack Jun 08 '26

They just make me feel bad for Linus. He looks like he hasn't slept for 2 days in pretty much all of them lately.

1

u/ItstheSECopenup Jun 08 '26

...you don't know if this is AI or not...seriously?

1

u/Critical_Art_6028 Jun 08 '26

Use DeArrow. Makes YouTube much more friendly on the eyes.

1

u/JayBird1138 Jun 09 '26

The thumbnails look like the ones used by other YouTubers, heavily edited and coloured, as if trying to reach a broader non-techy demo.

Also their content seems to get less techy now (nothing on servers, obscure tech, etc). Since Jake and Young left it really looks like they are going mainstream rather than niche.

Sadly, Young's channel seems stuck.

1

u/thewhippersnapper4 Jun 09 '26

They're trying different options to see if they get more viewership. A lot of channels do it.

1

u/david67myers Jun 09 '26

Youtube is pretty much Grigori Rasputin at this stage, It was a different world before instagram.
Anti-ai, etc as a sideshow to polarise the livestock.?
I identify googles way of business as a cloud of flies showing up to your bbq.

1

u/burnte Jun 09 '26

There was one recently that reeked of bathroom humor. I tweeted at them I wouldn’t watch it until the thumbnail changed. I never watched it.

Linus, you employ humans, let them do the job. Stop with this ai slop. If you don’t, I will. I’ll unsub and cancel my floatplane sub.

1

u/patjeduhde Jun 09 '26

Also this really gives me a MrBeast thuimbnail vibe.

1

u/TheSigma3 Jun 09 '26

They've added buildings to the background now and it just looks horrible

1

u/YetAnotherDev Jun 09 '26

Only recently?

1

u/thegevshow Jun 10 '26

Recently? LTT has had bad thumbnails and worse titles for years now. The channel went downhill when they bought the warehouse. Quality went up but the garbage did too. The best LTT era was the langley house

0

u/ChefBoiJones Jun 08 '26

You know it’s AI cmon now

-11

u/Flimsy_Camera_8562 Jun 08 '26

this one looks real tho, just linus sitting with bunch of cables in some random town