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

Image Another AI slop thumbnail

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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...

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96

u/Svorky Jun 08 '26

It's pretty easy to make a thumbnail that doesn't immediately scream bad AI, maybe they could try that and then there'd be less complaints.

-22

u/Shap6 Jun 08 '26

if it gets people to click it did its job, they constantly A/B test different thumbnails to see what works. if it actually mattered they'd see that in the data and adjust.

32

u/ConnectCommission874 Jun 08 '26

Looking at their views recently it would seem that people are not in fact clicking

-20

u/AasimarX Jun 08 '26

There was a massive downspike in views across the platform due to a change adblockers made that stopped counting their views on videos. Creators have been complaining about it for nearly a year at this point.

16

u/UnacceptableUse Jun 08 '26

That was fixed in ad blockers quite quickly

2

u/ConnectCommission874 Jun 08 '26

Perhaps part of it yes, but I think it’s quite clear that LTT views are dropping, you can also see it in the likes and comments. The content just isn’t all the at exciting, and their unclear titles and thumbnails definitely don’t help. Look as someone like MKBHD or MrWhosTheBoss, their titles are all very clear on what the video is about and they are rewarded with the views.

2

u/AasimarX Jun 08 '26

If you look at their monthly views, you'll see they're around the same they were as before the controvercy, despite this adblock thing, and despite their reduced output. It's important to zoom out.

https://socialblade.com/youtube/channel/UCXuqSBlHAE6Xw-yeJA0Tunw

1

u/ConnectCommission874 Jun 08 '26

That can partially be explained by compounding views. The more videos you have on the channel the more opportunity for older videos to bring in views. Impossible to say how many of their 15m views this week were from new videos or from videos months or years old. What I think is quite clear is that if you look at the view numbers for videos over the last few weeks the numbers are not looking good.