NVIDIA shoot itself

Probably everyone who wants to follow recent trends in hardware is usually watching some news over that subject and views some reviews for new hardware. For most hardware reviews I usually watching Hardware Unboxed channel. While many other youtubers provide the same content, but I really like their style, they way of presenting, data they provided etc. Plus following them for quite some time I never seen any leaning towards any side. They are always on the truth side.

And today I seen this video: Nvidia Bans Hardware Unboxed, Then Backpedals: Our Thoughts - YouTube. Basically, if you do not have time to watch, NVIDIA sent email to Hardware Unboxed saying that do not pay enough attention (and do not prize enough) new NVIDIA technologies like Ray Tracing, DLSS etc. and mostly concentrated on “old” rasterization performance. Because of that, they will not receive any samples from NVIDIA for day 1 reviews until they change their “editorial direction”.

I was really shocked. This kind of email could be sent only in one case, when channel does nothing except trashing your products without any real facts. In this case it has sense. You know that review will be negative anyway whether your product is good or bad, so there is no point.

People is looking for independent reviews for one reason – they would like that independent reviewers will present them true facts about some product, so people can make education decision about that product. And most people also would like to get some summary of some kind whether it worth buying and for whatever purpose they want.

And in previous paragraph key phrase is “independent review”. Nobody interested in review from manufacturer itself or paid reviews. Everybody understand that these will not be truthful reviews. There will be always distorted facts, some hidden moments etc.

And this email from NVIDIA shown that there do not want fair competition. They want review that pleases them. Or else. At the beginning they will ask to focus on some technology whether it has any real-world use or not. Next step, they will want to slightly “tweak reviews” and next step they will have to “approve” reviews, so send them script, “or else”. This is how censorship starts.

This is really bad move, especially with so high profile youtubers. I do not know what NVIDIA was thinking, but it is obvious that it will became public and very quickly and this is not good kind of PR. This is kind of PR that many high-ups are getting fired for mismanage this. This is PR-nightmare for NVIDIA.

Moreover, now people who knew about this story will question all other youtubers about how honest they were about these new technologies (Ray Tracing, DLSS etc.). Perhaps NVIDIA also pressed them, and they had to make “favorable” reviews for these technologies.

Also, another question was raised. If NVIDIA had to press even such high profile youtubers, it means that their tech is not good enough and they had to use such anti-market measures.

I hope NVIDIA will find the strength to clean this mess, because what they did right now is angry community and many of them will not buy NVIDIA card just to protest this dictatorship-like move. Specially considering how good AMD cards are. Usually, people do not change brands lightly and even another brand is about the same, they will stay with their favorite brand. But in this case, people could change. Nobody wants to support censorship. I know that I will switch to AMD even I was planning to buy 3060 Ti by end of the year. Because when I am spending my money not only, I get product, but I also support company my money gets to. And I do not want to support this kind of behavior.