FTC disclosures for influencers: www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/plain-language/1001a-influencer-guide-508_1.pdf Disclosures for UK creators: www.asa.org.uk/news/new-guidance-launched-for-social-influencers.html?gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjw8J6wBhDXARIsAPo7QA-dmKJdkjzvH8yeSsNHutvi77fvjjMzRFn6desRGjJtW3SxWzmwaRgaAjVDEALw_wcB
"I wrote them a letter..." Travis went full Karen? 😉😂. I agree and am glad you gave a shout out to Michael Fisher. He was the first RU-vidr I thought of when you started speaking on this.
One thing I cant’t stand is when you’re a paid channel member and the channel owner doesn’t interact with you at all in the comments section. This isn’t about preferential treatment, it’s about good business practices.
This is another reason I love the Fountain Pen community. RU-vidrs go past telling you when they were sent the pen. They will let you know if they are sending it back or (more rarely) buying it instead of sending it back.
So glad to see you talking about this, I have been seeing it so much lately, and not just youtube creators, but also celebs. Not knowing the FTC rules, is not an excuse.
This is exactly why I keep to myself, everybody in RU-vid Land wants the same exact thing, and so-called friends will become Frenemies, and try to take away what you have.
100%. I don’t have a lot of followers but am slowly growing. I’ve been asked to do collaborations by much bigger channels, but I don’t think I will. I like doing my own thing and don’t want to make videos to chase viewers. I will only end up hating the process and will stop doing it.
This is the reason why we dont take free product most of the time, we get offered 10 products every time i open my email. I never knew it was called an embargo. We only accept a free product if it is something we really want to review and cant afford to buy it, rare. But we need to make the point when we review products that we paid for it ourselves, vs the other 10 youtubers that got it for free. I love doing reviews on stuff that other YTers are reviewing for pay, and crush the product, haha. That Ai song at the end was insane, love it, what a world we live in now. Larry
Imbstill doing youtube. Thanks to youre advice we spoke 4 years ago when i first started i do music breakdowns now im one of the elite rap breakdown people. I havent been as consistent because life. But im back on. Im glad you still doing your channel. Well the grind never stops. And im going to catch my "competition" but somw of its on me spending too much time scrolling not enough recording..so its time to redirect my discipline if i want to do this full time along with a clothing brand. No excuses!! (Mostly) because things to come up😂
not sure if I'm more blown away by creators not disclosing products given to them or track made by ai explaining it ..either or appreciate the vid Travis
As an old man who yells at clouds and is an IT professional, I just assume all RU-vid videos about products are commercials. However, in my line of work it does allow me to support and train end users about products I don’t use regularly. On a side note, I would love to hear your opinion on the Apple Antitrust case as I immediately thought about your video of the sneaky/clever way Apple brings people into their ecosystem.
@@TravisMCPpersonally would love to hear your thoughts. I did at some point buy into the ecosystem and probably would never change that. Some of what they do protects that BUT it also creates other issues.
Not that MSFT has not forced any of us who worked in Corporate America into their ecosystem or anything like that. For instance, being old and old school, WordPerfect was miles better than Word but, by bundling, WP was pretty much pushed out.
Floss carter is the best youtubers.... He buys it from store with his own money and no holds bar review unlike some you tubers who looks fake like Ijustine and MKHB, to a certain extend
Floss is one of my favorite RU-vidrs. I’ve been watching him for years! But if you think Floss is buying every single product he reviews, then you don’t actually watch his videos or you aren’t paying attention. He buys a lot of stuff but I know for a fact he gets a lot of free products from companies. Same as most other RU-vidrs with over 100K subs. He’s even said as much in his videos.
Totally agree it is the law that you’re supposed to disclose that I have always done that whenever I was sent a product I see the same thing there’s tons of RU-vidr’s doing that
That is exactly why people aren't saying it. They are afraid that it will influence the value of their "opinion" or recommendation. There's someone who's doing this RIGHT NOW with a $4k product and not disclosing that she gets a $500-$1500 Affiliate commission. To get around this, the agreement the company has made is to call it a "marketing fee". This is the new category to avoid having to disclose. It's disgusting.
The ones I watch usually tell you that they got the product from the company and/or they bought the product outright. I usually feel comfortable with the RU-vidrs I watch and haven’t felt like they were not disclosing anything.
This is a great topic! And yes, it is oh so important that people are upfront about the products they are reviewing. I would be gone in a heartbeat if I thought a reviewer was not letting us know the truth about how they acquired the product.
Can you name a single time where The FTC has actually enforced something like this to a RU-vid Creator? It's a law in name only. And even basic RU-vid terms of service for disclosure are routinely ignored and nothing ever happens.
I've had quite a few embargos and ones I'm working now and people don't understand that there's serious lawsuits and consequences if you don't follow the rules.
I hate that this happens because as you says, it undermines what the process is supposed to be. I see so many comments saying, "X is paid off/this is just a commercial/they were paid to say that".... Its said dognmatically and assumed to be true and the unfortunate part is that there are a lot of influencers doing it the right way but they are assumed to be bad actors.
Top 10 tech reviewers are cleverly advertising or working with companies pretending they’re fair and balanced. One scenario would be worth a deep dive is if some of these large influencers are being paid to trash companies by the competitors of said companies.
That’s a huge issue in any YT sub community . Like i got into the 1/6 collectible action figures hobby and the first YTers i started following were the big ones ,one of them was sponsored by one distributor company for such figures ,and he was heavily promoting them , got a lot of new people ( myself included ) to order stuff there ,and that company just stopped sending people their stuff ,refusing refunds and a whole bunch of bad stuff . You can’t trust especially larger YTers . They might be entertaining ,but don’t trust them for advises.
This is an excellent video. I only ever really see these disclosures in tech videos and never really noticed anything outside of tech ever mentioning it
there is another youtuber where he says iphome x, 8, 7 all are getting ios 17+ and its all fake and hes trying to get views there are literally so many of there vidoes on his channel.
Being the masochist I am, I called out a content creator for not identifying an obvious in-video promotion and was crucified by commenters. I wasn't vilifying him, just calling it to his attention as he had been identifying such promotions in the past.
Point taken. I had got to the point that I don't even be on RU-vid too often. I do my own research and come to my own conclusion. Realized that most RU-vidrs can't be trusted.
I have taken a change of heart when it comes to reviews on my channel. If I don't need it I'm not going to take it. If it's bad I'm going to let people know and I'm not going to do it in a sarcastic or mean way. Unfortunately every time I criticize one thing about a product I get an email from the company stating all the reasons why they did a b and c. Then I don't hear from them again and it really is unfortunate. Especially when companies make all these promises for sponsored videos or content in the future. So it is better to be direct and honest with your audience in the long run.
Travis!!! I miss ya, bro, in this space. Loved your content, especially the iOS/Android switch videos. Fun! Anyway, good to see you on here spreading truth. Good job! Truth matters! FTW! 😁
4:44 Gotta love Michael Fisher. His writing skills are spectacular too. He's one of only a few RU-vidrs I trust quite a bit. Juan Bagnell and TK are great too. And of course yourself good sir.
Just wondering if your a regular high volume customer to an independent model shop that gets stock in a few days before the “release” date. They might sell you it early because you are a good customer and they know you won’t break embargo and just want to get content ready for day of release.
Not surprised. A lot of the big RU-vidrs do. Most are essentially paid shills. I don't trust Marques Brown because he has a literal deal with Apple. Which for me makes anything he says about other products by comparison very suspect.
What you said in the opening of this video got me thinking. You said you watched RU-vid before you became a RU-vidr. I guess that's kinda a "duh" statement but I wonder how many RU-vid creators there are out there that weren't RU-vid watchers to begin with. There surely has to be a few if not many. It's such a profitable business platform that there have to be folks who heard someone talking about how popular and successful people making millions from RU-vid. Folks that had never really used RU-vid before? Am I alone in this? Am I crazy? Are there RU-vidrs that were not RU-vid watchers beforehand? Just a 4 am mind fluttering for me lol
This is a big problem in the beauty community even though other RU-vidrs and watchers will bring it up. Those across the pond are very good at disclosing and those in the US just don’t. I think if the FTC really start fining them it would stop.
I don't think people are doing it maliciously I just think so much can go into content creation that they may forget. Also the pressure for a video to do good can make someone not want to disclose a certain fact that they received a product. That being said even if I get a product for free and I don't get paid which is true for 99% of my content like that, I mark the video as sponsored and take that hit. It's not only RU-vidrs though it's also product marketing it is really a shame how companies try to be vague in their descriptions and everything is misleading. Like televisions 240 Hz crystal clear refresh rate then you get the TV it's actually 60 Hz refresh rate. Colorometers that say up to 2000 nits brightness brand new monitor then you get it and it can't calibrate HDR. The consumer must be smarter and people as a whole must come together.
I just hated the RU-vid algorithm this last year. I have been putting time limits or just watching channels I know I like because a lot of videos are overwhelming now or pure junk.
I get a lot of kayaks and products in for review, I mentioned it on the first video, since many of those products stays with me for years and i use the all the time, i dont mention on following videos it would be too reectivive boring and serve no purpose
Imho the bigger the RU-vidr the less they can be trusted. But I dont see many RU-vidrs being totally open, honest, and forthcoming about being paid or receiving some benefits to "review" a product.
Do you have any specific examples? This was a good video on the "right" thing to do. But whether they legally are not doing it is grounded in case law that goes back nearly two decades. The ftc states "the disclosure should be in the video and not just in the description uploaded with the video." I teach at Texas A&M School of Law from time to time. It isn't the best, but if it is in the video description without the viewer having to push "more" it has been argued that they are compliant. You are right, it is sus. I disclose with my voice and in the video description but that doesn't mean I'm doing it "right." I'm going above and beyond. But there are literal cases where the ftc sued content creators and appeal courts found that a written disclosure is enough. That's why the ftc changed the language from "shall" to "should." The lowest level is "may" which the ftc doesn't use
@@TravisMCP welp in that case, they should have creative lawyering if the ftc ever takes up the case. The only argument they would have is IF disclosure is super imposed somewhere in the video, whether on a shirt, a watermark, or a hashtag. There is a case where a content creator used #ad within their video tags, which are viewable and they won their case. This is a good issue you raise. But ftc often gets roasted by appeal courts because this is a first amendment issue and defendants argue the ftc can't mandate the manner speech is disclosed. I agree with you that it should be how you and I do it. But this won't change. The ftc is pretty toothless
I watch a lot of mountain bike videos, I would say the creators I watch are very good at disclosing what they bought and what was given to them. My favorite videos are when a rider of high end equipment is given a budget bike, beats the snot out of it and loves it.
I also watch the Samsung monitor review that literally said review but it sounded like a sponsored video. Turns out the guy was just trying to do a good job and was new at it he did not receive anything for free. So sometimes yes perception is off.
Unfortunately there are you tubers that run ads without stating their being 5:52 paid to do so. Unfortunately a lot of this happens in Tech space. I saw a video on AR product from China that this influencer claim was like Apple VR glasses. The product is worse than Galaxy 3. I wish the few you tubers that don’t disclose gets outed.
I can’t stand reviews about up front sponsored products, like a phone case, in which the RU-vid has clearly not used the product. They unboxed it they say looks pretty good and that’s it. They’ve gotten a view and I’ve wasted my time.
ummm creating a bop for delivering a message to scammers or people who need to do better is my new fav thing I never knew I needed. Thx, people are gonna hate that I found this LOL. Bout to make a song for my son not cleaning his room as a warm up.
What I noticed especially with the more successful youtubers are they tend to humble brag. Mr Mobile however, is still the capt 2 phones that we knew since the pocketnow days. The others that I watch nowadays are juan bagnell and painfully honest tech although both are not reviewing that much anymore.
6:48 this doesn’t matter unless it’s enforced and for the most part is not, just like all the false advertising is supposed to be illegal but it’s everywhere and everyone knows it, people do your own do diligence and research from multiple sources & locations, 👍👍 on video talking about the issue
Yeah, it does get a little exhausting when RU-vidrs try to use FTC guidelines to claim that even their sponsored content is not biased. Like I'm sorry but I don't think in the history of digital media has that ever been enforced. It's a completely unenforceable law. It's not like the FDC is auditing random videos and going to check your emails to make sure you're not secretly admitting that you hate the products you're shilling.
I am sorry. I feel like typing today. Some ppl on here have brought up ijustine. I do no tknow her and rarely do I watch her videos. That said if you ever watched one of them you would really have to be a bit jnaware if. you did not realize she was an Apple cheerleader which is fine. Again if you ever read her comments she has reached cult status and the main people that follow her would do whatever she says so there is that ans many ytbers of a certain size enjoy that status.
MKBHD is the worst. You know that Apple and Samsung are giving him products to “influence” but he never says outright that they sent him the product. Marques is knowledgeable enough on tech but he lets his association with those companies bias and skew his objectivity. These days the only real tech RU-vidr I trust is Flossy Carter. He buys all of his own products and he’ll tell you if it’s good or if it’s garbage. He is the polar opposite of MKBHD and that’s why I trust him to give an honest and objective opinion.
@@AnointedFlow He'll roast them, and then in a follow up, he'll say how he's been using the big Pro Max Iphone and everything else in the apple ecosystem.
Hmmm I personally don't see any harm in somebody having the privilege to be the first to review an item (or service) in comparison to others doing it later, if both have been given the item and not got paid otherwise by the company. If their reviews contain negatives about the item it isn't really a commercial in my eyes. Commercials never criticise their products. On the side note: where are those times when people earned living by doing some actual work, instead of masses covering the same topic over and over, like those talking heads influencers commenting on the stanley cup craze (saw at least 5 of them, watched just 3, then blocking the rest), or the misleading 'delete me' service that has no power to clear your data from the black market... hello, there are real jobs to do out there!
