p.1 #1 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
David, one of my favorite guys on YT in the photo space, refused to review the X2D II because Hasselblad told him he had some leeway to be "a little negative to make it seem more authentic". It only proves what we could all sense through the noise of YouTube marketing of the X2D and X2D II and how astroturfed all of the sponsored content really is.
Dangling a $10,000-$20,000 kit in front of hungry content creators to get the positivity Hassy demands from their reviews.
p.1 #6 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
This is well known by everyone I speak to about the camera. Seems everyone genuinely like the camera, shame they chose to sully the brand with Chinese Mega Corp tactics.
p.1 #7 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
DKLeica wrote:
This is well known by everyone I speak to about the camera. Seems everyone genuinely like the camera, shame they chose to sully the brand with Chinese Mega Corp tactics.
Sadly it's proven to be a very successful marketing tactic. The plus side is that it's helping bring new people into the brand and keep profits healthy for what is ultimately a VERY fringe product.
p.1 #9 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
YouTube's been the new QVC. I'm not sure how much their viewing audience cares though.
I would say many reviewers were straight up dishonest about the AF capabilities of the camera. This is after having shot many live shows and run & gun events with the camera. The X2D II can't shine a Sony/Nikon/Canon mirrorless's shoes when it comes to AF.
Much love to Imel for keeping it 100 (and being a damn good photog). He's made some of my favorite camera reviews ever, great use of motion graphics to explain complicated subjects.
p.1 #11 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
RoamingScott wrote:
David, one of my favorite guys on YT in the photo space, refused to review the X2D II because Hasselblad told him he had some leeway to be "a little negative to make it seem more authentic". It only proves what we could all sense through the noise of YouTube marketing of the X2D and X2D II and how astroturfed all of the sponsored content really is.
Dangling a $10,000-$20,000 kit in front of hungry content creators to get the positivity Hassy demands from their reviews.
I am highly interested in the X2DII (just for fun); however, it appears that Hasselblad (in a stroke of genius marketing) gave away tons of these cameras to reviewers. I have watched all the YouTube reviews as well as read forum reviews. They had all received free equipment. The last straw, for me, was when I watched a very little known reviewer, who had less than 2,000 subscribers, talk about the fact that Hasselblad gave him (for keeps) an X2DII and 35-100mm lens!
I'm sure I would like most aspects of the camera and lenses, but there are many small nuanced aspects of the camera & lenses that reviewers seem to either gloss over or just rationalize. Also, renting is a fairly expensive proposition with Hasselblad equipment.
I have seen second hand X2DII bodies go for as little as $6500 and the 35-100mm for $3700. If that comes up, again, I might bite, knowing that I will take a lower financial hit if I decide the system isn't for me.
p.1 #12 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
This practice, by Hasselblad, was already apparent. Blitz multiple you-tuber prostitu-, er, I mean influencers with product, and, then, they are all seemingly reading from scripts.
Several new brands of M-mount lenses have seemed to have been doing the same thing, causing me to have contempt for all of them, except LLL.
David Imel is not the first you-tuber to have come at least partially clean, about this practice. Several have admitted that a substantial part of their income is accepting a freebie product, posting a positive review, and then selling the product. Some have said that posting a negative review would result in cessation of the freebies, so, they would ship the products back back to the company, and be silent, posting nothing. Actually, this practice existed before you tubers were a thing, in industries other than photography.
p.1 #13 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
Good for him, on a purely journalistic metric.
FWIW, on the other hand, I don’t recall seeing an internet reviewer’s claim for quality aspects of these cameras, no matter how outrageously positive, that hasn’t been verified, or surpassed, by my own personal experience over time.
p.1 #14 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
Hard to single out Hasselblad for this. The Japanese companies do it aggressively, explicitly or implied: Ambassadors, free trips for reviewers to exotic launch sites, and straight up paid greenturfing (Fuji, in particular). Hasselblad must have a new guy in sales who hasn't figured out "subtlety."
p.1 #15 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
As a recent owner of the X2D2 it wasn't the YouTube videos that convinced me to give it a try. I think most companies engage in this type of promotional agreement to some degree, sometimes they have official ambassadors who are more upfront about the sponsorship. I knew someone who was a Fuji ambassador for a while and he would occasionally get free equipment. I don't know but I believe that brand ambassadors weren't allowed to be negative about the brand/equipment.
On some level I'm not sure there's an effective marketing strategy for luxury/lifestyle goods that doesn't involve heavy YouTube promotion. People overselling the AF capabilities of the camera happens outside of YouTube as well. People on forums rationalizing their financial decisions making unsupported claims about a camera or lens capabilities.
I imagine it to be fairly difficult depending on YouTube to make any sort of living. The balance between being clickable and being trustworthy and how that impacts your income is not a choice I would envy anyone. Do I think it's disappointing that Hasselblad engages in this? Not really I don't see this as anything out-of-bounds or disqualifying. I don't really care who gets free cameras and most of my decision making is unaffected by whatever is happening on YouTube. If it creates a better used market for these cameras and lenses that's a benefit to me.
p.1 #16 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
I think the average person has no idea how little a YouTuber makes on a video that is stuffed full of mid-roll ads, but I'll let you in on it: ~$50 per 10,000 views.
Now go look at the view counts of your favorite YouTubers and you'll understand why all of them are taking sponsorships, pushing affiliate links, selling their review cameras, etc. The money isn't in the video itself, it's everything around the video. This isn't meant to excuse bad behavior of course, but the income streams of videos have very little to do with the video itself.
If someone is trying to make a career from YT, there's a gross game that has to be played or you simply won't eat. The more brands you piss off, the fewer streams you have available to you, and the industry is SMALL once you get into the backside of it. People talk, and word travels.
Its why I far prefer YT as a hobby. I can use copyrighted music, I can have ad-free videos that my audience greatly prefers over 5+ minutes of ads in a 15 minute video, and I can feel free to say whatever the hell I want about whatever product I'm talking about, all without doing a 60 second ad read for Nord VPN. I'm eating either way.
p.1 #17 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
I do not want to defend Hasselblad but there are been some documented cases of reviewers, critics and journalists destroying products because:
- they felt they had not been well treated
- writing ad-nauseam about a minor defect with no real world impact attracts more readers
- they had nothing better to do
So even many, many years ago, people learned to manipulate them. A great American filmmaker explained that in the 50s, he distributed a lot of explanations and analysis about his new movie to the critics.
So much that each of them could pick some as the basis of their article and not risk writing the same thing as the next guy.
He said he never add better reviews.
This is how the game is played. One may not like it but it will not change anytime soon.
P.S: and people having reviews on YouTube for free have what they deserve, i.e. some excellent content and a lot of crap.
p.1 #18 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
YouTube is running the "best" business in the world. They've got a free labor force that brings in tremendous revenue for them and they only have to give them crumbs of the pie. I'm hoping Netflix's push into YouTube-style content provides a little jolt to get YouTube to increase its payouts, but I'm not optimistic.
I was just watching this week's DECODER episode which happens to be about the business of YouTube.
More on topic:
I don't envy full-time YouTubers, especially within a niche like photography. Most of my favorite photo YouTubers have other full-time careers.
RoamingScott wrote:
I think the average person has no idea how little a YouTuber makes on a video that is stuffed full of mid-roll ads, but I'll let you in on it: ~$50 per 10,000 views.
Now go look at the view counts of your favorite YouTubers and you'll understand why all of them are taking sponsorships, pushing affiliate links, selling their review cameras, etc. The money isn't in the video itself, it's everything around the video. This isn't meant to excuse bad behavior of course, but the income streams of videos have very little to do with the video itself.
If someone is trying to make a career from YT, there's a gross game that has to be played or you simply won't eat. The more brands you piss off, the fewer streams you have available to you, and the industry is SMALL once you get into the backside of it. People talk, and word travels.
Its why I far prefer YT as a hobby. I can use copyrighted music, I can have ad-free videos that my audience greatly prefers over 5+ minutes of ads in a 15 minute video, and I can feel free to say whatever the hell I want about whatever product I'm talking about, all without doing a 60 second ad read for Nord VPN. I'm eating either way....Show more →
p.1 #19 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
I removed most youtube reviewers from my recommended list because they provide no useful information. "They" still sold me the x2d II and I love my GFX. I just wanted to see if there was anything "better" out there.
p.1 #20 · David Imel says the quiet part out loud about Hasselblad
RomanMF wrote:
I don't envy full-time YouTubers, especially within a niche like photography.
For sure. I love data and am always so interested in analytics and it's part of why I even go down these roads...to get an insider look and see how the sausage is made.
What's really really interesting to me is how DEAD YouTube is for even creators who we've all probably heard of. I'll pick on Dustin Abbott, since his stuff gets shared around quite frequently on here, and you tend to see his reviews embedded on just about every forum that's still alive.
Dustin has over 150,000 subscribers. Dustin has ONE VIDEO that has broken 53k views in the last year. This is a guy that uploads 8-10 videos a month. Many of his videos in the last 6 months haven't hit 10k, with some not even hitting 1k. His videos are long form and quite detailed, clearly taking an appreciable amount of time to make. If not for slinging Ridge wallets and the like, he'd probably have abandoned YT long ago.
Then I look at guys like Jason Kummerfeldt. Man takes full-ass cross country motorcycle trips, films every minute of it, shoots an ungodly amount of film, has to get all of his footage sorted and film dev'd/scanned when he gets back, and then builds a cohesive feature-length film equivalent out of it for...300k views, or roughly $1500 from ads. That's assuming he even turns ads on, which...sometimes he doesn't. Either way, it's assuredly not paying the full expenses of the gas, bike maintenance/repairs, and film.
It makes the prospect of doing business with Google unappealing at best if your livelihood relies on it whatsoever.
and I love my GFX. I just wanted to see if there was anything "better" out there.