Leaving Linus Media Group: A Decade of Growth, Challenges, and New Beginnings

On August 6th of last year, after spending nearly 10 years, almost half of my life at Lionus Media Group, the

company behind channels like Linus Tech Tips, Short Circuit, Techquicki, and more, I decided it was time for a

change. I packed my things, said my goodbyes, and left the office and company I poured so much of myself, the

entirety of my adult life, and many of my high school years into for the last time. Honestly, I had pretty much

settled on not making this video. It's just been kind of a long time since I left, and it's taken me a really long

time to feel like I'm emotionally and mentally prepared to talk about this. And to be frank, I still don't think I

100% am. But as my therapist likes to say, it's important to talk about your feelings. So, why don't we do it?

Working at LT was my first real job. Bye, Arlo. one that I literally found on Craigslist

and started when I was in high school, which meant taking the bus for nearly 2 hours either way after school or on the

weekend. But I didn't care. As a fan of the channel and so many other STEM channels, it was a dream job. And to say

that it's been a massive part of my life, one that shaped a not insubstantial part of who I am, would be

an understatement. In the early years, it was amazing. Sure, there were challenges, but when every day is a new

adventure, it's easy to excuse a bit of hardship given the thrill I got from it. I was originally hired as a general

laborer back when the channel had just over 2 million subscribers. Hilariously, it's a job title that didn't get updated

on my payubs, I think probably for a year after it changed. But it didn't really matter since while I did end up

working on a bunch of different things. a sort of general kind of guy. Almost none of it was what I was actually hired

for. You see, Ivonne wanted me to help organize the warehouse. And while I did eventually make it through the giant

mail pile, it would grow every day by more than I could usually get through. What I really ended up doing with my 16

or so hours a week, was helping Lionus with projects like tearing down the original Seven Gamers 1 CPU build, which

I think I did in my first week, testing a water blocks for water cooling through the ages, and even water cooling a PS4.

Admittedly, not very well, but it did at least work. >> What is Why is it broken, Ken?

>> And the curiosity didn't stop there. I'd be lying if I said going down memory lane for this video didn't have me

feeling like some kind of way. You just kind of forget about all the cool stuff you've done after you've been at it for

so long. There was 16K gaming, six editors, one CPU, more than one crazy desk PC, a whole season of secret

shopper, and of course, we even had an LT Minecraft server. Over the years, I wore a lot of hats. So much so that it's

what's written on my 5year service award thing. I was the legit Arlo, are you just going to have a nap in there? I was

the logistics person before we had a logistics team. Handled almost all of the IT infrastructure for the company

from around 20 people to let's say 80 or so by myself for a lot of it. And eventually a while after Alex, Emily,

and James got hired on as the first writers for the channel. I graduated HIGH SCHOOL

>> and became a full-time writer, too, which I neglected to mention and then just started showing up every day. I'm

sorry. After a few years, I also ended up becoming the LTT writing team

supervisor, helping the other writers with their projects, approving purchases, doing one-on- ons, running

our weekly content meetings, all of that while also trying to make videos. And most of this is years before we even got

to renovating Linus' house. It was a lot. And to be honest, there was actually a point a few years ago where I

almost quit as well, just purely because of the stress of trying to do both. But I made the decision to try going back to

just writing. And I'm really glad I did because looking back on all those years, I got to play with and learn about tech

I never would have otherwise. I got to design and build servers that power more than one creator's YouTube production. I

got to set a Guinness World Record with computers. Hell, I even got to put a silly wing on alongside folks I've

watched for years. And that's just the projects. I also got to meet so many incredible people, both creators and

co-workers, many of whom I'm still fortunate to call friends, and some who I even get to work with to this day. But

most importantly, I had the opportunity and honor to share the things I learned and experienced with all of you. And

hell, I even got to meet some of you at LTX, which was an absolute blast. It's something I don't take for granted, and

at the time, I genuinely feared losing. So, for everyone who's watching here on my own channel, thank you. And if you're

new here, the most important thing I can probably bestow upon you in this video is that I have a ton of exciting stuff

coming. Whether it's building a data center in my house, kitty out my own studio hopefully, and who knows, maybe

actually making car content at some point. If that sounds cool to you, why not get subscribed? And I would super

appreciate it. Tinus and Ivon and I guess Luke since apparently he's the one that told them they should hire me after

I started pointing out like bad design decisions on the case I had to tear down in the technical interview. I wouldn't

be where I am today had you not taken a chance on a silly 15-year-old. Thank you. Which is to say, leaving LMG was

probably the hardest decision I've ever had to make. I think I said it best in a letter I sent to them a few days after

handing in my resignation, which read in part, "Sometimes you have to cut off the old, this giving me chills already.

Sometimes you have to cut off the old branches to make space for the new ones to grow. I just genuinely did not

foresee the branch I'd be cutting off myself to be Linus Media Group. It's probably the biggest branch on my life

tree at this point. And it took a lot of me, probably a larger piece than I'd like to admit, to start hacking away.

But at some point, even after things are looking up, you have to start taking care of the rest of yourself and not

just the parts you want people to see. When you've been at a job for that long, it's natural for things to change. I

changed. I mean, I started when I was 15 and ended when I was 25, so that makes sense. The people change. Sometimes

people leave. And of course, the company's going to change, especially as that company grew from around 10 people

when I started to over a hundred when I left. Back in the day, it felt like we all fought in the trenches together,

working as a team to share this thing we all held so dear to our little fragile nerd hearts with the rest of the world

and to inspire others that share that passion and to be proud of it. It was really cool and it still is really cool.

When I started working on videos, I got to have a hand in everything. The idea, conquering any engineering or technical

challenges, building the things, testing the things, and ultimately writing, co-hosting, and working with the editors

to deliver finished videos that so many of you watched. It's just that over time, it went from that to a constant

what can be delegated to someone else, which in my case, where the videos I worked on were mostly based on things I

wanted to learn about, it was really challenging to do. I I didn't necessarily know how it was going to go.

It also meant that as soon as a shoot wrapped, the question turned to, well, who can finish this off? And that led to

the projects feeling kind of incomplete, which given how my ADHD brain works, meant that I got a feeling of maybe

relief that something was finally over instead of a feeling of accomplishment that I had achieved, learned, finished

something, it just made it hard to feel proud of the work I was doing, especially since that work was being

showed to the public. Combine that with the loss of team members you hope you work with forever. Things naturally

getting more corporate as headcount increased, going through major controversies more than once, resulting

in processes and policies created in the span of a week that no one spent the time to ask if actually made sense later

on. And slowly, the thing you signed up for changes into something completely different. And in my case, it started to

turn this thing I loved into something I kind of despised. And I wasn't the only team member who felt like this, which I

hated. And I also kind of hated that. I hated that. I don't know. It's just it's really hard to see something that you

put so much into become something you don't really want to be a part of. So, in the weeks and months before what

ended up being my departure, I gave a specific list of ultimatums, things I needed changed for this to still work

for me, and things I knew that resonated with the rest of the team. so that if ultimately I didn't stick around, it

would still benefit them. And while I don't know exactly for sure what ended up changed, I do know that at least some

of what I asked for was listened to. And to be clear, I'm not the only person who pushed for change. So this is by no

means me taking credit. I just hope that for the current and next generation of LMG staff that things continue to look

upwards. until I sent Ivonne. Guys, everyone knows you made sacrifices to get where you are. And to be able to

support a team of this size, and there's a lot of things you guys did right. Just don't forget that many of those same

people made massive sacrifices and braved many storms on your behalf as well. Ultimately, it came to a head

around feeling valued. And I'm far from the only person who felt that way. After 3 plus years of my total comp remaining

effectively the same, while affordability was getting worse and worse, especially in Vancouver, one of

the least affordable areas to live in the world, you kind of start thinking while you're working on your boss's

third house, if you're ever going to be able to buy a house. And for the record, I don't own this one. I'm just renting.

So, I started to take an earnest look at my worth, something I procrastinated for years and ignored really. I explored the

revenue that the videos I produced generated. I applied for and fielded a few job offers. Think like

infrastructure IT kind of work. It would have been pretty different than making YouTube videos, but it would have been

something new. And ultimately, LMG made the choice to not accept nor counter the amount I asked for, which it's perfectly

within the right to do. The job market is one that's cutthroat by its very nature. And so with the knowledge and

skills I'd learned along the way, the support of my recently fired friends and my partner, and after just about giving

my parents a heart attack in search of something better for my family, I quit. Throughout the many, many late night

chats it took me to come to terms with the idea of leaving this thing. It was really all I knew. I was reminded of the

term LMG lifer. It's what we used to call the OG team members back then. I thought it was pretty cool to work at a

place where so many of the people thought they'd hang around forever or even just for longer than they cared to

plan for. It's something that, as silly as it seems now in retrospect, knowing how much people's lives change and

having the perspective of an adult instead of a child, it was something that became part of my identity. But now

that I'd walked away from the only job I've ever really known where the majority of my friends work, a place I'd

like to think I had a pretty decently sized part in building, I was no longer a lifer. And that was kind of hard to

come to terms with, at least that day. Fortunately, I had something to look forward to. We're going to blow Luke's

back out right now. >> Shoulder. Shoulder. Because that same night, I flew to Las Vegas, not to a new

job, but to my very first Defcon, the world's biggest hacking convention. It was genuinely one of the coolest things

I've ever been to, and not at all scary like everyone makes it out to me. I even talked them into showing me how they run

the network out of this tiny little room with almost all donated or facility equipment. It was super cool and um

great for taking your mind off of reality for a little bit. My wrists are like dying.

>> Oh, you did it. YOU DID IT. >> ALSO, I am sorry I didn't actually end up making a video with the footage I

took. I just really didn't know what my plans actually were. >> You figured it out without figuring it

out. >> Yeah, >> since I quit, I didn't have severance to

fall on. I had to do something else to support myself and the family. Fortunately, as some of you probably

know, I'm kind of into finely depreciated European cars. Ones that are unfortunately expensive to fix and

sometimes prone to breaking, like this sick V10 M5 wagon that a customer of mine imported from Japan. Working on

cars like that has always been more of a hobby for me and less of a job. But despite saying that, for many years, I

hustled my ass in and out of the shop on evenings and weekends to support that hobby and save a bit of money for the

rainy day, like quitting your job, and of course, to feed my desire for knowledge. It's just that it wasn't

really as fun for me to learn about new stuff like that without getting to share it with somebody. That above all else is

what I really loved about my time at LMG. I got to share anything I learned with all of you. So even during my final

two weeks, I was already spending what little safety net I had required on lights, a microphone, a tripod, and a

bunch of iPhones I really couldn't afford with the hope that I could again share my passion for tech with all of

you. And since people are going to ask, yeah, all of this is a big part of why I had such an emotional reaction to clips

from my channel being used in the how LMG spends money video that LTT released recently. I'll link to it in the

description if you're interested, but it basically details the average comp across the entire team, talks about how

they spend the revenue the company generates, shares some insight into Linus and Ivon's take-home as the sole

shareholders of the company, and included a short segment at the end talking about past staff members new

ventures, and also included some footage of current staff members, too. at the time seeing myself and some of my

friends talked about in a section about how proud they were of XLMGs right after what felt like Lionus justifying the

issues so many of them and myself had been raising for years with cuz capitalism

it just felt kind of backhanded and it did make me really upset adding that people were misinterpreting it and the

fact that no one asked me for permission to use the clips or if I even wanted to be included in the first place or even

linking to the channel or anyone else's channels until I brought it up. It just maybe that's not how it was intended and

I'm sorry if it wasn't. But when you're directly on the other side of something like this, it's it's real stuff. This

affects your life and your friends who have already been through so much already. So yeah, I got emotional. I'm

still emotional and I'm not going to apologize for that. What I will apologize for is that I didn't need to

bring all of you into it. In retrospect, none of it makes any sense without context anyways. And more importantly,

it's just not your business. You guys saw it as a nice gesture, but to me, it hurt. And ultimately, that's my problem.

So, for that, I am sorry. That's not what you're here for. And I should have taken a moment to pause and let myself

breathe before acting emotionally because honestly, it's time to move on. I should have made this video a long

time ago so that this hasn't been looming over my head. And for a while there, I thought I'd be able to move on

without it, but clearly that's not the case. Despite all of that, I hope that they're able to fill the shoes I left

empty in a way that makes sense for them. And I look forward to hopefully seeing some content about my babies.

Wanuk 4, the mother vault. I honestly don't even remember if it it's Wanuk 4. I think that's right. And look, at some

point maybe I'll collaborate with LT again. It's not like we don't share common interests or potentially have

ways to help each other. And I'm grateful for everything they did for me and I'm hopeful for the future for

everyone there. But now that I've got this off my chest, I am closing this LMG chapter of my life

and turning the page back to what's coming next. Because in retrospect, leaving was the best decision I have

ever made. I now get to work on whatever interests me most. still work with some of the friends I made along the way and

you'll probably see some more collabs there and I get to share it with all of you. I am incredibly fortunate to be

able to do so and it's because all of you and of course because of my time at LMG. So, thank you. Seriously, from the

bottom of my heart, thank you. I don't know what else I can do to show my appreciation other than to continue to

try to make really good content. So, if you're looking to support this new adventure, I appreciate you. get

subscribed and maybe check out my Patreon, which I'll have linked down in the description, where you can watch the

ad free version of these videos for a small fee. Also, down there will be links to my social media page, Alex and

Andy's channel, the car channel, and some of the companies who have helped support and sponsor the channel so far.

Seriously, huge shout out to Boot.dev, Code Rabbit, UG, GLet, and Comply, just to name a few. And of course, Nipex

Tools, Ubiquiti, Framework, Hammond Manufacturing, Logitech, Corsair, iFixit, Haven, Intel, AMD, Optimus Water

Cooling, and so many of the other companies who helped support my projects thus far. And with the keen eyed among

you probably noticing that I haven't used products for some of those companies yet. And of course, thanks to

Arlo. He's the best co-host I ever could have asked for. >> Hi, I love you. So, thanks for watching.

I know that this is a little bit different than the usual videos, but from here on out, it's tech, baby. I'm

going to go shoot part two of the home data center tomorrow, so that's exciting. But let me know what you're

into. Bye. >> There's a boat. Why does it actually

smell like sea water? That's a very interesting question. Nothing. Nothing at all. Yes.