This is the emails between the YouTuber YGK3D and Anycubic, it seems like they won’t send 3D printers to reviewers who mention their GPL3 license violations.
tl;dr Anycubic uses open-source software for their firmware, but doesn’t make it public as per license agreement, and they don’t seem to be friendly to anyone who calls this out.
More info: https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxIMpZTkXqFo0H6pDwhZpdYqMYvLhPvWA5?lc=UgxA-4LYvwrnonXuXsZ4AaABAg
This is generally the implication with reviewers. You better not be too honest or you’re not getting any more review samples. Never trust reviewers. Not even the dude that’s supposedly reputable. They all know the game. Use the review to see the hardware and the basic functionality. Ignore everything else.
3D printing is particular bad though. I’ve been perusing this hobby for the past few years without buying a printer. There’s so much shit surrounding this particular topic. The communities are all militant about brands too.
I trust Project Farm, and GamerNexus. That’s about it
No, that only applies to shitty reviewers.
You’re only watching shitty reviewers.
If you want honest reviews, you need people like Gamers Nexus, Tyre Reviews, and Project Farm, to name a few.
Those are a fraction of a percent of reviewers. The issue predates YouTube. The days when it was only written articles was no different. They are at the mercy of not being shit listed by companies.
That is if they can’t pay for the products through the revenue of the review. Though ofc they still have to have ads or sponsors. Much more important is if they are financially stable and convicted enough not to sell out.
It’s true of anything reviewed on YouTube. Alex on Autos did a whole video mansplaining why he never mentions poor build quality and reliability of certain brands and basically gaslights his audience.
If he did, he would never get cars to review, so let’s count cup holders.
You can always get a car to review from a dealership or borrow one. But it’s quite hard when you’re just starting out in the business.
It’s a minefield out there!!
I keep doing research into what to buy to get into the hobby, only to after a while give up because it’s all fucked. 95% of reviewers seem fully in the pocket of the companies they are reviewing, it just looks like watching a advertisement.
Get a $250 printer and start using it. It may be all you’ll ever need, but after a year or so it’s likely you’ll start seeing other printers with different functions that you think would be useful and will decide to upgrade. Hopefully you’ll know what you want by then.
I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s a choice between what problems I want to deal with that are specific to the particular brand.
Some may or may not even be real issues I’ll ever encounter. It’s impossible to tell because nobody talks straight.
Go to forums. Look at university print farms.