"People" aren't critzicing Nvidia, they're just jumping unto the hate bandwagon and claiming Nvidia is evil, anti free speech and other similar ridiculous hyperbolic rhetoric (that obviously comes from a place of personal hate) simply because they are no longer providing free cards for some youtubers that purposely manipulate reviews and now are playing the victim for clickbait reasons.
What is that if not criticism?
You don't need to hate or have a personal vendetta against Nvidia to understand the validity of the issues that people are bringing up in this thread.
Hardware vendors, be they GPU, CPU, Motherboard, headphones, smartphones or whatever supply review units of their products to reviewers for one reason. They do it so that those reviewers can get their hands-on experience and write their reviews, produce their content and have it all ready for the launch embargo. If they have made a good product the reviews will act as near-enough free marketing for the product. The same shit happens with video games and reviews. Which is why some of the games of dubious quality don't actually send out review copies, because they're afraid that reviewers will harm potential sales.
Now, going back to Nvidia. In this situation they've rescinded Hardware Unboxed from access to FE RTX cards ahead of launch. Why? Because they feel that HUB's review content doesn't align with their own views. So what they've effectively done here is remove someone they think might negatively affect their product's positioning from having their voice heard at launch. Does that not strike you as slightly contentious? More to the point, they in their email have stated plain as day that they'll only reconsider their position if HUB change their editorial positioning to align with their own. Again, is that not contentious? As Linus put in his video, there is no way they were stupid enough to think this information wouldn't spread to other reviewers. And the message they're sending to other reviewers is that if they don't fall in line with how Nvidia sees things they too can have their access revoked.
Given that these reviewers entire businesses/incomes are dependent on them getting reviews out on time, they are in effect directly threatening their livelihoods (Whether or not you think that reviewing hardware is a valid business/vocation isn't really up for discussion). Given that Nvidia is the 80% market share GPU incumbent, they're flexing their power and dominance in the market to effectively try and bully independent reviewers into staying in line.
Not only are they doing that, they're sending a message to the wider public that nobody should trust anything positive said about their products, because now they've provided retarded fanboys and
actual haters with tangible evidence that they might be bullying reviewers or otherwise exerting some kind of pressure to receive positive reviews for their products. Even if you don't agree with people who think what they've done is wrong, you cannot argue that its just added completely unnecessary fuel to the fanboy fire and is a PR disaster.
You could argue in an ideal world that nobody should be given any free material and all reviewers should purchase the products like any other consumer and then do their reviews. And I would agree, that would be the ideal. However, we all know the world is more complicated than that. Consumers and consumer culture at large want their reviews at launch so they can decide on launch day whether or not they want to buy it. Its on that basis that hardware vendors such as Nvidia provide their review samples ahead of launch so that those reviews can be made in good faith that the reviews will be fair and honest.
I don't even know how you could argue that HUB's 3080 review was unfair, given that they
lavished praise on the RTX3080 for offering the largest gen-on-gen improvement in performance seen in years. I suppose you could argue that they didn't spend enough time discussing RTX or DLSS and those are very important value-adds. Except for the fact that they produced a
22 minute in-depth breakdown of performance for RTX and DLSS performance, and though they're still not sold on RTX (and they are more than entitled to have that opinion, even if you or indeed Nvidia disagree with it) they were very, very impressed with DLSS; the other value-add feature Nvidia place a lot of emphasis on. Not to mention that the in-depth video was released a day after the AIB and FE RTX 3080 launches, so the positive remarks were made months in advance of Nvidia deciding to cut them off.
So I don't think the frenzy over this is entirely unjustified. They seem to have revoked HUB's access to pre-release hardware for apparently no reason at all other than the fact that they weren't positive
enough for their tastes about RTX. Yes, yes, Nvidia said they'd still provide the launch driver and that HUB will still get access to AIB models; but if I may add some conjecture of my own, what's stopping Nvidia from providing access to the press driver days after launch, which would still materially impact HUB's business. Given how availability has been for RTX3000 and RX6000, its not even as though they'd be able to go out and buy one in time to produce a video during the launch window.
If you still don't agree. Fine, that's fair. I guess we have to agree to disagree.
Like other gaffer said, this is like a reviewer getting an hybrid car and not reviewing the electric part of the car and then complaining when the car company stops giving him free samples. Well, if you aren't capable of doing your job, it's not the company's fault. But it's better to go and claim the company is anti free speech and that they want to "control the narrative" simply because they want you to review the actual features of the product.
That analogy doesn't quite work though does it?
A more apt analogy would be a Automotive Journalist receiving a Plug-in Hybrid vehicle, giving a cursory overview of the electric range etc (which in a PHEV is normally 20-30 miles - i.e not much at all), and then subsequently complaining that there are not enough charging stations available for the plug-in to be useful. That would be a perfectly valid comparison and a perfectly valid complaint.
Another automotive example would be hydrogen fuel cell cards, which are much more environmentally friendly than gasoline vehicles, but again the dearth of hydrogen fuelling stations make that advantage somewhat meaningless in the grand scheme of things. Again valid complaints.
Should having these valid complaints be enough cause for the vehicle manufacturer to bar a dissenting voice from reviewing their vehicles? I don't think it is. Reviewers must be able to provide their honest thoughts about a product and/or service. If their opinion is negative, fucking tough shit. If you then decide to cut that reviewer off, it only reflects badly on you - as this current shitstorm has clearly proven.