MKBHD Behind the Scenes for a Year ⇥ youtube.com

If you want to understand what goes into a big YouTube production, this behind-the-scenes look from the tenth most popular tech channel seems to be a good place to start. It is remarkable how Marques Brownlee has grown from being just a guy making webcam videos from home to having a dedicated production space full of staff — and it all kind of hinges on YouTube, a singular video hosting platform. That would make me anxious daily, but Brownlee has made it work for about nine years.

Another thing that surprised me about this behind-the-scenes is just how far some companies will go to accommodate Brownlee. The Google Pixel team brought a bunch of unreleased devices to him for a first impressions video. That video was embargoed until an hour before Google was set to announce those devices. Brownlee, like anyone in the review space, has been accused of bias and favouritism, usually unfairly. If I were him, this kind of closeness would make me feel uncomfortable, as though Google is using me. I think Brownlee’s videos speak for themselves, however.