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00:00Hey, what's up, I'm KBHD here, welcome to 2021.
00:08So this is the OnePlus One, and this is the OnePlus 8 Pro.
00:16And the OnePlus story is a really fascinating one.
00:20So when people ask me in real life, hey, what phone do you use?
00:23And I say it's a OnePlus 8 Pro.
00:26The phone I use is called the OnePlus 8 Pro.
00:29The reaction is always one of two things.
00:32They either draw a total blank, and they have never heard of OnePlus, and they have to be
00:35filled in on what OnePlus is, or they already know about it, and they pull one out of their
00:40pocket too, and maybe they already saw the reviews, and they love the thing.
00:44It's actually gotten to the point where it's become a defining characteristic of the OnePlus
00:49brand.
00:50It's a really popular enthusiast smartphone brand, where people really know about it in
00:55the community already, but in the outside world, they're still trying to break into
01:00this mainstream where everyone's heard of them.
01:02But there's a really great quote from the Dark Knight, you might have heard about it,
01:06where you either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.
01:12And low key, that's kind of slowly what's been happening to OnePlus over the past couple
01:16years.
01:17Let me explain.
01:20So from the beginning, and this is an important fact to sort of keep in the back of your head
01:24for all of this, OnePlus is a brand owned and managed by a company called BBK Electronics.
01:32And that company also runs the brands for Oppo, Vivo, and Realme.
01:38So while all these companies are sort of viewed as independent, and they're independently
01:43managed and run, they're also kind of related, like brothers.
01:48So anyway, okay, OnePlus story starts pretty hot, right?
01:51They're the new kid on the block, they're a fresh face.
01:53And their first phone is a pretty massive success.
01:57It's the OnePlus One.
01:59And this phone, especially in the enthusiast community, catches on instantly.
02:03You know, they can barely keep up with orders.
02:05They have this wild invite only purchase system to get your hands on it.
02:09And the phone is hard to get right off the bat.
02:11And the reason that this phone is such a massive success is because it's positioned perfectly
02:16as maybe the original flagship killer.
02:20So it's coming from a new upstart company that's not spending millions on marketing.
02:24They're really listening to comments and their forums, and they're delivering features enthusiasts
02:29really want.
02:30And they have an incredible price to performance ratio.
02:32They partnered with CyanogenMod for the software for a custom, near stock Android experience.
02:37It was like a souped up version of the Nexus 5.
02:40They didn't cut corners with specs and performance, and they added features with software updates
02:45and they were active within their community.
02:46And it all comes from this young, hungry upstart that kind of feels like a startup.
02:51That was the kind of energy I could get behind.
02:53I really liked this phone when it came out.
02:57And I feel like if you're putting together a list of like the best phones of the last
03:00decade, I think this has to be on it.
03:02So OnePlus as a company starts building up from that, right?
03:05And there's a few botched marketing campaigns here and there.
03:07I suspect just from them not really being very familiar with this new market they're
03:10working with, but very quickly they've broken in and they just carve out this identity as
03:15being the new enthusiast phone with bang for the buck.
03:21But remember, remember that fact I told you to keep in mind from the beginning of the
03:24video, OnePlus is a new company, but they're not exactly a new company.
03:30Remember, they're a sub-brand alongside Vivo and Oppo and Realme.
03:34So while a lot of their phones and their startup style management is really fun, if you've
03:40paid attention over the past couple of years to some of their designs and even their oldest
03:45stuff, a lot of OnePlus phones are also Oppo phones.
03:51It goes all the way back to that OnePlus One.
03:54It came out around the same time as the Oppo Find 7.
03:58Two different phones from two different companies, but related companies.
04:02So the hardware shares a lot of parts and most of the substantial difference is in the
04:06software since Oppo is targeting one market and OnePlus is targeting another.
04:10Same idea with the OnePlus 5 and the Oppo R11.
04:13I mean, put them side by side and tell me without the logo, you could tell these apart.
04:16A little bit after that, there was OnePlus 6T that looked a lot like Oppo R17.
04:22And even today you have OnePlus's new Nord N100, which is visually almost indistinguishable
04:27from Oppo's A53.
04:29And even some Oppo technologies like VOOC charging get rebranded and included in OnePlus phones
04:34as dash charging.
04:35Now, none of this is a bad thing.
04:39So how do we bring this up?
04:42Well, the OnePlus brand has been evolving right in front of our eyes.
04:50Clearly they started off this company that was very focused with one phone per year,
04:54bringing the hype with the maximum value for the lowest price and diving deep into enthusiast
04:58features and listening to users and forums and on social media, all of that.
05:02But that isn't sustainable by itself.
05:06The enthusiast market is a tiny fraction of the entire market.
05:10And so while being the enthusiast favorite is great, they definitely want to leverage
05:15that status to be able to sell to the whole rest of the market.
05:18And so we've seen lots of attempts at that over the years.
05:21First of all, their flagship pricing, as you've seen, has slowly crept up year over year.
05:26So the OnePlus One started at $299 when it first came out, flagship killer status.
05:33And it's slowly bumped up over the years to now OnePlus 8 Pro starts at $899.
05:39So they had those early phones starting with OnePlus One, OnePlus 2, OnePlus 3, but they
05:43also tried phones like the OnePlus X, which were more fashion focused.
05:48They started dropping more phones per year with the T version and a pro versus non-pro
05:52version.
05:53And in their latest attempt, the Nord, which has turned into a full-blown line of budget
05:58phones in different regions for different low prices.
06:01Now to the enthusiast, this may seem disappointing.
06:05Like they aren't as focused as they once were with this one hard hitting phone per year
06:10to slay the giants as they now go chasing the mainstream.
06:14And so there's this pretty new narrative playing out in headlines and comments that OnePlus
06:17is sort of turning into Oppo with all these new phones that are coming out.
06:22But if you've been paying attention, then you already know OnePlus has been taking pages
06:27from Oppo's playbook since the very beginning.
06:30And both companies, along with pretty much every other major smartphone company, wants
06:34to sell eventually to as many people as possible.
06:39So there's a really great video by fellow YouTuber Tech Alter, I've recommended it before.
06:43It's an oldie, but a gay, but you should watch it on the theory of enthusiast brands.
06:49And basically his theory is there's almost no way that an enthusiast brand doesn't eventually
06:54disappoint you because there's only two ways their future can go.
06:58Either they will move on from enthusiasts and try to eventually sell to the rest of
07:02the world, the mainstream buyer, which is a little disappointing, or they continue to
07:07try to appeal to the most fickle crowd in the world that is also the smallest and eventually
07:13find that that's not good enough to sustain a business and they die.
07:18And that's also pretty disappointing.
07:19So the moral of the story today is don't be a fanboy, meaning don't become such a fan
07:26of a company that they can eventually betray you and let you down.
07:30Be a fan of the products themselves.
07:33So if a company you like drops a bad product, maybe it's time to consider other options.
07:37It sounds super simple because it is, but a lot of people don't have quite the same
07:42luxury.
07:43People working at OnePlus, for example, probably feel differently about the company they work
07:46for today than when they started, especially if they've been working for the company for
07:51a long time.
07:52Matter of fact, many people from that company's early days have left.
07:55So the OnePlus story has been pretty crazy.
07:58You know, on one hand, it is pretty unusual to see, I mean, it's pretty rare and actually
08:02kind of refreshing that you see a new brand or a fresh face sort of break in and disrupt
08:08things and shake it up a little bit.
08:10But on the other hand, you either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become
08:16the villain.
08:17Now this isn't to say OnePlus is like done and they'll never make another good phone
08:20again and they're going to become evil.
08:21No, I actually think they've sort of created a DNA that will allow them to probably keep
08:26making a lot of really good phones, phones that I continue to use and like.
08:30I'm sure that'll keep happening.
08:31But I think if you're looking for the best bang for the buck or even the most enthusiast
08:37focused smartphone brand, well, that's new shoes to be filled.
08:41That's going to be a sort of a rotating spot at the moment.
08:44It seems to be a lot of Redmi, a lot of Poco, and probably some new brands coming up will
08:48be in there too.
08:49So either way, that's been it.
08:50Thanks for watching and let me know if you guys enjoy these sort of explainer videos
08:54like this.
08:55I had a lot of fun with them.
08:56So hopefully you do too.
08:57Anyway, catch you guys in the next one.
09:00Peace.