This kind of outlines the problem for a lot of folks. HF doesn't sponsor very many people, and YT policies require a disclosure if a video is sponsored or a product is provided free. I don't recall seeing that he ever said anything like "Thanks to [Company X] for providing this [thingamajigy] for review!" or any disclaimer/disclosure in his descriptions.
As much as the "shill" thing and other random hate isn't very encouraging, it's easier to ignore than the people who assume he's sponsored just because he's saying nice things about a company that people have chosen to target for their anger.
Don't you think it's possible that he was just reflecting the significant effort HF was putting in to revise and improve its products?
I have no way to know if HF was sponsoring Real Tool Reviews, if just by providing tools for review, but just like the majority of comments at the time on his videos I just assumed they were when he started reviewing more and more Harbor Freight items. it's certainly possible he bought everything he ever reviewed himself, but if so I don't remember him saying that either. He left the channel 6 or so years ago and I'm not sure when Youtube policies started requiring such disclosures.
Ultimately that's the thing - if you lie or shine over stuff, people find out quick and you make no progress. Credibility is key. It's so damn hard to actually make any money worth all the hassle of doing videos (which even for my low-rent channel isn't trivial) that it's not worth it to lie or shill IMHO.
He had a well established channel with around a million, maybe more, subscribers at it's peak, with LOTS of views on every one of his vids (many in the millions) so his YT monetization income would not have been trivial. ****, I just checked and he STILL has 258K subscribers and hasn't posted a video in 6 years. Wow.
He also had obviously spent quite a bit of coin to do more thorough testing, like that Skidmore Wilhelm device for torque comparisons.
In the end I'm not sure why he just up and quit posting videos. The general consensus was, as there were many posts asking why, was the general negative turn on him in comments on his vids. And though the channel still is around a lot of the Harbor Freight vids were removed back then, which added to speculation. Perhaps it was something more personal that had nothing to do with the channel. Maybe he got married, or his real job started making him enough that a >$100k annual income from YT wasn't worth the hassle any more, maybe he got sick, or even passed away. I've no idea. I sure hope not any of the latter.
I just brought up Real Tool Reviews because I wish more tool reviewers would have followed his model of doing reviews, giving them a workout against other brands in some sort of real-world testing instead of just standing in front of their tool chests showing a tool they just got out of the box while regurgitating the product description. That's an automatic thumbs-down 'I dislike this' and click away from me every time, and I'm not likely to ever go back to that channel ever again.
The tool bear guy is not a shill IMHO. He says plenty of negative things about plenty of HF products if you watch his breakdown of the sale flyers, etc. Harbor Freight has provided products for review some videos, but I don't think they've paid him. He kinda wore me out though, so I don't watch him routinely these days.
Funny you bring him up. I wasn't thinking of him specifically when calling out shill tool reviews where they never actually use the tools they are hyping, but he's definitely in that mix. I've never really watched him, but have seen where he's been called out a lot just here lately for recently going political of sorts, sort of like AvE did back around the time Covid hit. Shame. When you have an audience that size, why even touch on anything that's so obviously going to divide it? I mean that rhetorically. I don't think any answers to that question would be allowed here on GJ, and that's a good thing for the exact point I was trying to make.
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About the only tool reviewer I do regularly watch any more, and he isn't even really a tool reviewer, is South Main Auto, and Eric O's been doing the Harbor Freight thing here lately too, similar to how he's done with Astro Tools for years. He's not just regurgitating the tool specs while holding a tool fresh out the box. He's using the tools in real-world automotive repairs. It's funny when he goes over-the-top to disclose they sent his this or that tool for free, but then he puts it to use. He's been using their ICON T10 Diagnostic scanner (I think it's a rebadged Autel), and their ICON smoke machine, and more recently he put away all of his comparable Snap-on ratchets and has been giving HF's new G2 line a work out.
(at a whopping ~4K views 
). It's a fine line to walk, but easy enough to avoid the worst cliche clickbait. 
)