I have had the "Mullard's", 12AU7, purchased from Upscale and manufactured in Saratov, Russia in my preamp for about 3 years now. Yeah, I had them cryo'ed.
I listen (average) about 3-4 hours a day. They would have to be well over 2,500 hours by now. They sound sweet and have never had any issue. I feel that the $120 I paid for the pair was fair, and without question, they were well worth replacing the JJ tubes that were initially installed - also mfg in Russia.
Sure, it may be snake oil sales at work, but we are talking $20-$30 dollars. As for the article, the author states that, "I’m the kinda guy who likes to know what he’s buying." That makes sense. But try that with just about any product nowadays. The global economy made that difficult, or even impossible, many years ago.
Pair that with the fact that the old world tubes are about dried up and those that have what is left have increased prices for them that go well beyond what any snake oil salesman would add to the tally. Pick your poison, old tubes are rare, expensive, and not guaranteed for any amount of time, while the newly mfg "old stock" tubes are matched and, in my case, will last at least 2,500 hours. I would also point out that Russia still uses tubes militarily and the expertise at that plant would be better than anywhere else in the world. Try that in America!