Earlier quoted context omitted.
Amazon link?
http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00E3OL5U8
Thank you!
Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
261–270 of 400 posts
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#262I see no reason why to buy anything but Anker. I once tried to purposely destroy an Anker MicroUSB cable (bought a 5 pack that had three 3ft, one 6ft, one 1ft, didn't need the 1ft), by grabbing the head of it with clamping pliers and yanking the fuck out of it with the cable wrapped around my hand, and bending it to near 180 degrees repeatedly for about 5 minutes. I could not kill it without straight up taking wire c…
I am happy user of Anker mouse and I must say - I dropped it so many times, but it works great. My wireless Microsoft mouses, while great, had average life of 1-1,5 year (I am using mouse ~10-12 hours a day).
Anker is with me since almost 2 years and only visible sign of fatigue I can notice is that brand name wear off from the face of mouse.
Great quality for silly price.
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#263Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't see why shipping a good cable with the product makes a difference. My house is full of USB chargers, because I want to be able to charge multiple devices several places in the living room as well as our bedrooms. Then there's the portable battery packs etc. One cable per device is insufficient for a lot of us.
Then you create a list of recommended cables. You don't bury that data in amazon reviews - if that's the intended purpose of releasing this information
They do have a list of recommended cables -- the ones that they sell. Regardless, that doesn't mean that the Google Store is the first place people go to get a "standard" cable, especially as it isn't necessarily the cheapest.
To many, a cable is a cable is a cable, and preventing someone from buying a commodity part that might damage their phone is a good objective, no matter how it's done.
Posting Amazon reviews might not be the optimal way to get me to buy the "right" cables, but it's a pretty effective way at preventing me from buying the wrong ones.
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#264This is cool, but being from the online marketing world, I can already see people copying this in bad ways. "Hi this is Tom, I am from iPhone Development Team 6 here at Apple and we have been testing [product] in our labs. In our opinion, [affiliate link to other releated product] is far better because this product [technical critique that few will understand but will serve to bolster reviewer's credibility, can be c…
You can pretty safely bet your life this is going to happen if this guy gets any press for what he's doing. Within a month or so, every tech product on Amazon will have glowing reviews by "Josh from Microsoft" or "Brian from Intel"
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#265I look forward to reading his review of this USB cable: http://www.amazon.com/AudioQuest-Diamond-feet-Braided-Cable/...
I'm sure Google can afford the $1000+ price tag.
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#266Earlier quoted context omitted.
And in a nutshell, that's why people buy stuff from apple. imo, their brand is "here's a good thing, and we promise it will work". Amazon's is "you're on your own, but it's really fucking cheap!" That's not to say amazon doesn't have good customer service, but the whole thing is still shit. I just wanted a [cable|dongle|hdmi adapter|battery|plant spray|charger] that was what it claimed to be and worked correctly the…
But once there are 500 reviews on a product it basically gives you that confidence. This isn't a troll comment. Ben Thompson makes the argument that the reason why EBay, AirBnB, and Uber work is because you basically are replacing the trust you had in a brand with the trust you have in community reviews. He calls it 'Aggregation Theory'. I find it rather compelling to explain why these types of marketplaces work.
Problem is another supplier can claim to sell the same item and benefit from the positive reviews. I've seen a lot of this with unbranded items like USB chargers for cars.
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#267I see no reason why to buy anything but Anker. I once tried to purposely destroy an Anker MicroUSB cable (bought a 5 pack that had three 3ft, one 6ft, one 1ft, didn't need the 1ft), by grabbing the head of it with clamping pliers and yanking the fuck out of it with the cable wrapped around my hand, and bending it to near 180 degrees repeatedly for about 5 minutes. I could not kill it without straight up taking wire c…
I recently got a Nexus 5X and it only came with a usb-c to usb-c cable and I wasn't able to connect it to my computer. I searched specifically for anker, usb-c to usb-a and couldn't find anything. Can anyone confirm that this is a product somewhere? This is what I went with, but it didn't seem to support data transfer. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B011N7ME48?psc=1&redirect=t...
I just bought a 3 footer from Joto, seem's to be pretty well made.
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#268What I find interesting here is that Benson is essentially using his employer as a reputation guarantor. I guess depending on the company's HR that could fall either way of a) This is great, we're getting nice PR b) Mr Benson, we need to have a quiet word about what it is you do here and what Google is not in the business of. Really interesting. edit: I assumed this is part of his job. I just find the publishing of t…
I actually had the same reaction. He has a vested interest in pushing specific vendors that work well with his employers products. This means because of his reputation (Google engineer) it's easy for him to dismiss one cable manufacturer and support another while getting some form of a kickback either directly or indirectly from said manufacturers. Sure, he's doing his job, but he's also in the position to pick and c…
>This means because of his reputation (Google engineer) it's easy for him to dismiss one cable manufacturer and support another while getting some form of a kickback either directly or indirectly from said manufacturers.
That's always a risk, but I think it is more of a risk having used his real profile and Google affiliation. On the face of it, I want to think that Google pays Benson well enough that he needn't go tell lies on Amazon as a side job.
>As such, I would discount his advice based on the possible bias towards products that could possibly line his own pockets.
This isn't like for example "audiophile" cable reviews where people just make crap up in ambiguous terms hoping to sell a thousand-plus dollar pair of speaker cables knowing full well that no one can argue sensibly about the warmness/depth/color/scent of the sound.
He pretty clearly explains his major complaint being the lack of a proper 56k pullup so that the cable identifies itself correctly. This is testable by almost anyone. It makes very little sense to publicly tell a lie that can be verified so trivially.
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#269The current rhetoric when it comes to the failings of online reviews is to point at fraudulent reviews. I posit that, rather, it's the lack of weighting reviews by the expertise of the reviewers. Clearly the reviews of a hardware engineer at Google should have more weight to them than an average consumer (on products like this), because as bkmartin points out, the average consumer has no idea as to the true quality o…
When buying something online, I make a habit of reading a couple of the negative reviews. Sometimes they're, "I meant to buy a toaster, and misclicked on this television instead. Makes poor toast. 2/5." But sometimes they're more like, "It worked great for two years, and then became sentient and strangled my pet fish. 2/5" Rating distributions only tell you part of the story.
Negative reviews are the first thing I always read.
Re: Google engineer writing Amazon reviews on USB-C cables that don't work
#270I see no reason why to buy anything but Anker. I once tried to purposely destroy an Anker MicroUSB cable (bought a 5 pack that had three 3ft, one 6ft, one 1ft, didn't need the 1ft), by grabbing the head of it with clamping pliers and yanking the fuck out of it with the cable wrapped around my hand, and bending it to near 180 degrees repeatedly for about 5 minutes. I could not kill it without straight up taking wire c…
It's difficult to buy Anker outside of North America. The Amazon Basics stuff is reasonable, too.
Widely available in the UK.