Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

npr.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 273 posts

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#221

Post by tim333 »

akuji1993 wrote: post #190
chrissnell wrote: post #114

I've been burned multiple times by this; the worst was a pair of remote control off-road trucks for my sons' Christmas presents. They had hundreds of 5-star reviews and both units worked for maybe 5 minutes each. Within days of Christmas, the listing was flooded with 1-star reviews from other conned parents with very similar stories. The number of products impacted must be far over the 1% claimed. There are whole cat…

The thing is, you really can't buy from anyone but Amazon directly anymore. The marketplace is flooded by chinese off brands that break the moment you touch them. At least that's the situation here in Europe.

Is there a way to actually do that for most stuff? I actually want to buy some real Apple EarPods and the first 30 results seem to say supplied by some random outlet for about 25% the regular price. Dunno if there's a only show direct from Amazon button somewhere?

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#222

Post by notacoward »

nfoz wrote: post #161

I'm not really sure why there are any real reviews on sites like Amazon, Yelp etc. Why do people leave reviews; what's in it for them? Is it some strange form of altruism where they're helping their fellow anonymous shopper while also helping out one of the world's most successful megacorporations? Writing this comment has made me re-think why I'm writing this comment.

> Is it some strange form of altruism

That makes me sad. Altruism is not strange. The urge to do for others what you would have liked them to do for you is common, normal, and healthy. I review only a small percentage of the things I buy online, but I do review some when I feel that I can provide some information I don't see in other reviews. Precise details about fit for running gear, or durability for just about any product, are often hard to come by, so I'll often come back and add a review to share my findings. Maybe it will encourage someone else to do similar reviews, and maybe some day I'll benefit from reading one of those. Does that seem strange to you?

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#223

Post by ejo4041 »

danjayh wrote: post #145
ashelmire wrote: post #88

"Our approximation is that less than 1 percent of reviews are inauthentic" Get the hell outta here. Look at literally any product and you'll see a plethora of obviously fake reviews. The worst I've noticed? Check out headphones. 500+ 5 star reviews for cheap Chinese products all over the place. In fact, anything that's around 500 5 star reviews is probably mostly fake reviews.

Worse still, Amazon will delete authentic reviews that contain information they don't like. For instance, I started working my way through all of the batteries on Amazon (top review on this product, for instance: https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B009PPR5OU/ ), and Amazon deleted them from multiple products because of the table with cost/battery data (which is extremely relevant when reviewing a commodity product like Alka…

As a seller, I can verify that one of the reasons I can request a review is removed from my product is because of cost. However, I cannot find a reference in their product review guidelines [1]. Seems like they need to update that guide, unless I missed it.

Sellers play a big part in flagging reviews that violate the guidelines. In fact, I think most of the culling of bad reviews comes from customers and sellers complaining and very little from automation as people here might imagine.

[1] - https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=...

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#224

Post by ejo4041 »

1024core wrote: post #154

Anecdata, sample size 1. I bought some toy for a toddler. Upon receiving it, I realized that the description was misleading; many of the "pieces" they had listed boldly were just cheap plastic pieces of crap that had no useful functionality. So I returned it, and wrote a 1-star review. A few weeks later, I got an email from them: they were offering $30 if I took down the review. I ignored the email. Several weeks lat…

You can report a seller and it was pretty easy to find via google, "amazon report seller": https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/help/help.html?itemID=20...

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#225

Post by mercurysmessage »

beamatronic wrote: post #149
ashelmire wrote: post #88

"Our approximation is that less than 1 percent of reviews are inauthentic" Get the hell outta here. Look at literally any product and you'll see a plethora of obviously fake reviews. The worst I've noticed? Check out headphones. 500+ 5 star reviews for cheap Chinese products all over the place. In fact, anything that's around 500 5 star reviews is probably mostly fake reviews.

The last time I needed headphones, I turned this on its head and bought AmazonBasics brand. Any chance of commingling there? Anyway they were great. I went back to buy more, but they were sadly discontinued.

I've only bought Sennheiser and Audio Technica headphones for the past couple of years. Good quality and good sound.

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#226

Post by cptskippy »

Waterluvian wrote: post #118
chrissnell wrote: post #114

I've been burned multiple times by this; the worst was a pair of remote control off-road trucks for my sons' Christmas presents. They had hundreds of 5-star reviews and both units worked for maybe 5 minutes each. Within days of Christmas, the listing was flooded with 1-star reviews from other conned parents with very similar stories. The number of products impacted must be far over the 1% claimed. There are whole cat…

I can handle getting some crappy set of headphones but a big let down for a child's Christmas is just so upsetting to a point that maybe I've got unaddressed issues. I have a toddler and I think I'll gladly pay the premium to buy Toys R Us stuff I can touch and play with in the store.

As of the last decade, the quality of products from Toys R Us wasn't that great either. If there was a name brand they had it and also a cheap inferior clone. If no name brand existed then it was just inferior junk. The only real exception was there stuffed animals which were all pretty nice.

Water toys were mostly all garbage.

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#227

Post by tim333 »

redgetan wrote: post #148

I've actually very interested in finding a solution to this problem as well. I think the issue is that regular users who are more likely to give honest reviews currently don't have an incentive to write one as there's nothing to gain, but potentially something to lose. If everyone is rewarded instead of just the ones who give positive reviews (i.e ones who receive free stuff, getting paid for etc,), then the ratio of…

Not sure about blockchain but contacting the odd person who has the buying pattern of a regular customer and asking them what they think might work.

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#228

Post by tim333 »

Nasrudith wrote: post #62
bob_theslob646 wrote: post #12

How are there not laws that enforce companies to verify there reviews. I understand it is a complex problem, but first it was our elections were manipulated via spam advertising and now, most of the products that we buy are going to be.

Well such moderation requirements would be massively impractical and run afoul of safe harbor. Not to mention being defacto prior restraint. Besides even if money was no object it isn't possible to always and definitively prove truth or falsehood. Even if someone posts a five star review of chalky dry chocolate they may just have crappy taste.

Don't worry. The EU will probably mandate something massively impractical anyway.

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#229

Post by Ensorceled »

themodelplumber wrote: post #117
Ensorceled wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, when you were giving the book 3 stars, how did you judge the book? Did that match what you then learned (3 stars dooms a book). Did you intend to doom the book or feel it should be doomed?

Upon reconsideration I felt that for some readers it should be doomed, while for others it was probably a worthwhile purchase, and I made that clear in my review. Book recommendation is not as straightforward as people think.

Agreed. I have no problems with books being doomed by reviews, I want to avoid dreck as much as the next reader.

Re: Some Amazon Reviews Are Too Good to Be Believed – They're Paid For

#230

Post by 0xcafecafe »

chrissnell wrote: post #114

I've been burned multiple times by this; the worst was a pair of remote control off-road trucks for my sons' Christmas presents. They had hundreds of 5-star reviews and both units worked for maybe 5 minutes each. Within days of Christmas, the listing was flooded with 1-star reviews from other conned parents with very similar stories. The number of products impacted must be far over the 1% claimed. There are whole cat…

Ever since BestBuy has started price matching amazon, I have started going there a lot. And the purchases have been significant: a modem/router, a laptop and a couple of fitbits.

Nothing better than being assured that the product you receive is genuine and well priced.

Post reply on HN