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

Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

theguardian.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 334 posts

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#291

Post by mbesto »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #285
mbesto wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It hasn't hurt their revenues, so they have no commercial reason to do anything about it. In other words - it's a leading indicator. > also explain why the website overall looks so dated in many areas. As pointed out by UX experts "what's good for Amazon is not good for normal sites." https://www.nngroup.com/articles/amazon-no-e-commerce-role-m...

> It hasn't hurt their revenues, so they have no commercial reason to do anything about it. That can't be the explanation. They surely must be aware of it, and surely must be looking forward in time, right? I guess it's possible that everyone there is a moron, but it doesn't seem likely.

> They surely must be aware of it,

I know for a fact from an Amazon employee that they are aware of it. It's more that they don't have a focus on fixing it.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#292

Post by cgriswald »

umichguy wrote: post #239
TeMPOraL wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> kind of like when Netflix shows "shows related to" when they don't have what you're actually looking for. I wish they would fix that and make it communicate clearly that they don't have this show, and the following are just the alternatives. Because with the UX looking identical for when there is a match and when there is none, this feels like a cheap attempt at duping people into watching something anyway.

"kind of like when Netflix shows "shows related to" when they don't have what you're actually looking for." I wouldn't mind that to be honest. And I've discovered some shows/ movies which were pretty damn good (but not mainstream) just based on this sort of logic. I most likely would've never discovered them otherwise.

Showing related shows is a nice feature. The Netflix implementation feels mildly manipulative. It is as if they are pretending the film or show you are looking for does not exist and hoping you will just watch something else on their network rather than leave for another network.

I'd much rather see an acknowledgment that the show exists and that they don't carry it, and a list of related titles separated by actor, genre, director, etc. If contract allows, they could even include a "Coming on %month %date" if a licensing agreement has been reached but is not yet active. That might make me just wait until they have the title and find something else to watch now, rather than checking if (say) HBO has the movie. Additionally, they could have a "request this title" button, even if it does nothing because they're already basing their leasings on search data.

I'd also like a list of places I can view it a la gowatchit.com, but I can understand why they don't do that.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#293

Post by rasz »

tyfon wrote: post #32
bingbingo wrote: post #4

Shit like this is what made me lose confidence in Amazon and I stopped my prime subscription. My wife bought me “luxury” branded jackets and clothing for fall. Half of them were counterfeit. I called Amazon and they said I can return them and they’ll send me new ones. Ok. How will I know those won’t be counterfeit? Worse, I found a jacket was counterfeit after the return period when it literally started to fall apart…

I wonder how this is in Europe where the buyer can get very hefty fines for buying counterfeit goods and even heftier fines for bringing said goods across borders. Personally I don't shop at Amazon so I don't know if it's a problem here.

"His name had been flagged by CBP for importing counterfeit goods "

https://www.racked.com/2018/1/8/16849298/amazon-counterfeits...

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#294

Post by sten »

spacehome wrote: post #219
sverige wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, ditto on newegg. My heroes for fighting patent trolls and building the best shopping cart ever and having good products at good prices. Lately it's been in decline though. Haven't bought anything there for over a year.

The patent troll-fighting heroes have moved on from Newegg. It’s owned by different people now.

What's the alternative to newegg if I may ask?

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#295

Post by marcusjt »

hbbio wrote: post #234
x0054 wrote: post #111

Amazon is going downhill quickly. I target shoot with a compound bow as a hobby, and as a result I usually buy a set of arrows a year. In 2015 when I would search for "target arrows" on Amazon the first page results would be for legit American companies who make exceptional arrows for about $30 per set of 6. Now, and for the last 2 years if I search for "target arrows" I get pages and pages of Chinese crap arrows (I…

It would be very funny if Amazon gets back to where Internet started... curated directories. Not necessarily à la Yahoo! but a modern collaborative system, with help from some ML would do. My friends at Slant would agree :)

Amazon wants to automate & eliminate manual tasks, not add more manual tasks to what they've already got.

But Amazon's bright sparks might be able to come up with an automated approach to solving this problem (e.g. via machine learning to identify the suspicious patterns of behaviour that Which? and others have observed) if they are suitably incentivised (e.g. sufficiently embarrassed)

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#296

Post by dmritard96 »

On this post, many commentators seem convinced amazon will have issues resulting from lack of trust. Any leading indicators that would bring some credibility to this claim that anyone can share? In general, the HN community seems to be a bit more opinionated (and informed) than the average nonHN reader wrt privacy and other things that get attention in the tech circles. Always looking to understand the difference between HN community and the broader populace.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#297

Post by astrodust »

sundvor wrote: post #144
astrodust wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only way to describe this is as an unfortunate inevitability of review systems as a whole.

Yep. To me, the real bullshit is the expectation that anything other than a 100% 5/5 score is an indicator of serious fault. If you leave 4/5 as an eBay review for example you have pretty much offended the seller.

Like on Fiverr where if I leave a 3 star review for substandard work, below expectations set by their portfolio, I feel like I've killed their dog.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#298

Post by LiterallyDoge »

mbesto wrote: post #291
pavel_lishin wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It hasn't hurt their revenues, so they have no commercial reason to do anything about it. That can't be the explanation. They surely must be aware of it, and surely must be looking forward in time, right? I guess it's possible that everyone there is a moron, but it doesn't seem likely.

> They surely must be aware of it, I know for a fact from an Amazon employee that they are aware of it. It's more that they don't have a focus on fixing it.

That seems shortsighted for such a traditionally longsighted company. If you sell tents to people who sell fruit, and don't screen the fruit for disease, and then people get sick, they will use other bazaars.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#299

Post by ericd »

kipchak wrote: post #290
ericd wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only the same model if you ignore the large psychological difference.

I remember this being used early on in WoW; in order to keep people from playing too long XP earned decreased over time. After complains it was changed to a boost for time spent logged out which was much more popular.

Ha! Great example.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#300

Post by reagan83 »

Regardsyjc wrote: post #270
reagan83 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great insight - what services do you use to watch your own & other sellers? Been meaning to write software in this space for a while. Feel free to dm me email is in profile.

I use Viral Launch's Market Intelligence to get data on # of reviews, estimated sales, review %, etc. I also use Helium10 to get keyword search data supposedly from the Amazon Advertising API. Between those two sets of data- it's very easy to see bad sellers. There's dozens of tools for Amazon sellers and I think what they're missing is something that connects ALL the moving parts together as well as helps Amazon sel…

Amazing writeup and insight - appreciate the detailed response.
Post reply on HN