71–80 of 429 posts
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Disruptive solution proposal: Get rid of the review system entirely. Stars, comments, user pictures; eliminate all of it. For everyone. There. Problem solved.
And how exactly does that solve the problem?
I'm surprised you can still write reviews for products and services on Amazon you haven't bought from Amazon. How much of this racket on places like Amazon and Yelp would be killed if you had a unique generated ID assigned to you once you purchased a good or service and it was verified as delivered?
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Unless it’s a really big ticket item I’ve given up on product research as the investment is just not worth my time. I just buy whatever Wirecutter tells me to; usually they’re not too wrong.
I've recently had bad experiences with wirecutter's recommendations. I no longer trust them. It started a little before the NYT acquired them but the downward momentum accelerated from there. The biggest flaw I see is their product selection process, it always involves looking at the amazon top sellers. Those are usually filled with astroturfed, paid and bribed reviews.
I'm surprised you can still write reviews for products and services on Amazon you haven't bought from Amazon. How much of this racket on places like Amazon and Yelp would be killed if you had a unique generated ID assigned to you once you purchased a good or service and it was verified as delivered?
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Sellers generate fake orders for their products using real identities, actually send the product to those people, but leave a fake review in their name. I've tried raising the issue repeatedly with Amazon, but I've now given up and look forward to the random crap I get sent almost on a monthly basis.
Where do I sign up to get free random stuff sent to me from Amazon review farmers?
Of course they are, it's not like Amazon really cares much. With all the power of AWS and deep learning etc., identifying fake reviews should be a piece of cake if you are Amazon. It doesn't affect the bottom line, so why bother.
I guess I feel more comfortable commenting on this vs such posts about Google (my employer) because I don't have to worry about leaking anything important but this is absolutely not a piece of cake. Anyone who has worked on planet scale anti-abuse systems knows this is a very tough and never ending problem. You think there are obvious signals for good or bad - the 0.01% cases where this does not hold up turns to 20 m…
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And how exactly does that solve the problem?
Because the truth is that the reviews are probably almost all fake. Who the f**k IRL takes the time to log back in and leave a product review when the product arrives? I've never done it, and I used to buy from Amazon quite a lot.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
And how exactly does that solve the problem?
Because the truth is that the reviews are probably almost all fake. Who the f**k IRL takes the time to log back in and leave a product review when the product arrives? I've never done it, and I used to buy from Amazon quite a lot.
Nice people who want to help others out, and angry people who want their money back.
I haven't used amazon in years and this was largely the reason why. After getting scammed a few times by products that seemed to have good reviews I decided to just keep shopping local instead where I can actually see the product and speak to human beings who used it. Amazon will forever be the one stop shop for cheap counterfeit shit until they actually address these issues.
So easy to say. My local stores all have at least a 25 to 50 percent markup on anything on Amazon. Cameras to drones to computers to auto parts. Amazon beats on price by a huge margin. I'd love to buy tyres and oil from the local shop but the 50 to 100 percent price difference is not worth it.
I haven't used amazon in years and this was largely the reason why. After getting scammed a few times by products that seemed to have good reviews I decided to just keep shopping local instead where I can actually see the product and speak to human beings who used it. Amazon will forever be the one stop shop for cheap counterfeit shit until they actually address these issues.
I also stopped buying anything health/body related after receiving some "organic bees wax" for some DIY candles that smelled like a chemical plant and melted at the wrong temperature (who knows what it was) and some vitamin D pills that were all melted.