191–200 of 281 posts
rule of thumb - for the highest signal/noise ratio, look for reviews that give mediocre, but positive ratings - in the range of 6/10 to 8/10. This filters out bots, fake reviews and low-effort negatives (product is ok, but shipping!) What's left is man-made reviews that praise what is praiseworthy, and highlight the real drawbacks the products suffer from
Do not sort by "helpful" in any Amazon property (which is default).
A couple of days ago I realised that I started treating vast amounts of followers or positive reviews as a red flag. This first happened as I was looking at a Blackmagicdesign product with staggeringly many 5-star reviews and seemingly zero bound to have poor feedback from bad units, mismatched expectations, courier mishaps, etc.? Those manufacturer could be innocent; outlier where somehow everyone’s satisfied. Still…
It's gotten to the point where if you leave an honest review of a bad experience you might face a defamation lawsuit. I wish I was joking, but: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-03-20/before-you-write-that... Also leaving anything other than a 5 star review is basically criticizing the company and guaranteed to upset. This is absolutely rubbish; an e.g. 3/5 should be the baseline for acceptable service, and 4/5 reserv…
My first experience of this was in rideshare reviews, as a driver. Anything below five stars and it counts as a mark against you, for which eventually you can be deactivated. Then I started seeing this behavior copied everywhere. It really leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I agree with you on what it should mean, but unfortunately I've got no idea how to convince businesses of this.
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Consumer Reports was (and still is!) so trusted because it is the one publication that lacks the usual conflicts of interest that every other publication has.
The Wirecutter (now part of NY Times) is another that doesn't accept freebie products, if I recall. They do use affiliate links, so they have incentive to want you to buy _something_, but no incentive to give any particular brand or model a biased review.
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I call Amex, tell them my story, get money back immediately 'pending investigation', and never hear another thing. Don't abuse it, they have top notch investigation. When you spend on a credit card, it's not your money they're stealing. I've used it probably 5 times in 10 years, and never had a problem.
Agreed. AMEX really goes to bat for you. The few times I have had an issue they go after the issue with tenacity. No hassle to me beyond a 2 min phone call.
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Consumer Reports buys the products they review. They can't be blacklisted if they're not relying on the manufacturer to send them a free demo/item. (Youtube/Blog) Reviewers get blacklisted by companies by not providing a positive review about a product they were given . As they rely on scooping type style reviews, this means they not only don't get a free product to review, but they can't review it until after it's f…
Only problem is that CR then needs to wait until release day to start its review. While the corrupt get advance copies to review that get released in advance, or are embargoed until release day, but still, will get published way before CR can publish a proper review.
The "gotta have everything day one (or earlier!) to be cool!" is the most successful piece of meta-marketing imaginable.
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Can't answer your question, but give advice. Get good with Amex or Chase, and buy everything with a credit card. Anymore I don't even worry about such scammers, I just get my money back and move on.
Is it much of a hassle to get your money back or is it a single paper to file?
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>>> The "fraud economy" was democratized in the last decade but it has always existed. Previously you needed to be rich, powerful, and well connected to have media companies cover your business/product. Now you can buy fake engagement, reviews, upvotes, etc with a few click so everyone does it. Yes. And this is a pattern we are seeing all over - thank you. It's it necessarily good or bad. just more open, democratic,…
The fact that it was previously restricted to only monied interests means that it was relatively rare in the past. Yes, there were the magazines and floating 'reviewers' who everyone learned were shills for whatever company was paying them for a good review, but the bulk of the reviews were earnestly trying to live up to consumer expectations for such reviews. Once things became more 'democratic' and cheaper we saw t…
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The business could run afoul of any of these guidelines if they plant the review on Amazon.
Simple: outsource it to another business to post the fake reviews to Amazon.
Generally I'd say product reviews are one of those ideas like passwords that work but don't survive introduction to the general public and mass use. The problems of authenticity are obvious, but I've also noticed that people who rely on word of mouth from their friends and colleagues are generally happier. And why wouldn't they be? A colleague tells you this e.g. monitor is perfect for your line of work so you get it…
In addition, reviews are a prime example of sub-optimal communication by us. A lot of people don't write reviews for others but for themselves and thus, many of them are just unhelpful to me. "Great restaurant, food was lovely. price is OK!" - Well, what was great about the restaurant. What is an "OK" price? Is it 5€ or 30€? You didn't probably order the entire menu, so what did you order? What did you like about you…