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Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

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Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#411
post #210

I'm seeing similar things everywhere. I stood in line for a food truck a couple years ago that offered a promotion "$2 off your order if you show us your 5-star review of our truck on [site]." Obviously, you have to do this before you even order your food so I was intensely put-off by this. I gave them a 5-star review with no comment, received my discount, then after I tried the food I edited the review to 1-star wit…

Any review system eventually kills all below 5-star businesses. So it is a matter of survival to game the system - because everyone else does.

Yes the food truck’s request sucked, but without it they’d be out of business.

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Selectively removing negative reviews is so sleazy, one wonders if it is actually even legal. Surely there's some truth-in-advertising legislation this falls under?

Not a lawyer but I think in the US, you have the right to remain silent. I don't think a law can compel anyone to publish anything. Might be the first amendment.

It looks like there is a law against companies writing contract clauses barring you or penalizing you for writing a negative review, but I don't know if there is a law that bars companies from deleting truthful, non-libelous reviews. Seems like a basic loophole to me that should have been covered in the Consumer Review Fairness Act.

> Whether your summer plans include replacing your air conditioning, installing new flooring, or riding the range, you will probably read customer reviews to learn what people say about their experiences with a business or product. Shoppers benefit from knowing what others have to say, and the Consumer Review Fairness Act (CRFA) protects people’s ability to share their truthful experiences and opinions.

> The FTC enforces the CRFA and recently sued three businesses (and two of their owners) for violating that law. According to the FTC, the companies used form contracts that barred customers from sharing negative comments and that imposed financial penalties against customers who did so. Under proposed agreements with the FTC, the businesses — including an HVAC and electrical contractor, a flooring seller, and a company that takes people on horseback rides — will stop using, and will not enforce, those contract provisions. They will also inform people who signed the contracts that the provisions can't be enforced.

> The CRFA protects your ability to share your honest opinions about a business’s products, services, or conduct in any forum, including social media. You can publish your honest review even if you say something negative about a business or the services it performed for you. If you have a signed form contract that restricts you from sharing reviews or penalizes you for doing that, the business may not be able to enforce those restrictions. If a business tries to enforce a restriction or penalty, let the business know about the CRFA, and please report it to the FTC or your state consumer protection agency. [0]

[0] https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/2019/05/your-right-post-ho...

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#413
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I would do is write the 5 star review, get the gift card, and then edit the review.

Interesting take, and who would the seller complain to about the modified review? Amazon? "Yes Amazon, we paid this customer $20 for a five star review against your policy, and they changed the review to be more honest after they got our money!" The only problem might be if Amazon decided you were affiliated with the scammy seller and penalized your account or blocked you from buying.

Well the complaint is that one-star reviews get deleted.

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#414
post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, that food truck operator is a victim too. They live and die by reviews, and if everyone else does it, they have to too to survive. The whole thing is jacked up.

Asking for a review is OK. Asking for a five-star review is not I imagine that food truck operator would do a lot better by simply asking "Like or hate our food? Leave an honest review on for a discount" If their food and service is good, they'll get the positive reviews they need

If the food and service is good what incentive is there to write a review at all? It's additional work and time for nothing. I never write positive reviews for that reason. For negative reviews it's completely opposite. So completely "honest" unedited review system would always skew very negative, because only negative reviewers have any incentive to write a review.

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#415
post #407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They won't pop back up with 12k 5 star reviews immediately? I'm honestly shocked by this comment - warning sides aside, paying for reviews should cause a ban. I am as unconvinced by this argument about "popping back" as I am by people who say that raising taxes is useless because people will just hide their money.

Well, he does have a point. I just checked amazon.de for "webcam". Holy crap, the first page is just no-name webcams that all look the same, probably built in the same 2-3 factories in the same city in China with different names on them. If you buy some JellyTech Webcam or a Webcams Webcam for Eu 20-30, what do you expect. The funny thing is, all of these have 1k+ ratings and 4,5 to 5 star reviews, while more expensi…

A lot of products have extreme monoculture.

For another example, most ice machines for consumer use all use the exact same flawed mechanical mechanism.

Someone cut a few cents of the BOM by dropping detection of when the water tray had fully rotated, and instead the mechanism will eventually break due to repeated stress as they just run the motor a few seconds too long. For occasional use it works. For frequent use and you'll easily cause them to break in the exact same manner each time after about a year.

Models keep disappearing, presumably because too many break within the warranty period, but then new ones with slightly different exteriors and the exact same broken interior mechanism appears. This has gone on for many years.

When I last bought one it took ages to find one that used another design, hampered by lack of pictures showing the tray. Finally did find one and never buying another brand again if I can avoid it.

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it's sad. I've had Yelp and AirBnB remove reviews. I don't know what to do about it. They Yelp one I can't verify the service (a dentist) didn't get better. The AirBnB one I can tell nothing was fixed because the issues are verifiable in the listing itself.

Third-party anonymous reviews. It would have to be anonymous because Airbnb bans users for reviewing outside their platform. https://thenextweb.com/syndication/2019/02/18/how-i-got-bann...

> because Airbnb bans users for reviewing outside their platform.

Wow, it get more and more evil the further I read down this thread. What a shitty, shitty companies are involved in all these shenanigans!

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 1 star review that loves the product but hated the way it was shipped. Someone needs to write a textbook on the pathology of those people.

Shipping is part of the purchase process. If the product is good, but the shipping is not, buyers deserve to be informed. If there are separate reviews for the product and the shipping of a product (still tied to that product, but also the shipping carrier that was used for that order) then a split review (one for each) is legitimate. Otherwise if there's only one review spot, EVERYTHING is on the table.

And in shipping we could distinguish packaging and transport. I would like to rate both.

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Asking for a review is OK. Asking for a five-star review is not I imagine that food truck operator would do a lot better by simply asking "Like or hate our food? Leave an honest review on for a discount" If their food and service is good, they'll get the positive reviews they need

You're responding to someone that agrees with you. But also states that everyone else is review-farming and that if they don't do it they will be left behind. I.e. your plan is doomed to fail.

I'm just stating that there's an alternative to asking for only 5-star reviews that will likely work better. Just asking for honest reviews (and offering a discount for them) is more ethical, and the honesty will be appreciated by customers.

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#419
post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google reviews are massively edited upon complaints. A while ago I rented a pretty nice and expensive apartment in Southern England. I was the first tenant and there were huge pipe leaks and other horrible construction issues, like a misaligned lift that kept trapping people inside. Neighbors next door, who owned apartments built by the same company, had different but equally annoying issues. And the company didn't d…

Selectively removing negative reviews is so sleazy, one wonders if it is actually even legal. Surely there's some truth-in-advertising legislation this falls under?

I'm thinking about possible approaches from time to time. There's the ethical aspect, but also removal messes up threaded comment systems. A common workaround seems to be to leave the removed comment in place, but make its contents blank.

I think a good solution would be setting aside all owner-removed comments, concealed but available for review if someone clicks on them:

  + (124 comments removed by the author)
That the content uploader/business owner would be able to hide genuinely disruptive and spammy messages. Abusing the power would be pretty easy to expose. Just expand the list of removed comments and see if they're really trash or merely criticizing the author/owner/uploader.

Re: Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews

#420
Amazon sellers keep complaining, that more and more users only bother to write reviews when something is wrong with the product, but not when everything is OK.

Well, I wrote three 5 star reviews during the last year, and I put a real effort into them, giving others tips how to avoid common mistakes when using the product, and correcting common misconceptions. I could do this, because I know this class of devices well.

The outcome was in every case, that I got a message back, that Amazon has to check and approve the reviews, which never happened. It's obvious, that they either don't want thorough reviews, even if they are 5 star, or are just not able to understand them.

After that, I understandably stopped to write reviews. In fact, I deleted my Amazon account, because I had some cases of defective products and dubious dealers, in which Amazon wasn't helpful at all, and that seems to become more and more common recently.

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