4 ms·

About time. I hate these "free reviews". I had to start looking at verified purchases and read a few of these with 5, 3 and 1 star ratings to get a sense if th

About time. I hate these "free reviews". I had to start looking at verified purchases and read a few of these with 5, 3 and 1 star ratings to get a sense if the product is worth buying for. Was becoming too much of a hassle.

Kadin 10y ago
One of the few of those silly "life hack" tips that I've seen floating around that was really useful was a suggestion to look at the 3-star reviews on Amazon, if you aren't sure about something. They generally aren't especially biased (people who are biased for or against the product are going to leave 5 or 1-star reviews) and tend to have the most useful weighing of pros and cons. That's not to say there aren't valid 5 star and 1 star reviews -- including my own, because I tend not to review products unless they stick out for some reason -- but a lot of the 2/3/4 star reviews are the most diagnostically useful.
- nicklaf 10y ago
  Among products whose review distribution is heavily skewed toward 5-stars, the 1-star reviews are often the most useful, since this is where you might learn that reviewers are being offered compensation in return for removing their negative review (either by stating it directly, or as evidenced by an aggressive comment left by the seller in response to the unhappy customer).
  - jerkstate 10y ago
    Understanding the rate and nature of bad reviews provides much better signal than high-star reviews. You will get a lot of garbage in 1-star reviews but I find you also find information about expected uses of the product that don't work, or other types of important feedback (for example, I was looking for a "bluetooth splitter" a while back and lots of 5-star reviews said that the product worked as advertise, but some percentage of 1-star reviews stated that several of the products added a few hundred milliseconds of latency to the audio). I also use the percentage of low-star reviews between similar frequently reviewed items (for example, coffee makers with hundreds of reviews each) to approximate design defects, manufacturing defect rate and/or ease of use issues.

Kadin 10y ago

One of the few of those silly "life hack" tips that I've seen floating around that was really useful was a suggestion to look at the 3-star reviews on Amazon, if you aren't sure about something. They generally aren't especially biased (people who are biased for or against the product are going to leave 5 or 1-star reviews) and tend to have the most useful weighing of pros and cons. That's not to say there aren't valid 5 star and 1 star reviews -- including my own, because I tend not to review products unless they stick out for some reason -- but a lot of the 2/3/4 star reviews are the most diagnostically useful.

nicklaf 10y ago
Among products whose review distribution is heavily skewed toward 5-stars, the 1-star reviews are often the most useful, since this is where you might learn that reviewers are being offered compensation in return for removing their negative review (either by stating it directly, or as evidenced by an aggressive comment left by the seller in response to the unhappy customer).
- jerkstate 10y ago
  Understanding the rate and nature of bad reviews provides much better signal than high-star reviews. You will get a lot of garbage in 1-star reviews but I find you also find information about expected uses of the product that don't work, or other types of important feedback (for example, I was looking for a "bluetooth splitter" a while back and lots of 5-star reviews said that the product worked as advertise, but some percentage of 1-star reviews stated that several of the products added a few hundred milliseconds of latency to the audio). I also use the percentage of low-star reviews between similar frequently reviewed items (for example, coffee makers with hundreds of reviews each) to approximate design defects, manufacturing defect rate and/or ease of use issues.