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Could someone explain the hate for affiliate links? Maybe I'm just being naive, but as long as there's no suspicion of ratings bias, I'm fine with them. Ex: I'

by sampl 10y ago

Could someone explain the hate for affiliate links? Maybe I'm just being naive, but as long as there's no suspicion of ratings bias, I'm fine with them. Ex: I've used thewirecutter.com recommendations for home supplies--and I'm happy to give the creators a kickback for their effort (at no cost to me).

dublinben 10y ago
Judging by the rest of the comments in this discussion, there are some very notable oversights missing from this list. It's not unlikely that is caused by a lack of referral program from those providers.
- brndn 10y ago
  There may be notable services missing, but I wouldn't say it is an oversight. It seems the most popular or well-known services are covered and not all of them have referral links. Sure, there is room for improvement, but it seems to me that the creator put this together in good faith.
koolba 10y ago
> Could someone explain the hate for affiliate links? Maybe I'm just being naive, but as long as there's no suspicion of ratings bias, I'm fine with them. > Ex: I've used thewirecutter.com recommendations for home supplies--and I'm happy to give the creators a kickback for their effort (at no cost to me). Wirecutter is an example of affiliate links working well. The site itself adds value by providing deep reviews of each product set and presents options, even at different price points. The vast majority of sites that include affiliate links are nothing more than listicles with the bare min amount of content to get included in search engine indexes. They're also notorious for not being maintained so whatever the "best, more curated, bespoke, ..." content was of 201X becomes the only recommendation ever presented.
pharrlax 10y ago
They're looked down upon becayse they're associated with questionable "review" sites that are essentially grey-hat SEO-gaming schemes. I don't think this site qualifies though. There's nothing wrong with affiliate-linking an unbiased head-to-head comparison.
nikcub 10y ago
It misaligns incentives. This comment thread is full of people pointing out popular services that haven't been included. The reason they haven't been included is because they don't have affiliate programs. I don't know how this can be presented as 'a curated list of best tools' when it simply isn't This isn't unbiased content, it's an advertorial - a blatant one, at that - and for that reason it doesn't really belong here.
gnopgnip 10y ago
When there is money involved you have to question if the difference in revenue is biasing the review, or the choice of products to consider in the review.

by sampl 10y ago

dublinben 10y ago

Judging by the rest of the comments in this discussion, there are some very notable oversights missing from this list. It's not unlikely that is caused by a lack of referral program from those providers.

brndn 10y ago
There may be notable services missing, but I wouldn't say it is an oversight. It seems the most popular or well-known services are covered and not all of them have referral links. Sure, there is room for improvement, but it seems to me that the creator put this together in good faith.

koolba 10y ago

> Could someone explain the hate for affiliate links? Maybe I'm just being naive, but as long as there's no suspicion of ratings bias, I'm fine with them. > Ex: I've used thewirecutter.com recommendations for home supplies--and I'm happy to give the creators a kickback for their effort (at no cost to me). Wirecutter is an example of affiliate links working well. The site itself adds value by providing deep reviews of each product set and presents options, even at different price points. The vast majority of sites that include affiliate links are nothing more than listicles with the bare min amount of content to get included in search engine indexes. They're also notorious for not being maintained so whatever the "best, more curated, bespoke, ..." content was of 201X becomes the only recommendation ever presented.

pharrlax 10y ago

They're looked down upon becayse they're associated with questionable "review" sites that are essentially grey-hat SEO-gaming schemes. I don't think this site qualifies though. There's nothing wrong with affiliate-linking an unbiased head-to-head comparison.

nikcub 10y ago

It misaligns incentives. This comment thread is full of people pointing out popular services that haven't been included. The reason they haven't been included is because they don't have affiliate programs. I don't know how this can be presented as 'a curated list of best tools' when it simply isn't This isn't unbiased content, it's an advertorial - a blatant one, at that - and for that reason it doesn't really belong here.

gnopgnip 10y ago

When there is money involved you have to question if the difference in revenue is biasing the review, or the choice of products to consider in the review.