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Apple Limits Lengthy iPhone X Testing for Most Reviewers

46 points by skue 9y ago

mankash666 9y ago
iPhone X reviews are expected to receive the largest audience, so Apple's strategy of starving time probably makes the reviewers be more favorable. I've also known a reviewer who got into Apple's "Shadow Ban" list for a negative review. In his case, Apple product reviews always garnered the largest audience, thereby impacting his bottom line.
- eridius 9y ago
  "Shadow Ban" seems like you're saying tech reviewers are entitled to being able to review Apple devices before they're released. But that's not true. Apple always seeds a limited number of devices (rather than giving one to anyone who claims to be a journalist), and it's their prerogative to give the devices to the reviewers of their choice.
  - JustSomeNobody 9y ago
    Right, but if you don't go deep like Rene Ritchie does, you may not get invited again.
  - vetinari 9y ago
    While that's true, for the user, a review by a reviewer who is afraid to state his opinion or mention any negative in order to be invited again, is quite useless.
    - eli 9y ago
      It's hardly black and white. Some would argue that a review by a reviewer who got to use a hot new phone for free cannot be fair in the first place. It's one of the reasons Consumer Reports buys all of the things they test for full price at retail.
      - madeofpalk 9y ago
        > one of the reasons Consumer Reports buys all of the things they test for full price at retail. Does the reviewer personally pay for the device?
        PeterisP 9y ago
        The key part is not if they have to pay or not, but if the conditions of getting the phone or not can possibly be affected by the previous reviews. A reviewer who gets to use a phone for free provided by Apple understands that Apple might not "gift" the next phone if they don't like the review. A reviewer who gets to use a phone for free provided by their employer doesn't care about what Apple thinks, since Consumer Reports can and will buy the next phone for testing anyway under the same conditions as always.
  - ksk 9y ago
    Right, but people can and do use a company's legal actions to make moral judgements on them. If a web hosting company chose to give hosting space to a hate-group, people would be upset too. It's disappointing that Apple feels like they can bully people into only giving them favorable reviews.
    - eridius 9y ago
      I've seen reviewers say negative things about Apple products within the context of a review and still get future devices. I don't know what reviewer the parent was talking about, but if Apple thought their review was unfair, I see no problem with Apple deciding not to give that reviewer any more devices.
      - ksk 9y ago
        >but if Apple thought their review was unfair, I see no problem with Apple deciding not to give that reviewer any more devices. Sure, and other people can call it bullying. I guess we all agree then !!
        eridius 9y ago
        "Bullying" would be "you can't say anything negative". As I already said, I've seen reviewers say negative things and still get devices. There's a difference between saying negative things in a review, and writing an unfair review.
        ksk 9y ago
        You can still be a bully even if you do it 5% of the time. Its not all black, doesn't mean its white, and the reality is always grey. I'll concede that maybe at times, the reviewers are unfair, and at times Apple is unfair. We can judge it ourselves on a case by case basis. You can just as easily rush to point out "the person is within their rights to say this" just as "apple is within their rights to withold devices". I don't particularly feel the need to defend Apple (or any other giant corporation). They have people they pay for that.
oflannabhra 9y ago
Did they limit the reviewers time with the iPhone X? Or did they limit their time before the embargo lifted? Genuinely curious, some reviewers are saying they will update their “impressions” with full reviews.
- aetherson 9y ago
  Per the article, they usually give out review units at embargo time - 1 week, and instead they gave out review units at embargo time - 1 day (except to TechCrunch, Buzzfeed, and Mashable, plus some Youtubers, Axios, and Glamour).
- IBM 9y ago
  They gave them 24 hours until the embargo was lifted. I'm not sure why some blogs are upset about it though, because they could have waited however long they wanted before they published something. They clearly wanted in on the initial review traffic.
  - Skunkleton 9y ago
    That is the whole point. Most of these review sites are trying to run a business, so they need traffic. Launch day reviews are a huge source of traffic, so they need to 1) post as soon as the embargo is lifted, and 2) stay on apples good side so that they get early review units. The effect is that we aren't getting entirely honest reviews of apple products on launch day, and we probably aren't getting honest reviews afterwards from any site that depends on the traffic from early review units.
    - oflannabhra 9y ago
      Launch day is Friday. Most outlets will have had the phone for the whole week by then. I really don’t see how this results is consumers having less information. There is a 5-6 wait on any new iPhone X’s. If any issues arise, consumers will be able to cancel their orders free of charge.
slg 9y ago
My first thought is there are three possible explanations for this. 1. Apple is not concerned about increasing demand with reviews because there is already a backlog of orders that exceeds supply. This is similar to Tesla's anti-selling of the Model 3 in favor of a product that already has wide supply. 2. Apple was really making last minute hardware and software changes that prevented them from producing a large number of review units ahead of time. 3. Apple knows there are flaws in the phone and wants to limit the amount of time a reviewer might have in order to discover those flaws before the first publish date. Considering Apple's history, that they still provided week long review windows for a handful of sources, and none of those sources are particularly technical device reviewers, I would lean towards option 3. Is there any other possible explanation for this change?
- lolsal 9y ago
  I would say there may be many more possible explanations than you listed here. We cannot know, only speculate.
- IBM 9y ago
  The idea that anything reviewers write will have any measurable impact on iPhone sales is laughable. Can reviews or other media coverage kill a startup? Sure. It happened to Juicero. An Apple product is like a Star Wars movie, it doesn't matter what anyone writes, people are going to see it. Nobody really intermediates between Apple's relationship with customers, and that's been proven over and over again (most recently with The Verge's months long campaign painting the removal of the headphone jack as "user hostile").
  - slg 9y ago
    Will bad reviews kill an Apple/Star Wars release, obviously not. That however doesn't mean that reviews don't have any effect. Otherwise why would these companies go through the process of giving out review devices or holding critic screenings? Or why would all these reviews get so much traffic if their content had no effect on the reader's ultimate buying decision?
    - 9y ago
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
binaryapparatus 9y ago
John Gruber from daring fireball doesn't sound too happy about getting review unit after all those youtube "stars". > Thank god Apple seeded Mike Allen with an iPhone X review unit. Such great insight from his fucking nephew, the emoji expert.
- throwanem 9y ago
  John Gruber thinks a great deal of himself! I've never been quite sure why.
  - binaryapparatus 9y ago
    Agreed.
  - runjake 9y ago
    Because most of us tend to think a great deal about ourselves. The difference being: he has a lucrative, popular blog and we don't.
    - throwanem 9y ago
      I mind me of the fit he pitched over Atwood et al. attempting to bring some sanity to the farrago of Markdown variants a couple years back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8264733 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8264733 I'm glad his blog gets him paid! Everyone should have a way to make a good living. But I'm not sure why his blog getting him paid requires that I or anyone else take him as seriously as he so often seems to do.
- briandear 9y ago
  I don’t dislike Gruber, but has he earned the entitlement he seems to be suggesting? Gruber is very “inside baseball” — average consumers don’t really care about his opinion. Sure he’s “tech famous” but I don’t think anyone that isn’t already using an Apple product really cares what he thinks — and even most Apple users probably aren’t making a decision from a Gruber review.
Animats 9y ago
Whatever. It's been less than two months since the last Apple phone release. Are they trying to compete with the Sony Xperia line for number of slightly different models?
- Animats 9y ago
  Modded down to -4. Apple's PR operation is on the job.
lechiffre10 9y ago
This is the first time Apple has sent youtube personalities iPhone review units. In the Steve Jobs era, they would carefully select certain tech columnists. That coupled with limiting time for reviewers seems to be a desperate attempt at convincing people to buy the phone. The verge says FaceID is inconsistent in daylight and outside when beeing used.
- developer2 9y ago
  It's exactly this. YouTubers are being given phones to drum up some uneducated noise to dilute any criticism from technical reviews. YouTubers only care about view counts and their popularity, and most will just shout about how shiny it is without putting in any effort to find anything to criticize. Apple needs some hype to convince consumers that the iPhone X's notch design, and Face ID not working in sunlight or sitting on a flat surface, aren't deal breakers. That notch is the most gimmicky thing to ever make it past the concept phase for a modern phone. The tech reviews I've seen so far are showing off just how broken existing apps are because of the notch interfering. Of course all the "big player" apps will be fixed within 1-2 months, but there are thousands of apps that will never be updated to support the X's notch. Apple needs to figure out how to embed these components beneath the screen. Yes it will be an incredible technical challenge; but that's what we're really waiting for: 100% screen space. Until that is possible, they shouldn't have pushed such an unfinished concept as being "innovative".
davidf18 9y ago
The phone has the screen of the 8+ with the size of the 8 which makes phone far easier to manage than the 8+. The camera reviews are helpful -- tech crunch did a nice review at DisneyLand comparing the "X" camera with the 8+, including in low-light situations testing out stabilization. But most of these reviews have never reviewed what is most important to me which is the voice quality and signal quality using it as a phone. The iPhone X (and 8/8+) have EVS (Enhanced Voice Support) for the first time and for the moment only T-mobile supports it). How does EVS sound compared with EVS? When will Verizon/ATT, etc. be installing EVS? The iPhone has 4 microphones. One for voice, three for ambient noise for background noise cancellation. How well does this work compared with the previous model? Is the signal any better on this phone than preview models (My Verizon iPhone 7+ has trouble receiving LTE signal in some Manhattan office towers, dropping to 1X and 3G.
lostmsu 9y ago
Another way to grab some attention.

46 points by skue 9y ago

iPhone X reviews are expected to receive the largest audience, so Apple's strategy of starving time probably makes the reviewers be more favorable. I've also known a reviewer who got into Apple's "Shadow Ban" list for a negative review. In his case, Apple product reviews always garnered the largest audience, thereby impacting his bottom line.

eridius 9y ago
"Shadow Ban" seems like you're saying tech reviewers are entitled to being able to review Apple devices before they're released. But that's not true. Apple always seeds a limited number of devices (rather than giving one to anyone who claims to be a journalist), and it's their prerogative to give the devices to the reviewers of their choice.
- JustSomeNobody 9y ago
  Right, but if you don't go deep like Rene Ritchie does, you may not get invited again.
- vetinari 9y ago
  While that's true, for the user, a review by a reviewer who is afraid to state his opinion or mention any negative in order to be invited again, is quite useless.
  - eli 9y ago
    It's hardly black and white. Some would argue that a review by a reviewer who got to use a hot new phone for free cannot be fair in the first place. It's one of the reasons Consumer Reports buys all of the things they test for full price at retail.
    - madeofpalk 9y ago
      > one of the reasons Consumer Reports buys all of the things they test for full price at retail. Does the reviewer personally pay for the device?
      - PeterisP 9y ago
        The key part is not if they have to pay or not, but if the conditions of getting the phone or not can possibly be affected by the previous reviews. A reviewer who gets to use a phone for free provided by Apple understands that Apple might not "gift" the next phone if they don't like the review. A reviewer who gets to use a phone for free provided by their employer doesn't care about what Apple thinks, since Consumer Reports can and will buy the next phone for testing anyway under the same conditions as always.
- ksk 9y ago
  Right, but people can and do use a company's legal actions to make moral judgements on them. If a web hosting company chose to give hosting space to a hate-group, people would be upset too. It's disappointing that Apple feels like they can bully people into only giving them favorable reviews.
  - eridius 9y ago
    I've seen reviewers say negative things about Apple products within the context of a review and still get future devices. I don't know what reviewer the parent was talking about, but if Apple thought their review was unfair, I see no problem with Apple deciding not to give that reviewer any more devices.
    - ksk 9y ago
      >but if Apple thought their review was unfair, I see no problem with Apple deciding not to give that reviewer any more devices. Sure, and other people can call it bullying. I guess we all agree then !!
      - eridius 9y ago
        "Bullying" would be "you can't say anything negative". As I already said, I've seen reviewers say negative things and still get devices. There's a difference between saying negative things in a review, and writing an unfair review.
        ksk 9y ago
        You can still be a bully even if you do it 5% of the time. Its not all black, doesn't mean its white, and the reality is always grey. I'll concede that maybe at times, the reviewers are unfair, and at times Apple is unfair. We can judge it ourselves on a case by case basis. You can just as easily rush to point out "the person is within their rights to say this" just as "apple is within their rights to withold devices". I don't particularly feel the need to defend Apple (or any other giant corporation). They have people they pay for that.

oflannabhra 9y ago

Did they limit the reviewers time with the iPhone X? Or did they limit their time before the embargo lifted? Genuinely curious, some reviewers are saying they will update their “impressions” with full reviews.

aetherson 9y ago
Per the article, they usually give out review units at embargo time - 1 week, and instead they gave out review units at embargo time - 1 day (except to TechCrunch, Buzzfeed, and Mashable, plus some Youtubers, Axios, and Glamour).
IBM 9y ago
They gave them 24 hours until the embargo was lifted. I'm not sure why some blogs are upset about it though, because they could have waited however long they wanted before they published something. They clearly wanted in on the initial review traffic.
- Skunkleton 9y ago
  That is the whole point. Most of these review sites are trying to run a business, so they need traffic. Launch day reviews are a huge source of traffic, so they need to 1) post as soon as the embargo is lifted, and 2) stay on apples good side so that they get early review units. The effect is that we aren't getting entirely honest reviews of apple products on launch day, and we probably aren't getting honest reviews afterwards from any site that depends on the traffic from early review units.
  - oflannabhra 9y ago
    Launch day is Friday. Most outlets will have had the phone for the whole week by then. I really don’t see how this results is consumers having less information. There is a 5-6 wait on any new iPhone X’s. If any issues arise, consumers will be able to cancel their orders free of charge.

slg 9y ago

My first thought is there are three possible explanations for this. 1. Apple is not concerned about increasing demand with reviews because there is already a backlog of orders that exceeds supply. This is similar to Tesla's anti-selling of the Model 3 in favor of a product that already has wide supply. 2. Apple was really making last minute hardware and software changes that prevented them from producing a large number of review units ahead of time. 3. Apple knows there are flaws in the phone and wants to limit the amount of time a reviewer might have in order to discover those flaws before the first publish date. Considering Apple's history, that they still provided week long review windows for a handful of sources, and none of those sources are particularly technical device reviewers, I would lean towards option 3. Is there any other possible explanation for this change?

lolsal 9y ago
I would say there may be many more possible explanations than you listed here. We cannot know, only speculate.
IBM 9y ago
The idea that anything reviewers write will have any measurable impact on iPhone sales is laughable. Can reviews or other media coverage kill a startup? Sure. It happened to Juicero. An Apple product is like a Star Wars movie, it doesn't matter what anyone writes, people are going to see it. Nobody really intermediates between Apple's relationship with customers, and that's been proven over and over again (most recently with The Verge's months long campaign painting the removal of the headphone jack as "user hostile").
- slg 9y ago
  Will bad reviews kill an Apple/Star Wars release, obviously not. That however doesn't mean that reviews don't have any effect. Otherwise why would these companies go through the process of giving out review devices or holding critic screenings? Or why would all these reviews get so much traffic if their content had no effect on the reader's ultimate buying decision?
  - 9y ago

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

binaryapparatus 9y ago

John Gruber from daring fireball doesn't sound too happy about getting review unit after all those youtube "stars". > Thank god Apple seeded Mike Allen with an iPhone X review unit. Such great insight from his fucking nephew, the emoji expert.

throwanem 9y ago
John Gruber thinks a great deal of himself! I've never been quite sure why.
- binaryapparatus 9y ago
  Agreed.
- runjake 9y ago
  Because most of us tend to think a great deal about ourselves. The difference being: he has a lucrative, popular blog and we don't.
  - throwanem 9y ago
    I mind me of the fit he pitched over Atwood et al. attempting to bring some sanity to the farrago of Markdown variants a couple years back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8264733 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8264733 I'm glad his blog gets him paid! Everyone should have a way to make a good living. But I'm not sure why his blog getting him paid requires that I or anyone else take him as seriously as he so often seems to do.
briandear 9y ago
I don’t dislike Gruber, but has he earned the entitlement he seems to be suggesting? Gruber is very “inside baseball” — average consumers don’t really care about his opinion. Sure he’s “tech famous” but I don’t think anyone that isn’t already using an Apple product really cares what he thinks — and even most Apple users probably aren’t making a decision from a Gruber review.

Animats 9y ago

Whatever. It's been less than two months since the last Apple phone release. Are they trying to compete with the Sony Xperia line for number of slightly different models?

Animats 9y ago
Modded down to -4. Apple's PR operation is on the job.

lechiffre10 9y ago

This is the first time Apple has sent youtube personalities iPhone review units. In the Steve Jobs era, they would carefully select certain tech columnists. That coupled with limiting time for reviewers seems to be a desperate attempt at convincing people to buy the phone. The verge says FaceID is inconsistent in daylight and outside when beeing used.

developer2 9y ago
It's exactly this. YouTubers are being given phones to drum up some uneducated noise to dilute any criticism from technical reviews. YouTubers only care about view counts and their popularity, and most will just shout about how shiny it is without putting in any effort to find anything to criticize. Apple needs some hype to convince consumers that the iPhone X's notch design, and Face ID not working in sunlight or sitting on a flat surface, aren't deal breakers. That notch is the most gimmicky thing to ever make it past the concept phase for a modern phone. The tech reviews I've seen so far are showing off just how broken existing apps are because of the notch interfering. Of course all the "big player" apps will be fixed within 1-2 months, but there are thousands of apps that will never be updated to support the X's notch. Apple needs to figure out how to embed these components beneath the screen. Yes it will be an incredible technical challenge; but that's what we're really waiting for: 100% screen space. Until that is possible, they shouldn't have pushed such an unfinished concept as being "innovative".

davidf18 9y ago

The phone has the screen of the 8+ with the size of the 8 which makes phone far easier to manage than the 8+. The camera reviews are helpful -- tech crunch did a nice review at DisneyLand comparing the "X" camera with the 8+, including in low-light situations testing out stabilization. But most of these reviews have never reviewed what is most important to me which is the voice quality and signal quality using it as a phone. The iPhone X (and 8/8+) have EVS (Enhanced Voice Support) for the first time and for the moment only T-mobile supports it). How does EVS sound compared with EVS? When will Verizon/ATT, etc. be installing EVS? The iPhone has 4 microphones. One for voice, three for ambient noise for background noise cancellation. How well does this work compared with the previous model? Is the signal any better on this phone than preview models (My Verizon iPhone 7+ has trouble receiving LTE signal in some Manhattan office towers, dropping to 1X and 3G.

lostmsu 9y ago

Another way to grab some attention.