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Aren’t amazon reviews one of the most gamed review system ever? Also, stock co-mingling. That alone makes me buy as little from amazon and as much from elsewhe

Aren’t amazon reviews one of the most gamed review system ever? Also, stock co-mingling. That alone makes me buy as little from amazon and as much from elsewhere as I can.

Semaphor 6y ago
There are far fewer fake reviews at amazon.de (well, compared to what I read on HN) and surprisingly many that are high quality. I think it might be partially because the reviews would need to be in German so you have fewer low-cost ways to have them created. And I’m not sure we have co-mingling here because I never heard of the problems that seem to be common in the US (/ on HN) with it and also never experienced it myself (I spend around 2.200 € on Amazon per year)
- AnssiH 6y ago
  > I’m not sure we have co-mingling here We do, the seller setting for that ("Barcode preference") is there in the Seller Central Europe and the help text explicitly talks about commingling.
  - Semaphor 6y ago
    Thanks. Do you know why the counterfeit problem does not seem as much of a problem here?
    - AnssiH 6y ago
      No idea. I haven't experienced that either and I use amazon.de a lot. I've had one item sold by Amazon as new that was clearly a fraud return, though, i.e. the item inside the product package was switched for a different model.
    - shajznnckfke 6y ago
      I think HN commenters also overstate the problem. I’m in the US, use Amazon a lot, and haven’t noticed counterfeits. Maybe I’m just bad at identifying them. I think it’s the type of issue where it would be a major problem for the producer of a specific product that got ripped off, and any customers who are fans of that product, but may never affect the average buyer.
    - savanaly 6y ago
      I live in the US and out of hundreds (thousands?) of purchases only one or two have made me question if they were counterfeit, and even those worked well enough and I didn't return them. There may be a selection bias in the comments you read because the countless people like me never post their experience and the 0.001% who unluckily were repeatedly sold counterfeit will likely post about it.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
wasmitnetzen 6y ago
I feel like to stock co-mingling issue is far less pronounced in Europe compared to what the American crowd here on HN says. I live in Europe, and never got a fake product from Amazon.
- tomduncalf 6y ago
  Just as another data point, same here in the UK and i buy quite a lot of things from there
- wdb 6y ago
  I have received a few fake products from Amazon UK. Most of them were counterfeit books though
Bayart 6y ago
It's less of an issue on the EU side of Amazon. The search engine being cluttered by Chinese shit is just as bad, though.
- jxramos 6y ago
  That cluttering and dumping of tons of similar indistinguishable products under different sellers really annoys me. Another annoyance even when I do shop in those redundant product categories is that they don't even upload reallife photos of their products but these lowsy idealized CGI photos that give no sense to the quality or actual appearance of the item.

Aren’t amazon reviews one of the most gamed review system ever? Also, stock co-mingling. That alone makes me buy as little from amazon and as much from elsewhere as I can.

Semaphor 6y ago

There are far fewer fake reviews at amazon.de (well, compared to what I read on HN) and surprisingly many that are high quality. I think it might be partially because the reviews would need to be in German so you have fewer low-cost ways to have them created. And I’m not sure we have co-mingling here because I never heard of the problems that seem to be common in the US (/ on HN) with it and also never experienced it myself (I spend around 2.200 € on Amazon per year)

AnssiH 6y ago
> I’m not sure we have co-mingling here We do, the seller setting for that ("Barcode preference") is there in the Seller Central Europe and the help text explicitly talks about commingling.
- Semaphor 6y ago
  Thanks. Do you know why the counterfeit problem does not seem as much of a problem here?
  - AnssiH 6y ago
    No idea. I haven't experienced that either and I use amazon.de a lot. I've had one item sold by Amazon as new that was clearly a fraud return, though, i.e. the item inside the product package was switched for a different model.
  - shajznnckfke 6y ago
    I think HN commenters also overstate the problem. I’m in the US, use Amazon a lot, and haven’t noticed counterfeits. Maybe I’m just bad at identifying them. I think it’s the type of issue where it would be a major problem for the producer of a specific product that got ripped off, and any customers who are fans of that product, but may never affect the average buyer.
  - savanaly 6y ago
    I live in the US and out of hundreds (thousands?) of purchases only one or two have made me question if they were counterfeit, and even those worked well enough and I didn't return them. There may be a selection bias in the comments you read because the countless people like me never post their experience and the 0.001% who unluckily were repeatedly sold counterfeit will likely post about it.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]

wasmitnetzen 6y ago

I feel like to stock co-mingling issue is far less pronounced in Europe compared to what the American crowd here on HN says. I live in Europe, and never got a fake product from Amazon.

tomduncalf 6y ago
Just as another data point, same here in the UK and i buy quite a lot of things from there
wdb 6y ago
I have received a few fake products from Amazon UK. Most of them were counterfeit books though

Bayart 6y ago

It's less of an issue on the EU side of Amazon. The search engine being cluttered by Chinese shit is just as bad, though.

jxramos 6y ago
That cluttering and dumping of tons of similar indistinguishable products under different sellers really annoys me. Another annoyance even when I do shop in those redundant product categories is that they don't even upload reallife photos of their products but these lowsy idealized CGI photos that give no sense to the quality or actual appearance of the item.