4 ms·

Amazon reviews are about as useful as Youtube comments. You can read them for entertainment but don't expect anything useful about the product, and don't base

Amazon reviews are about as useful as Youtube comments. You can read them for entertainment but don't expect anything useful about the product, and don't base a purchase decision on them.

tjoff 6y ago
Youtube comments are actually decent now, with a very low bar for decent at least. Also depending on the type of video/target audience of course. That google managed to improve them so much is likely their biggest achievement I can think of in many years.
- oblio 6y ago
  It's a very low bar. The original, unfiltered ones were Chernobyl + WW1 trenches. Now they've just manure.
MichaelApproved 6y ago
Not entirely true. Yes, Amazon is flooded with fake reviews but I still look through them. Photos and videos in reviews are extremely helpful. There are also many in-depth reviews that are trustworthy.
- alkonaut 6y ago
  You implictly assume that you'll receive a similar product to the one people reviewed or photographed. Without that assumption, a lot is lost. Under that assumption, I agree. If you trust the seller, then you can probably also trust the reviews of the kind you mention (e.g. product photos). The problem occurs when you want to use the reviews to determine whether to trust the seller, not the product.
jmeister 6y ago
Hyperbole. I’ve been reading book reviews on Amazon before buying, on-site or somewhere else, for ~15 years. I’ve almost never seen an item with unhelpful reviews.
- alkonaut 6y ago
  > Hyperbole Fwiw, I completely agree!
- _emacsomancer_ 6y ago
  I think book reviews (and presumably music, movie reviews) are going to be quite a bit different from other sorts of product reviews, for obvious reasons.
GavinMcG 6y ago
I always look at negative reviews. From those you can tell if there's a consistent concern, if someone got a fake, or if there was just a preference mismatch for someone.
- whatisthiseven 6y ago
  This also used to be my strategy, but now I am concerned that competing brands are sabotaging each other by just leaving poor 1-star reviews. I say this as I have read some low reviews that just made no sense, or didn't reference aspects of the product that existed. I still trust 1-star reviews more than 5-star, but I don't take them as gospel. As you said, if there is a consistent message across all the negative reviews from a mix of reviewer types, then it strengthens the signal quality. Buying online sucks :(
  - exhilaration 6y ago
    I find the 3-4 star reviews the most helpful. I feel like the positive fake reviews are all 5 stars (based on what the little notes I get in my Amazon packages, the vendors will only reward you for 5 star reviews) and I'm guessing the negative fake reviews are all 1 star. So that leaves those reviews in the middle as the only ones worth paying attention to.
  - ve55 6y ago
    I came up with this as well. My strategy for products was often to read 1-star reviews, and there were often two cases: 1) The reviews are low-quality and not indicative of much, so there are few legitimate complaints, or 2) The reviews showcase a significant problem with the product alongside proof, and/or are often made by intelligent consumers After enough time doing this with success, I've started to see many more 1-star reviews on products that get highly upvoted until they're the 'top review(s)', which don't really contain anything useful at all. They try to appear like they are an instance of 2), but often offer little evidence or quality argumentation. I imagine it's easy to upvote 1/-star reviews on competitors' products to drive a lot of their traffic elsewhere instead. At this point I would love having a review system that is curated to only be from people I like/trust, but that is another whole story and ecosystem of course.

Amazon reviews are about as useful as Youtube comments. You can read them for entertainment but don't expect anything useful about the product, and don't base a purchase decision on them.

tjoff 6y ago

Youtube comments are actually decent now, with a very low bar for decent at least. Also depending on the type of video/target audience of course. That google managed to improve them so much is likely their biggest achievement I can think of in many years.

oblio 6y ago
It's a very low bar. The original, unfiltered ones were Chernobyl + WW1 trenches. Now they've just manure.

MichaelApproved 6y ago

Not entirely true. Yes, Amazon is flooded with fake reviews but I still look through them. Photos and videos in reviews are extremely helpful. There are also many in-depth reviews that are trustworthy.

alkonaut 6y ago
You implictly assume that you'll receive a similar product to the one people reviewed or photographed. Without that assumption, a lot is lost. Under that assumption, I agree. If you trust the seller, then you can probably also trust the reviews of the kind you mention (e.g. product photos). The problem occurs when you want to use the reviews to determine whether to trust the seller, not the product.

jmeister 6y ago

Hyperbole. I’ve been reading book reviews on Amazon before buying, on-site or somewhere else, for ~15 years. I’ve almost never seen an item with unhelpful reviews.

alkonaut 6y ago
> Hyperbole Fwiw, I completely agree!
_emacsomancer_ 6y ago
I think book reviews (and presumably music, movie reviews) are going to be quite a bit different from other sorts of product reviews, for obvious reasons.

GavinMcG 6y ago

I always look at negative reviews. From those you can tell if there's a consistent concern, if someone got a fake, or if there was just a preference mismatch for someone.

whatisthiseven 6y ago
This also used to be my strategy, but now I am concerned that competing brands are sabotaging each other by just leaving poor 1-star reviews. I say this as I have read some low reviews that just made no sense, or didn't reference aspects of the product that existed. I still trust 1-star reviews more than 5-star, but I don't take them as gospel. As you said, if there is a consistent message across all the negative reviews from a mix of reviewer types, then it strengthens the signal quality. Buying online sucks :(
- exhilaration 6y ago
  I find the 3-4 star reviews the most helpful. I feel like the positive fake reviews are all 5 stars (based on what the little notes I get in my Amazon packages, the vendors will only reward you for 5 star reviews) and I'm guessing the negative fake reviews are all 1 star. So that leaves those reviews in the middle as the only ones worth paying attention to.
- ve55 6y ago
  I came up with this as well. My strategy for products was often to read 1-star reviews, and there were often two cases: 1) The reviews are low-quality and not indicative of much, so there are few legitimate complaints, or 2) The reviews showcase a significant problem with the product alongside proof, and/or are often made by intelligent consumers After enough time doing this with success, I've started to see many more 1-star reviews on products that get highly upvoted until they're the 'top review(s)', which don't really contain anything useful at all. They try to appear like they are an instance of 2), but often offer little evidence or quality argumentation. I imagine it's easy to upvote 1/-star reviews on competitors' products to drive a lot of their traffic elsewhere instead. At this point I would love having a review system that is curated to only be from people I like/trust, but that is another whole story and ecosystem of course.