5 ms·
> “Why do you think any of the reviews on Amazon are real?” Because they contain facts which anchor them to reality and act as “proof of work” in some way. I
by jodrellblank 6y ago
> “Why do you think any of the reviews on Amazon are real?”
Because they contain facts which anchor them to reality and act as “proof of work” in some way.
I don’t care for a review which says “this camera takes amazing pictures” that could apply to any camera and is subjective, but one which says “the cover on the sd card slot is sharp and cut my finger twice” is likely someone who has used that specific camera, and has a specific comment, and while it could be faked - why would it be? Like the difference between house adverts that say “cozy kitchen” vs “marble countertops”, didn’t Freakonomics find that specifics increase value more than generalities because people know what a marble countertop is but a cozy kitchen is filler when there’s nothing good to say.
- PoignardAzur 6y agoYeah, that's my heuristic too, but I'm worried it's going to get increasingly gamed as time goes on. Especially since, you know, GTP-3 is a thing, and its effects are going to be felt pretty soon.
- thw0rted 6y agoI think you've got the right idea. It's about incentives. With fake positive reviews, the seller has an incentive to leave them up, and Amazon has no particular incentive to remove them -- you, a random user, has to somehow convince Amazon to take them down. With fake negative reviews, the seller has an incentive to get them taken down, and has the data to prove that the reviewer didn't actually buy the item. (Actually buying all your competitor's items to leave fake negative reviews about them would dramatically increase the cost of the tactic.) End result: ignore positive reviews because they're easily faked, check negative reviews because they're probably accurate.