5 ms·

I wish there was a concept of paid expert reviews on Amazon/everywhere. A general review system works well (ignoring review gaming) when your concern is "Does t

by arijun 2y ago

I wish there was a concept of paid expert reviews on Amazon/everywhere. A general review system works well (ignoring review gaming) when your concern is "Does this shirt fit?" or "What's the build quality?", but fails when one expert review of "This device is fundamentally unsound," gets drowned out by reviews on the more easily testable aspects ("The band is really comfortable!"). A great example would be when Benson Leung was testing USB-C cables on Amazon to see which were standards compliant.

ge96 2y ago
In my experience too when posting a negative review it can get removed (this was about replacement batteries for lenovo laptops).
- fph 2y ago
  We need to use Unicode steganography to hide the message "this smartwatch sucks" into an innocent-looking review.
  - scblock 2y ago
    How does this help anyone?
    - gr3ml1n 2y ago
      The suggestion is that negative reviews are suppressed. Communicating a negative review through a facially positive review would help avoid that.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - 6LLvveMx2koXfwn 2y ago
        But this is a negative review that is literally not hidden, to the extent that it is being discussed openly on a site about a completely unrelated topic.
  - redleader55 2y ago
    Apparently something similar is used by Chinese customers reviewing restaurants. They would make a food sign from food pieces that spells "crap food" in slang, but otherwise leave a stellar review for the restaurant.
    - barbazoo 2y ago
      It sounds like they're hesitant to leave a bad review, why is that?
- DecentShoes 2y ago
  I had a review removed on Amazon for mentioning that the company bribed me for a fake positive review.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
HnUser12 2y ago
Isn’t amazon vine paid review?
- CrazyStat 2y ago
  Vine is compensated with free products to review, but I don’t think they’re paid beyond that. They are also not experts, generally.
  - HnUser12 2y ago
    Ah ok, thanks!
michaelt 2y ago
I considered doing this once, a few years ago, but I couldn't figure out a way to make it work. It's pretty frustrating that when you're shopping for a laptop, nobody can tell you it'll suspend properly under Linux. Or when you're shopping for a bike light nobody can tell you whether over the summer it'll self-discharge to the point it bricks itself due to cell imbalance. Or when you're shopping for a microsd card, nobody can tell you.... you get the picture. But to produce honest reviews, I couldn't accept free review units, kickbacks or affiliate money. And people shopping for laptops and bike lights don't need a $$$-per-month subscription to my newsletter/channel/patreon, they just need a few yes-or-no answers. And there's a huge amount of churn in products on sites like Amazon; you wouldn't just pay for 40 bike lights, review them all, and solve the problem forever. Different models and brands appear all the time. And even then, just because when I reviewed that microsd card and found it had great performance, nothing stops the manufacturer substituting cheaper components later on, without changing the part number; it's not like there was a specification promising the performance I observed in my review.
- mansandersson 2y ago
  I get your point. But ever so often you stumble upon someone actually doing exactly that within their particular interest domain, such as the guy in Netherlands who buys and tests bike lights https://swhs.home.xs4all.nl/fiets/tests/verlichting/index_en.html https://swhs.home.xs4all.nl/fiets/tests/verlichting/index_en...
ThinkingGuy 2y ago
TornadoGuard: https://xkcd.com/937/ https://xkcd.com/937/
thrownblown 2y ago
Project Farm!
- pirates 2y ago
  Seconding this, Project Farm absolutely rules. I’m not the target demographic for probably half the stuff he reviews but I’m always impressed with his videos. That said I’m a little curious if any kind of Gell-Mann effect is going on since he never reviews products that I already have extensive experience with. I’m wondering if anyone has watched any of his reviews and came away feeling like he did a really poor job.
WorldMaker 2y ago
Find a business model for Consumer Reports that better fits this century and add things that should be obvious like "Search by ASIN" to their website?

by arijun 2y ago

ge96 2y ago

In my experience too when posting a negative review it can get removed (this was about replacement batteries for lenovo laptops).

fph 2y ago
We need to use Unicode steganography to hide the message "this smartwatch sucks" into an innocent-looking review.
- scblock 2y ago
  How does this help anyone?
  - gr3ml1n 2y ago
    The suggestion is that negative reviews are suppressed. Communicating a negative review through a facially positive review would help avoid that.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - 6LLvveMx2koXfwn 2y ago
      But this is a negative review that is literally not hidden, to the extent that it is being discussed openly on a site about a completely unrelated topic.
- redleader55 2y ago
  Apparently something similar is used by Chinese customers reviewing restaurants. They would make a food sign from food pieces that spells "crap food" in slang, but otherwise leave a stellar review for the restaurant.
  - barbazoo 2y ago
    It sounds like they're hesitant to leave a bad review, why is that?
DecentShoes 2y ago
I had a review removed on Amazon for mentioning that the company bribed me for a fake positive review.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

HnUser12 2y ago

Isn’t amazon vine paid review?

CrazyStat 2y ago
Vine is compensated with free products to review, but I don’t think they’re paid beyond that. They are also not experts, generally.
- HnUser12 2y ago
  Ah ok, thanks!

michaelt 2y ago

I considered doing this once, a few years ago, but I couldn't figure out a way to make it work. It's pretty frustrating that when you're shopping for a laptop, nobody can tell you it'll suspend properly under Linux. Or when you're shopping for a bike light nobody can tell you whether over the summer it'll self-discharge to the point it bricks itself due to cell imbalance. Or when you're shopping for a microsd card, nobody can tell you.... you get the picture. But to produce honest reviews, I couldn't accept free review units, kickbacks or affiliate money. And people shopping for laptops and bike lights don't need a $$$-per-month subscription to my newsletter/channel/patreon, they just need a few yes-or-no answers. And there's a huge amount of churn in products on sites like Amazon; you wouldn't just pay for 40 bike lights, review them all, and solve the problem forever. Different models and brands appear all the time. And even then, just because when I reviewed that microsd card and found it had great performance, nothing stops the manufacturer substituting cheaper components later on, without changing the part number; it's not like there was a specification promising the performance I observed in my review.

mansandersson 2y ago
I get your point. But ever so often you stumble upon someone actually doing exactly that within their particular interest domain, such as the guy in Netherlands who buys and tests bike lights https://swhs.home.xs4all.nl/fiets/tests/verlichting/index_en.html https://swhs.home.xs4all.nl/fiets/tests/verlichting/index_en...

ThinkingGuy 2y ago

TornadoGuard: https://xkcd.com/937/ https://xkcd.com/937/

thrownblown 2y ago

Project Farm!

pirates 2y ago
Seconding this, Project Farm absolutely rules. I’m not the target demographic for probably half the stuff he reviews but I’m always impressed with his videos. That said I’m a little curious if any kind of Gell-Mann effect is going on since he never reviews products that I already have extensive experience with. I’m wondering if anyone has watched any of his reviews and came away feeling like he did a really poor job.

WorldMaker 2y ago

Find a business model for Consumer Reports that better fits this century and add things that should be obvious like "Search by ASIN" to their website?