What Smell?

There’s an ongoing soap opera between one website and ATI public relations over who gets to go to what and under what conditions.

I’m not going to even bother linking to the complaining, because it’s a waste of time. You read for a while, then you give up, because no one comes across too admirably.

One can nitpick as to which act or actor is worse than another, but it’s like picking out the grossest turd in the middle of a sewer. The whole system stinks; it’s not just one or a few companies/websites.

The sad reality of the review process is that it is mostly and merely a corporate marketing tool hiding behind a facade of independence.

The independence is a facade because one party is much stronger than the other. So long as the corporation can effectively shut a media outlet down by withholding product, comment by that media will be generally be compromised.

Imagine the New York Times theatre critic being banned for six months from Broadway due to a bad review. Imagine the New York Times being banned from the White House because the lead correspondent chose not to attend a particular briefing.

You don’t see such things happening simply because the New York Times is too big to be shut down that way. Indeed, if such a thing were to happen, even their competitors would scream bloody murder, simply due to “Today, them; tomorrow, me.”

The playing field is much less level here.

The Subtle Slants

It’s not that every review is doomed to be a fanboy article. Any public relations unit worth it’s weight knows that a little occasional criticism must be tolerated to allow for credibility in some circles, just as any good special interest group realizes that a politician they back will not vote for their side every single time.

No, it’s often more subtle than that. You find the corporate effect in tone, in spin, in providing a positive sound bite whether deserved or not.

And mind you, this happens even when not a single word is exchanged about the matter. When you figuratively bring an 800-pound gorilla into the room for a meeting, you don’t have to tell the other participant(s), “He can kill you.”

People self-censor; they tone down the negative and emphasize the positive. A few even seem to write in a sort of code inbetween the lines of a review to indicate to the more astute what the reviewer really thinks of the product.

It’s no wonder that many readers confine themselves to just look at the numbers (and well, that’s just a different field of manipulation).

And yes, occasionally someone may delude himself into thinking he’s a gorilla, too, and start threatening the gorilla, but that’s like getting high, climbing into the gorilla cage, and start punching. Natural selection tends to take care of such folks.

The Solution We’ll Never See

The only way you’ll get truly independent reviews will be for the corporations to cut out the samples, and let anybody who reviews the product buy the thing.

Unfortunately, the universe won’t be around long enough for us to see this happen voluntarily.

The corporations will never say yes because this will cut off their left marketing genital. They don’t want honesty; they want sales.

The reviewers will never say yes because it will put most of them out of business.

Most importantly, though, most in the audience don’t seem to particularly care. A large proportion of the sales aren’t rational to begin with; if you buy on fantasy or allegiance, what do you care about reality?

One could always set up something like a Consumer Reports, a place that buys all its equipment, but realistically, you’d have to pay for the reviews, and they’ll always show up later than the corporate sponsored blurbs.

One could legislate a better system, but really, what government is going to do that?

Ultimately, one gets the system one deserves, and so long as the audience accepts what we have today, that’s what we’ll keep getting.

You can’t clean out the stables when the inhabitants look at you funny and say, “What smell?”

Ed

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Avatar of Sentential
Sentential

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I actually do that when I have an in-forum review but I have to admit... it gets pricey *really* quick. People often wonder why I go thru so much hardware. Its simply because I couldnt afford to do such reviews without selling the merch quickly there after

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rhino56

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nice article. is that written by the famous Talking Ed? lol j/k

how many bad reviews do you see on computer components? yet every other posts is help my this or that is messed up. there are quite a few products that are less than they claim to be.

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9mmCensor

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The state in which reviews are done for the most part is quite poor.

There are 3 camps I see of reviewers.

1) Reviewers who dont know what they are doing. They dont have the technical know how to do a good review of a product, and their results blow. Dont assume that a well _written_ review cannot be technically done poorly, sometimes a very well written review masks the BS results. Also included in this to some extent is reviewers how dont have the proper equipment to do a decent job.
2) Reviewers who may know how to do a good review and have the means to do so, but dont always do so. These are the people that manipulate data, testing, and use well crafted persausive arguments, to enhance the review. They keep the good reviews going, so the review samples keep flowing.
3) Reviewers who know what they are talking about, have the right equipment and use it properly, and are honest. These are good reviewers. Unfourtunately they are rare.

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rhino56

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The state in which reviews are done for the most part is quite poor.

There are 3 camps I see of reviewers.

1) Reviewers who dont know what they are doing. They dont have the technical know how to do a good review of a product, and their results blow. Dont assume that a well _written_ review cannot be technically done poorly, sometimes a very well written review masks the BS results. Also included in this to some extent is reviewers how dont have the proper equipment to do a decent job.
2) Reviewers who may know how to do a good review and have the means to do so, but dont always do so. These are the people that manipulate data, testing, and use well crafted persausive arguments, to enhance the review. They keep the good reviews going, so the review samples keep flowing.
3) Reviewers who know what they are talking about, have the right equipment and use it properly, and are honest. These are good reviewers. Unfourtunately they are rare.

as is honesty these days

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Audioaficionado

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12,385 messages 31 likes

I never buy solely based on some review sites recomendation. I also read a lot of user forum reviews. The user reviews will show all the problems and gottachs the site reviews leave out.

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rhino56

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i think this is an interesting read regarding the ethics of some reviewers
review
http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/article/1813.1/

http://www.beyond3d.com/forum/showthread.php?t=23662

just shameful :eh?:

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BBigJ

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I'm scared to ask this (because I might go look), but where is the soap opera Ed talks about?

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HousERaT

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I actually do that when I have an in-forum review but I have to admit... it gets pricey *really* quick. People often wonder why I go thru so much hardware. Its simply because I couldnt afford to do such reviews without selling the merch quickly there after

People who've read your reviews know they are very much based in reality and people who buy retail are likely to have the same experiences you do. I wish I could read most reviews with the same kind of confidence.

on a side note...... when I purchase new products I generally do a review on it, especially if the info for such product is limited. It would be great if everyone got into the act of doing such things. I really put a bit of stock into forum reviews..... especially from my mates here. ;)

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orionlion82

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I'm scared to ask this (because I might go look), but where is the soap opera Ed talks about?

umm, i think i saw something funny on _______ *

*now what sort of minds desire to know?

anyways, hes right, its bad, its not getting better, and naming names does nothing, except maybe draw him into the nonsense, and thats why were not gonna say it outright; hes got enough to be grumpy about allready.

what does that mean?
its much worse than you think, its gonna get even worse, and its pointless to worry about it, because nothing is going to change anytime soon.

why should you care?
any brand name you see on the internet is likely followed by a carefully controlled sales pitch , weather you want it or not.
disguise words such as "review" and "objective" and "fair" even "independant" are now to be understood as the opposite of their conventional values.

"but.... but... this is terrible! how could this ever happen? its not fair! we might be lead astray by clever PR/marketing departments - and buy bogus stuff!"

yup. thats the point. ...get a helmut.

"we should be protected against this sort of thing by the govern-..."

i think the lesson of recent events should not be lost -
who's gonna protect you again?
*ahem* thats enough of that.....

the point is, that this is capatilisim in action.
things will only be *fair* and warm and fuzzy
when *fair, warm and fuzzy* = profitable-
no matter who is charged with protecting the integrity of the system.

malware is not fair - but it is profitable, so it exists, however in a slightly different way.

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BigDan3131

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I think we missed one type of reviewer the one one who works for the site selling it to get more " cough " suckers to buy it.

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